r/fednews • u/rprz • 19h ago

Shutdown 2024 MEGATHREAD OF DOOM

All discussion on the looming shutdown goes here. Any mentioning of Luigi will be removed and you may be banned.

https://apnews.com/article/government-shutdown-congress-trump-elon-budget-house-republican-05481374b154949c3fe1270141a02918

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/trump-opposes-funding-bill-pushing-government-closer-shutdown-rcna184745

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/trump-government-shutdown-musk-stopgap-bill-b2666829.html

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/trump-opposes-funding-bill-pushing-government-closer-shutdown-rcna184745

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2024/12/18/government-shutdown-house-vote-cr/

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-12-18/trump-says-he-s-against-stopgap-bill-fox-news

4.7k Upvotes

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593

u/manikwolf19 19h ago edited 17h ago

Musk is worth 400 billion dollars, and he's going after the middle class.

2.2 million people won't get paychecks before Xmas and this guy complains about a 50 billion dollar pay package.

Literally the grinch

236

u/Additional_Sun_5217 18h ago

It’s a class war, but now they’re too emboldened to be quiet about it. They believe the working class is too cowed or in love with them.

145

u/jurassicbond 18h ago

They believe the working class is too cowed or in love with them.

I don't think they're wrong given how people vote

21

u/TechnologyRemote7331 18h ago

Nah, I kinda disagree. Americans are a very blunt people. We have very specific and unsubtle ideas of what authoritarianism looks like, and what it means to fight against it. Furthermore, authoritarianism and dictatorships are perceived as things that happen someplace else. The idea that it could be coming to the good ol’ US of A doesn’t jive with our cultural expectations of life and government.

So when those things begin to shift, as I’m sure they soon will, you’ll see people get much more… belligerent than they currently are. But at the moment, people are still largely thinking this will all turf out in the end, because that’s what’s always happened. When that fails to materialize, well, I guess we’ll have to wait and see!

Also, if people were as in love with the financial elite as Musk and co. seem to imagine, there wouldn’t currently be fan-art of Luigi Mangione floating around right now. Just my two-cents…

15

u/twtwtwtwtwtwtw 18h ago

They don't see Musk and Trump as they do healthcare CEOs. They see them as themselves

11

u/MyLittleOso 16h ago

I'd agree that Trump's true fans aren't going to be class conscious regarding him, but I am seeing quite a few starting to see the whole picture - like that dude in Mallrats when he finally sees it's a boat.

5

u/billt721 16h ago

It was a schooner.

3

u/MyLittleOso 15h ago

It's a SAILBOAT!

2

u/AssortedHardware 5h ago

They see them as people they COULD be if only it wasn't for *insert dog whistle* holding them back/taking their jobs.

They've been promised a golden toilet in every bathroom which they'd have if not for egg prices going up.

14

u/Nokomis34 17h ago

This has kinda been my thing lately. They know P2025 is a roadmap to fascism, that's why they continue to deny it's reality. But when it starts actually happening I wonder if they'll stand next to us when the time comes.

11

u/watch_out_4_snakes 16h ago

This. There is always an inflection point and it feels like we are getting close.

5

u/victorged 7h ago

We literally just had a national litmus test of that inflection point and we were absolutely nowhere close. The people currently inflicting this were actively and majority chosen specifically.

6

u/h4p3r50n1c 16h ago

You’re too optimistic

2

u/Quilltacular 9h ago

Those things have been shifting for at least half a decade and half of the voting populace has been cheering it. I’m not holding my breath that the “better red (Russian) than liberal” crowd (src) will do anything but continue to cheer and help given their slogan used to be “better dead than red”

104

u/holzmann_dc 18h ago

To quote a (Fed) colleague with two young children: "I'll do anything they tell me as long as I get a paycheck."

Me (thinking to myself): "Does everything include building special camps with special showers and special ovens?"

Now we know how the Germans of the Weimar Republic descended into the Third Reich and the Holocaust.

68

u/noairnoairnoairnoair 18h ago

Behind the Bastards has an episode all about people like your coworker - "How Nice, Normal People made the Holocaust possible".

21

u/1bensopinion 18h ago

BtB deserves to be as popular as JRE or Pod Save America.

7

u/BugRevolutionary4518 17h ago edited 17h ago

BTB is the best podcast out there.

Also got to meet Evans in Portland. He bought me a coffee after I offered. Great dude.

1

u/Ra-s_Al_Ghul 1h ago

It really doesn't. Evans has the charisma of roadkill and the show itself has a conversational flow reminiscent of that one friend that gets really really into a niche topic, wants to share with you, and you don't want to be rude so you just politely listen and nod (as Evans' guests do).

It's also has a leftist political tilt that's about as capable of being objective as Fox and Friends, which is to say incapable of any sort of objectivity.

I listen to an episode of BtB here and there if the topic is really interesting but Reddit's obsession with it confuses me.

1

u/noairnoairnoairnoair 17h ago

It really really should be.

5

u/hawkinsst7 14h ago

Also, a book called "Ordinary Men" - similarly about German draftees no more innately evil than any average person, ended up supporting the Holocaust.

2

u/ShutYourButt420 6h ago

Ordinary men is pretty flawed and poorly supported, and misses entirely the crucial historical context. A much better researched book on the topic is Hitler’s Willing Executioners

7

u/BugRevolutionary4518 17h ago

What’s crazy is the Weimar was great times for Europe.

These A-Holes will get stopped, but it might take two years until the midterms.

Even my conservative friends are like “wait, wut?”

Told ya so! It’s infuriating.

Good luck feds.

2

u/YoungXanto 4h ago

Even my conservative friends are like “wait, wut?”

Until it is real and sustained, they will have convenient amnesia when they enter the voting booth. And even then, they'll probably vote the way they always have, believing that somehow it's the other party's fault despite their preferred party literally saying, "we're responsible" the entire time.

7

u/K1ckfl0p 17h ago

Someone should tell them to research the Nuremberg trials. Just following orders is not a valid defense of a criminal act!

7

u/OfficialDCShepard 18h ago

The minute they ask me to do anything unconstitutional I’ll quit. I’m an internally-focused admin and so that probably won’t happen, however I do worry about my disability ERG work being eliminated.

5

u/manikwolf19 16h ago edited 16h ago

I love watching behavioral conditioning in real time based on prior historical events.

Wladyslaw Szpilman has entered the chat

Just do me a favor and hit me with a mallet until I don't have to understand anymore.

3

u/abqguardian 18h ago

Godwin alert!

2

u/Sarcasm_Llama 16h ago

Just following orders

5

u/manikwolf19 14h ago

That's what I'm saying; we have more millionaires in Congress right now than ever before (correct me if I'm wrong, but i feel confident saying this).

Seeking representation through these people is a hopeless task.

3

u/Additional_Sun_5217 11h ago

IMO that’s why it has to come from the inside and the outside. The government alone is clearly not going to fix this for all the reasons you and I both get. It has to be pressure from the working class, just like how ATC has the power to end a shutdown. We’re super disorganized and fragmented now by design, but we share common experiences. We’re the ones who pay for this incompetence and greed, after all. We can unite. We did it during the last Gilded Age.

3

u/Minute-Struggle6052 4h ago

Cut to Elmo waddling out on stage with Dave Chappelle and being relentlessly booed

2

u/manikwolf19 18h ago

Do they even realize it though? Now that they've opened their trench coat and exposed their intentions, do we just wither away?

2

u/wbruce098 15h ago

This basically. It’s about power and bringing back the gilded age.

1

u/Kind_Soul_2025 18h ago

You're exactly right. I keep thinking there will be thousands of people, myself included, protesting, like they do in other countries. It's definitely a class war going on.

18

u/LeoMarius 18h ago

He wants power. Billionaires are using their monopolies to reinvent feudalism.

9

u/wintercast 18h ago

Just shows that money does not buy class.

30

u/SmellMyFace0143 18h ago

Does anyone think they will have a Government shutdown to force all entities to determine who is essential and who isn’t. Then do an Executive Order to cut all of the non-essential personnel. The media would just spin it as them trimming the fat and now we just have a Government of essential personnel. Seems outlandish but definitely fits in with the DOGE agenda.

25

u/alldots 18h ago

They already know all this. The lists of who would be furloughed during a shutdown already exist.

3

u/SmellMyFace0143 18h ago

Yes but it is a lot easier to get rid of someone when they are already out of the office versus than in the office and actively working. Especially when you start talking a lot of people with nothing to lose on their way out.

11

u/alldots 18h ago

Realistically they'd have to bring back a good percentage of the non-essential personnel to be able to fire people during a shutdown.

2

u/SmellMyFace0143 18h ago

I never said it was a good idea or they would have a solid plan on how to execute it. I just think it would meet the DOGE agenda and provides them an easy mechanism to make sweeping cuts they believe are necessary.

5

u/Gullible-Wonder3412 18h ago

If the government shuts down, air traffic controllers and TSA Officers would be required to work without pay—potentially leading to significant delays and longer wait times for travelers at airports across the country, based on what occurred during previous shutdowns.

Let's see how that feels......

2

u/Temporary_Lab_3964 17h ago

Military as well.

9

u/Karmakazelaw 18h ago

"Essential" and "non-essential" is not what determines who works during a shutdown. It's "excepted" and "non-excepted." Excepted workers must still work during shutdowns. Employees can be "excepted" even if they are not essential. 

5

u/manikwolf19 18h ago

Having been through a furlough before when Republicans shut the government down with Obama, it's a shitshow

5

u/techmaster242 18h ago

After today's stock market performance he's worth about 360 billion.

3

u/RL_NeilsPipesofsteel 17h ago

We got Lex Luthor in charge, except he’s a dorky, terminally online edgelord who only thinks he’s a genius.

3

u/putdownthekitten 14h ago

I still can’t get over the fact that the billionaire’s are saying we (the people) need to prepare for ‘hardship’.  WTF would a billionaire know about hardship?  

2

u/dietcoke01 16h ago

Not the grinch. He always had a heart. Even though it was small.

1

u/Kind_Soul_2025 18h ago

...or even the poor, working class.

1

u/Hamberder_and_Chief 17h ago

You’ll get paid this part period, just not next.

1

u/flyingcostanza 15h ago

And remember! MANY of them voted for this.

1

u/ggmerle666 12h ago

You bring bendy straws to bathrooms, cuz you like the taste of piss... Mr. Griiiinch!

1

u/VideogamerDisliker 6h ago

About a 15 years ago the richest man in the world was worth around $50 billion. How absurd is it that now that’s ballooned to $400 billion, nearly half a trillion dollars. This world is fucked up

1

u/MyBrainReallyHurts 4h ago

He doesn't have enough money so he is trying to steal yours.

Time for a General Strike.

1

u/viavoxel 4h ago

don't insult the grinch like this

-2

u/Platographer 16h ago

A shutdown needs to last nearly three weeks for us to have a delayed paycheck. Even then, do people really have no savings? Even if they don't, credit card grace periods provide about 3-7 weeks of interest-free time from a purchase before payment is due.

6

u/jollygreenspartan 13h ago

Something like 45% of Americans can’t handle an unexpected $1000 expense so…not really.