Congress punts again.

Congress passed a "continuing resolution" last night.  Rather than perform its Constitutional role of  allocating Federal funds to needed programs, it punted.  The continuing resolution says in effect, "All you bureaucrats can keep on spending money the way you did last year."  
   No killing of wasteful and unneeded programs.  No new programs.  Stasis, nothing changes.  With the economy headed for the rocks,  Congress says "Steady as she goes.  Full steam ahead."
   In stead of passing departmental appropriation bills like its is supposed to, Congress has spent its time threatening to shut down the government, investigating Hillary's email, passing highway bills, and general purpose bloviating.
   Way to go Congress Critters.

How to prevent a Government Shutdown

Simple.  Pass some appropriation bills.  They way it ought to be, and the way it used to be, Congress would pass bills appropriating money for each department of the executive, State, Defense, Treasury, NASA, Energy, Commerce, and so on.  If  appropriations for one department failed to pass, the rest of the government could keep on running.
   In the last 10-15 years Congress has been unable to pass appropriation bills.  At the 11th hour Congress will pass one single humungous bill that funds everything.  This trick neuters Congressional power of the purse.  You can't refuse to fund objectionable programs because the only way to do it is shut the entire government down, which is perilous.  Last time Newt Gengrich tried it, he was blamed for intransigence and driven from the speakership and from the House.  We don't have anyone in Congress anymore with the kind of stones Newt Gengrich had.  Newt was something of a loose cannon, but he had guts.  Congress won't do a government shutdown over Obama Care this time.  No guts.
    What they ought to do is pass appropriation bills for every department EXCEPT Obama care.  The house has the votes.  The Senate could be wooed into passing reasonable appropriation bills, especially if they were skillfully larded with pork.  If Obama vetoes them, then he looks intransigent.   Then we could keep the government alive, and Obamacare unfunded.
 

Talking the talk. Not walking much

The talk is about getting the president to "reduce spending"  and the Senate to "pass a budget".  Neither of these activities means much to us taxpayers.   Congress used to pass appropriations bills, one for each major department.  Such a bill  reads "the so-and-so department may spend so many billion dollars in this fiscal year".  The way to "reduce spending" is to appropriate less money.  So far no talk about appropriations bills at all, let alone reducing their size. 
  In fact, passing appropriations bills got so difficult in years past that Congress gave up attempting it.  Each bill would trigger a big time fight between those who wanted more money for their pet programs and those who wanted to cut spending.  The fights got so bad that the fiscal year would be over and no appropriations bills passed. 
   In order the keep the government running, it became customary to pass "continuing resolutions", bills reading "Your department may continue spending at last year's level." 
   In order to actually cut spending, Congress, not the president, must pass appropriations bills or continuing resolutions reading "your depart gets less money that it got last year".  That's the walk.  So far it's all talk, no walk.
  The Republicans in Congress are as bad as the Democrats in just talking the talk
  Think about voting a straight Tea Party ticket.