And it was started, full disclosure, by a friend of mine during the 2019 government shutdown, which is the longest government shutdown in history.Īnd it was federal workers pooling their resources together in terms of information about where to get food, where to get assistance, some people offering help, most people looking for help. But if you look at the - there's a private Facebook group called FedFam. On my way here, I saw the bicycle fencing going up around the Lincoln Memorial, because that will be closed if the government shuts down. Well, I think when people think of shutdowns, they think of national parks being closed. They're just not serious, and they have taken flight from reality, and it's become make-believe. And it's a lesson that, once you start pretending to other people, you end up lying to yourself.Īnd so I think they firmly believe they're doing something constructive here, and I have sympathy with the idea that the deficits are too big. And John Kasich, and - who was then in the House, wanted to cut government spending. They wanted to cut government spending, and they had a plan to cut. And, to me, it's the - I wouldn't say it's inevitable, but to find the fork in the road that led us to this spot, I'd go back to the 1990s and back to Newt Gingrich, where you really had the beginning of departure - of make-believe departure from reality.Īnd compared to today's crew, Newt Gingrich looks like Plato and Socrates, because they actually had a plan. Yes, I really don't - I have trouble seeing how this ends, because, in theory, it would end when he did a deal with Democrats and they got Republicans and Democrats together.

It's not about you david brooks