By Jamie Stiehm

Posted: April 4, 2011

(Following is an excerpt from Newsweek that expresses my position exactly on this issue.  Copyright restrictions prohibit my publishing the entire article, but I encourage you to read the rest of it.)
Shutting down the federal government is a hostile act against civil society.
The Civil War started 150 years ago in April 1861, and we are still getting over it, still talking about it, still writing about it. Some in the South have still not made peace with the end of the Civil War and hold fast to "heroes," notably General Robert E. Lee. President Abraham Lincoln showed what he thought of Lee when he seized Arlington, Lee's stately home and slave plantation across the Potomac River, and started burying the dead Union soldiers in the ground there.

Lincoln's message could not be clearer: Leading an assault on the Union was not a Sunday picnic in the country. Serious consequences followed, hitting home.
Now we have a band of rebels—87 of them newcomers—in the House Republican majority, who are fixin' for a fight. Spoiling to see the Capitol Dome go dark. Acting as if that's the mission, the reason they crossed lines to come into the heart of the enemy. Washington is a staging ground for their defiant anger at the Union. The republic is under a new kind of siege.
If they have their way, the federal government will be closed this time next week, not what we need right now with so many American households hanging by a thread. [Check out a roundup of political cartoons on the budget and deficit.]
Now a few facts to concentrate the mind. First, the Tea Party is part of the problem. But hold the whole lot of House Republicans and their leaders responsible. If there are any grown-ups in the House, they are allowing their most radical element, unschooled freshmen, to dominate in a delicate showdown looming with the Senate and the White House. [Check out a roundup of political cartoons on the Tea Party.]
To watch a video on this subject and read the article in its entirety, go to https://www.usnews.com/opinion/blogs/Jamie-Stiehm/2011/04/04/a-federal-gvoernment-shutdown-would-be-an-assault-on-america?s_cid=rss:Jamie-Stiehm:a-federal-gvoernment-shutdown-would-be-an-assault-on-america