Monthly Archives: February 2018

Making Congress Work

BY MICHAEL S. JOHNSON  |  FEB 13, 2018

Congress was burning the midnight oil once again last week, rushing to pass a resolution extending federal spending for only another month. It was the fourth time legislators have had to do that in as many months.

In Washington, that’s good news. The alternative was to shutter some government agencies until the money could be restored. It is a shame, isn’t it? Dysfunction is the norm.

Taxpayers pay a heavy price for the dysfunction of their government. It runs into the billions upon billions of dollars, mind-numbing figures to average taxpayers who clip dollar-off coupons every Saturday. The most recent extended shutdown—there have been four in the last 10 years—was in 2013 and lasted 14 days, costing taxpayers an estimated $2 billion. Continue reading