Congressman Confronts Park Ranger

[Panacea]

Panacea, one minor correction: Congress has already voted that when the shutdown ends, the staff get back pay.

I stand corrected; I thought Congress hadn't passed that bill yet.

[Barracuda]

Oh look, more NPS political games BS.

Privately funded site ordered to close, may never open again thanks to NPS order

Despite being completely and totally funded by private sources, the Claude Moore Colonial Farm was suddenly shut down by NPS goons as "part of the shutdown", despite having never been subject to previous shutdowns. As a result, the site has already lost $20,000 of likely revenue and may get so far behind on revenue from visitors that it may never re-open (since of course, the government is unlikely to cover THEIR back expenses.)

[Hyena Dandy]

How many times do you need to read the words “emergencies involving the safety of human life or the protection of property” before you can figure out what they mean? Would a dictionary help?

[Duelist925]

How many times do you need to read the words “emergencies involving the safety of human life or the protection of property” before you can figure out what they mean? Would a dictionary help?

Ahh, but my good Yena, Faux News said it, so it must be true! After all, they're Fair and Balanced(tm)!

[Rapscallion]

Any independent verification of this? If it's not a governmental body, the officials should have left it alone, right?

Aha! Nothing but a biased source, reading it, but it's on federal land and already opened once more.

Rapscallion

[Panacea]

Oh look, more NPS political games BS.

Privately funded site ordered to close, may never open again thanks to NPS order

Despite being completely and totally funded by private sources, the Claude Moore Colonial Farm was suddenly shut down by NPS goons as "part of the shutdown", despite having never been subject to previous shutdowns. As a result, the site has already lost $20,000 of likely revenue and may get so far behind on revenue from visitors that it may never re-open (since of course, the government is unlikely to cover THEIR back expenses.)

The Farm is on FEDERAL land! What part of SHUTDOWN don't you get? This park is just like every other park being forced to shut down.

Yes, it sucks. Yes, it hurts. But the NPS are doing their jobs, the job CONGRESS told them to do when they shut down the government.

If you want to blame someone, blame the Tea Party. They forced the shutdown in the first place, in a completely unnecessary fight over the ACA that they KNEW they would lose.

[Andara Bledin]

If you want to blame someone, blame the Tea Party. They forced the shutdown in the first place, in a completely unnecessary fight over the ACA that they KNEW they would lose.

The worst part is that, based on some of their crowing, it's not even about the ACA. The entire point was to shut things down because...

Yeah, they're a bunch of small-government pseudo-anarchists that just want to burn most of it down. >_<

[Barracuda]

The Farm is on FEDERAL land! What part of SHUTDOWN don't you get? This park is just like every other park being forced to shut down.

The part where the whole rationale for the shutdown is to save money since there is currently no budget. You act as though the shutdown itself is the POINT.
How much money did the NPS spend shutting DOWN all these private parks and open air memorials compared to just letting them be? This park received NO federal money! It costs the federal government nothing to let them operate. In fact, they spent more shutting it down than they would have leaving it open. What is the rationale for shutting it down at all? The whole point of the "shutdown" is because supposedly there is no money! Yet the Park Service is somehow finding the funds to use MORE personnel to PREVENT people from enjoying the national parks than they use when they are OPEN! Quit acting as though the shutdown itself is the point! And you keep talking about "everything" being shutdown. It's extremely selective! Large private corporations running private parks on federal land have been left alone. The President's personal federally funded golf course has been left alone. Camp David has been left alone. Please, explain the rationale behind the decisions as to what gets shut down and what doesn't in light of that!

[smileyeagle1021]

The part where the whole rationale for the shutdown is to save money since there is currently no budget. You act as though the shutdown itself is the POINT.

I'm afraid you've missed the point of the shut down, not us. This isn't about what costs more or what costs less, this isn't about whether or not we have the money (which we don't), it is about the fact that the law states that if there is no approved budget, there is to be no government services that are not essential. Does it cost more to keep these parks closed than just leave them open? Probably. Is keeping the parks open an essential service? Nope, not in the least. Hell, under the law, non essential government workers are committing a crime if they so much as open an email that is related to their job.
If this had ever been about saving money, Congress would have approved the budget that had been proposed that already had much deeper cuts than what the president wanted... you know, compromise, the President didn't get the spending that he wanted, the TEA party didn't get the gutting of health-care reform that they wanted, but at least the President was willing to be man enough to say "I didn't get everything I want, but getting the budget passed is more important."
To be blunt, the attitude of the TEA party when it comes to healthcare can be summed up by the response I got from my congressional representative, "your mother has nothing to worry about when it comes to health care, because all she has to do to become eligible for medicade is to cut her income to a low enough level to be eligible."
Yes, rather than allow her to be self sufficient, the TEA party would rather she become dependent on government (so that they can condemn her as a leech on society)... tell me again how they are about saving money?

[Daskinor]

The part where the whole rationale for the shutdown is to save money since there is currently no budget. You act as though the shutdown itself is the POINT.
How much money did the NPS spend shutting DOWN all these private parks and open air memorials compared to just letting them be? This park received NO federal money! It costs the federal government nothing to let them operate. In fact, they spent more shutting it down than they would have leaving it open. What is the rationale for shutting it down at all? The whole point of the "shutdown" is because supposedly there is no money! Yet the Park Service is somehow finding the funds to use MORE personnel to PREVENT people from enjoying the national parks than they use when they are OPEN! Quit acting as though the shutdown itself is the point! And you keep talking about "everything" being shutdown. It's extremely selective! Large private corporations running private parks on federal land have been left alone. The President's personal federally funded golf course has been left alone. Camp David has been left alone. Please, explain the rationale behind the decisions as to what gets shut down and what doesn't in light of that!

http://www.doi.gov/shutdown/fy2014/u...gency-plan.pdf

that was the plan drafted by the NPS service managers.

We are not talking about just a few park rangers. We are talking about every service the federal government operates on federal land. If there is a forest fire the federal government must respond. Must operate its own search and rescue, its own EMT and Fire services. Upkeep of public areas, cleaning and maintenance of facilities. National weather service alerts.

The people who are on duty for minimum support ARE NOT GETTING PAID.

The most cost effective plan is to simply use what resources you need to keep people out. Then you can scale back all the support for that park. Keep the park rangers there to keep the property secure and safe. But are the toilets getting cleaned, no. Are they keeping normal staffing levels for search and rescue, no. Is the trash being collected, no.

It sucks that the Colonial Farm sits on federal land, inside a federal park. They Lease the land for 0 dollars, and all the services required for protecting life and welfare are federal resources. If they need to cal the cops for some reason, a park ranger shows up not the state police. Its all about what they need to keep on staff in the area to respond to any event.

In the 1995 shutdown they allowed some entities to pay for the upkeep. But some situations occurred that where not optimal. So the NPS did not draw up plans for that consideration. I have a few articles for that I will directly link later. (I need to pull a pdf off a research portal) Mainly it was Arizona and their upkeep of the Grand Canyon parks.

Camp David is not staffed by the NPS. Its a DoD facility staffed by active duty military, they are getting paid so there is no reason to shut down the facility. The DoD spends allot of time and effort keeping the location secure and ready for any use.

[Hyena Dandy]

The part where the whole rationale for the shutdown is to save money since there is currently no budget. You act as though the shutdown itself is the POINT.

So this is why everything you've said comes off totally ridiculous.

I've said it already in this thread. Let me go again.

THE SHUTDOWN ITSELF IS THE POINT

Really. It's not about money. It's about a loophole that existed in the Constitution. It's about keeping the executive branch from doing anything not authorized by Congress. It has absolutely nothing to do about spending money or not spending money. It costs nothing for, for instance, my dad to check his e-mail or use his cell phone. However, he can't, because even though it's free, it's still an executive branch thing (He's with the Park Service.)

The goal of the Shutdown is to paralyze the executive branch. This is not a political statement. This is a historical statement. This is a statement about what was going through the heads of the people who wrote the Antideficiency Act. It was to close loopholes that would allow the President to entirely ignore the legislature, by doing an action and having the funds appropriated later.

That is why we are having the shutdown. From a perspective of what the LAW IS INTENDED FOR, not a perspective of what the Republicans are doing, the entire point of a shutdown is to keep the Federal Government from acting. If that's a political statement, it's one about Andrew Johnson, not Boehner or Obama.

[Panacea]

The part where the whole rationale for the shutdown is to save money since there is currently no budget. You act as though the shutdown itself is the POINT.
The President's personal federally funded golf course has been left alone. Camp David has been left alone. Please, explain the rationale behind the decisions as to what gets shut down and what doesn't in light of that!

I'd like to see a source that shows the golf course or Camp David are still in operation. Not that they were ever open to the public to begin with. Nor have I seen any report of the President golfing since the shutdown began.

The reason the government is shut down is because Congress did not agree on a budget before the start of the fiscal year on October 1st. Congress also failed to to pass a continuing resolution to keep the government funded until a budget is passed. So, no budget, no CR, no appropriations. Government is out of cash and shuts down.

The shutdown is the point, in a left handed way. However, it is the Tea Party attempting to make the point. They forced the shutdown by preventing passage of a CR by attaching a repeal of Obamacare to it. They did so knowing the CR would fail. They wanted to shutdown the government. They don't like the government, so sabotaging it to them is exactly the point.

For the rest of us, it's a symptom of dysfunction in Congress.

Either way, the government is shut down, which means quit yer bitching about this and that in the Park Service being affected. If you don't like it, tell your Congressmen to pass a clean CR and reopen the government. But enough with whining and crying about who's getting hurt. Shutdowns hurt. It sucks, but that's the consequence of being a fucking dumbshit and not playing nice with people you disagree with politically.

The Tea Party pushed us into this. If they can't swallow their damn pride and admit they fucked up, then people are going to continue getting hurt.

[Hyena Dandy]

The shutdown is the point, in a left handed way. However, it is the Tea Party attempting to make the point.

Politically, I might agree. But in a discussion of the things that do and don't get shut down these days, I think that an understanding that the shutdown has nothing to do with whether we have the money to do things is important. Shutdowns aren't financial, they're constitutional.

[Greenday]

Camp David is operated by the DoD and most of the staffers are technically part of the military. As a result, they wouldn't be furloughed. Camp David gets used for foreign dignitary visits which people seem to forget. Joe Biden was actually staying there for vacation during the shutdown but that was scheduled before the shutdown started. Also, who cares if Biden stayed there because the shutdown has nothing to do with the VP.

As for golf, Obama plays golf on military bases when he's in DC. Since military bases remain open, golf remains open. It's not like the whole military base is closed but Obama makes them keep the golf course open just for him.

The entire problem with the shutdown is it's just one giant pissing match between the Repubs and the Dems. And lots of people get affected but Congress doesn't give a crap.

[Gravekeeper]

The entire problem with the shutdown is it's just one giant pissing match between the Repubs and the Dems. And lots of people get affected but Congress doesn't give a crap.

A pissing match implies both sides are competing by the same rules. This is a hostage situation. -.-