MJ - 134 - Government Shutdown

[00:00:00]

Dave: And we're live.

Reese: Where's the music?

Dave: I literally, did you not hear a word I just said to you?

I'm not gonna do the intro thing.

Reese: Oh, I, okay. Wow. I thought you meant something else with that. Apparently. I love you. I've never been on live TV before. Apparently I don't listen when you tell me things.

Dave: Wow. That we know to be true.

Reese: What?

Intro Music: This is Dave. This is Reese, and this is Manic Joy, a podcast about love, and, and uncertainty.

Dave: Hey. You know what though? It's been a long time since I've heard your, your lovely, your dulce tones in my [00:01:00] ear holes.

Reese: What? When I was doing fire? Bad.

Ooh, that stung. Hey. Yeah.

Dave: Hey. Cheers, motherfucker.

Reese: Cheers. It's been a hot minute.

Dave: It has been clink.

You make lots of noises. That's the good stuff right there.

Reese: It tastes like burning.

Dave: Yummy, yum. Yums.

Reese: Ooh, you put all the alcohol in this bad boy.

Dave: That's how a martini goes.

Reese: Woo. It's strong. I it's been a while.

Dave: I'm like, what are you talking about?

Reese: And also, I have to say, I am, I'm quite proud of myself at our annual,

Dave: oh, what do you have to say?

Reese: I'm gonna tap myself on the shoulder. Not the shoulder, the back, whatever at our Halloween party.

Dave: Mm-hmm.

Reese: I did not have any of the 57 Vespers that were made [00:02:00] in that moment that I didn't have one.

Dave: It's true. I think we did, we both did pretty well.

Reese: Yeah.

Dave: We had the, we had the Halloween party. And then it w we, we learned that we had to do a two hour, two and a half hour trip to Vermont the next day.

Reese: Yeah.

Dave: So we had to pace ourselves.

Reese: Yeah. Because the, so yeah, that, so getting older and drinking really is not. Ideal. Especially, 'cause I like to, I like to overdo it.

Dave: You do?

Reese: I do. I like to, if you're gonna go big or go home, man, like do it or don't shit the,

Dave: it's not so much have shit you like to over do it.

It's just you don't know when to stop.

Reese: That's called overdoing it. I like it.

Dave: Well, I know you overdo it

Reese: and so the last couple of times my hangovers have been doozies, like they haven't been often, but when I

Dave: have they been doozers?

Reese: Well, it was do. Boozy the night before. Boozy. Boozy, and then it's boozy the next day.

And I'm like, oh. So I couldn't imagine being in that car ride. Oh. Filling

Dave: or standing and [00:03:00] walking and doing all that stuff. Wine. We did good. We did get paced ourselves. I had, I only had two drinks.

Reese: Yeah, I was

Dave: that night.

Reese: I was, uh,

Dave: and then I water rest of the time.

Reese: Those, uh, iced tea drinks,

Dave: which are barely drinks.

Reese: Which are, but it just sends me to the bathroom fif every 15 seconds.

Dave: It's get, you get a, you get a sugar hangover more than anything else with those.

Reese: Yeah. But it wasn't, you know, it wasn't even like that bad. I, it was good. No,

Dave: you were good. You were in good shape.

Reese: Um, yeah. So were you. Nice job. Hey, I loved our, I loved our Halloween costumes this year.

Dave: We did good.

Reese: I thought it was good.

Dave: I thought it was good too. Maybe we should use that as our

Reese: little Poltergeist action.

Dave: Maybe. Uh, maybe not. We'll see.

Reese: There's some people that should be looking into the light. They should go straight to the light. And I'm saying that because our Halloween costumes were from Poltergeist I was tan Tangina,

Dave: is that what her name is?

Reese: Her name is,

Dave: I don't even know what her name was.

Reese: Tangina. Baron's.

Dave: Ooh. At you

Reese: or Burrows.

Dave: Look at you Getting deep into the research.

Reese: I did a lot of research. I did a lot of, I went crazy.

Dave: What was, what was I was Carolanne.

Reese: You were Carolanne.

Dave: Wrap your mind around [00:04:00] that.

Reese: I love so much that you were like, yeah.

Okay. I'll put on that wig and do it. Of course. And wear size. Extra, extra, extra large women's pajamas. It was very cute.

Dave: I wear them to this day.

Reese: Yeah. You wore I'm wearing them now.

You wore them to bed that night. It was great. Did

Dave: I did.

Reese: Um, that was a cute good

Dave: What, what were their last names? Do you remember?

Reese: Oh gosh. I feel like they said it.

Dave: I'm sure they did,

Reese: but I don't remember.

Dave: Fine. I see how it is.

Reese: Yeah. I was more immersed in my own, yeah, research so. Well,

Dave: all you care about is yourself. Thanks a lot.

Reese: Well, well, you know what? I also created your outfit for you. You could have done your own homework.

You're a big girl boy.

Dave: A girl, boy.

Reese: Listen, that's, you find that in Thailand. That doesn't happen here. War. Oh, hey on Anyway. So what's up?

Dave: Let me tell you a little bit of something.

Reese: Oh, boy.

Dave: We, this is episode 134.

Reese: That's crazy.

Dave: Isn't that crazy?

Reese: And we started this 2020.

Dave: Yeah. And then we paused for a while.

I, I, you know, oh, so my one [00:05:00] regret, did I say regret? Funny? Yeah, I did.

Reese: You have gerts?

Dave: My, my one gert is that. We didn't power through.

Reese: Mm.

Dave: And continue to do that during the pandemic.

Reese: Yeah, I know. But you know what, we were,

Dave: you were, you, were you were in a weird space.

Reese: I was in a weird place. I, I don't think,

Dave: but I wish we went with it because that would've, I think that would've actually taken,

Reese: it would've been a little time capsule.

But I have to taken to tell you taken off though. I didn't really need to be recording my thoughts at that time. I, I struggled a little bit, know that I was in a weird place.

Dave: I know that what I'm saying. That's what I'm saying. But,

Reese: and then, uh, you know,

Dave: that would've been good radio,

Reese: but we were having a Okay.

Wolf man, Jack,

Dave: I just got a little bit of that. Yeah, he kitties we're gonna go to the woman having the mental breakdown. He, ah,

Reese: oh, you'd have to collect me from the basement where I was. Screaming. Yeah. Cleaning cans of corn with

Dave: Lysol. In your eyeballs.

Reese: With Lysol in, yeah. And so, . I, it's probably best but I was gonna say is that I think we did a good job, , finding other [00:06:00] fun things to do.

We did a lot of family activities during that time.

Dave: We did, we did,

Reese: you know, like to get going for the pizza. Yep. We get went on our pizza adventures. So, you know, it's, it's, yeah. No, we, it was fine. It was probably good. Good that

Dave: we, we definitely did little things we needed to do

Reese: and we came back when it was time and one of those episodes were with the girls, which even better,

Dave: everything took off during the pandemic.

Everyone who started the podcast during the pandemic is like famous now. And look at us.

Reese: Um, look at us. Look at us.

Dave: Look at us. We're awesome.

Reese: We are awesome. We're killing it.

Dave: So listen,

Reese: 135 episodes,

Dave: 134,

Reese: whatever

Dave: is what we're on right now.

Reese: Mm-hmm.

Dave: But we took a little break.

Reese: I know. It's, October was very busy.

Dave: We were very busy.

Reese: We missed an entire month doing the podcast, and we tried like

Dave: pretty wild.

Reese: One night we were supposed to, and then I got mad at you and then, yep. We didn't do it then. We didn't, we got into a fight, didn't, do you remember why did I get mad at you? Oh. Who even knows you did something annoying probably.

Yeah. And I got pissed off. And you, you, [00:07:00]

Dave: you overreacted.

Reese: I did not. My feelings are valid.

Dave: Oh, they're valid.

Reese: You're ridiculous.

Dave: They're valid already.

Reese: You're ridiculous.

Dave: Yeah, we are.

Reese: Uh, yeah.

Dave: See,

Reese: So that didn't happen, but we there so a lot going on.

Dave: Well, yeah. And then it seems so, so if you're not doing your own podcast, you may not know this, but there's like a short window sometimes where in the day.

We typically do these on Friday nights or we do these on the weekend. Typically Friday would be ideal, but if you miss that window of when you've got enough energy to do it, it's like, ah,

Reese: yeah, it's over. You're done.

Dave: No, we're gonna go to bed.

Reese: You're done. Yeah.

Dave: And so right now I'm feeling good. We got a good honey.

Reese: Well, I took a nice nap.

Dave: What time is it? It's 6 46.

Reese: I it up this right now. I have to tell you, we're in the midst of. The, it being pitch dark by 4 37.

Dave: Oh yeah. It's already like,

Reese: Oh, awful

Dave: nighttime out there. It's crazy.

Reese: 'cause by the time, like at five 30, I, I went and took a nap around like 2 30, 3 o'clock.

Kind of didn't fall asleep until like three. [00:08:00] Woke up at Flake, quarter to five. I didn't know what planet I was on. I was like, how late did I sleep? Like I didn't even look at the time. I thought it was like legitimately eight o'clock at night.

Dave: Oh, I know.

Reese: It was a quarter to five. I don't know how i's

Dave: ridiculous.

Reese: I think it starts, the darkness starts way too early and I think it, I totally understand the seasonal depression.

Dave: You in the darkness.

Reese: I'm in the darkness.

Dave: So apparently, so one of the apps that I like to use, and I know you use it on occasion too, it's called End L-E-E-N-D-E-L. Pretty

Reese: much every night I've been using it.

Dave: You have every

Reese: night.

Dave: So that app has a new thing for seasonal changes.

Reese: Oh, cool.

Dave: So it's supposed to. Rate, like where your, I don't know, your circadian rhythm is now based on the changes in the, the, the lightness and stuff like that so that it energizes you during the times that you would typically feel down.

Reese: Oh,

Dave: so you should check it out. I have [00:09:00] to try that. It's a new thing. Yeah, it's

Reese: pretty. I've, I started using it, well, I started, I

Dave: love that app.

Reese: I actually started using it when you. Went away last year when you were doing your business trips. Mm-hmm. Or whatever. Mm-hmm. And, . I was doing the ceiling fan noises on.

Oh yeah, Spotify. And then the DJ on Spotify would be like, yeah, here's some of your favorite classics that you've been playing all the time. And it's like, ceiling fan,

Dave: ceiling fan noise.

Reese: Like, ah. So I'm like, that's not good. And then you're like, use the Endel. And I'm like, you know what? Let me give that a whirl.

It's been on my phone. Sometimes I would use it. As like background noise when I'm doing work. 'cause I cannot, I can't sit in silence And so, and the tinnitus, I can't sit in silence. Oh sure. Because it's like in my ear.

Dave: I find it really valuable for, 'cause there's different things you can use it for. You can use it for sleep, you can use it for whatever your energy happens to be at that particular time of the day, you can [00:10:00] use it for like deep focus. Like, I love it for when I'm like, all right, I'm gonna spend 45 minutes, I'm gonna blast through this work. And like the music is,

Reese: yeah.

Dave: And you're just like, sometimes in the zone,

Reese: I can't go to bed

Dave: because I can't listen to music.

Sometimes

Reese: I can't listen to music

Dave: because it was like, I wanna sing the music and I, I get distracted. But this just like, I, I think I've described it before. Is it it like. If you could see the, the hand motion I'm making,

Reese: uh, it looks like you're jerking off a

Dave: A what? A what?

Reese: An Oopa Loompa.

Dave: An wow de doo.

Um,

Reese: good times.

Dave: Yeah. Why was I all the way down there? Um,,

Reese: Wow.

Dave: Whoa. So it, it, like, it like. Massages your brain, I guess is a way of, what I'm trying to say is like, but it's like pulsing. It's like, it's like, I don't know. It does something to your brain and it's cool.

Reese: Yeah. Well, [00:11:00] and also the, they have a special one for tinnitus.

The only thing I don't like about it, it's, it only goes for two hours and then it shuts off. So the second it shuts off, I wake up, my brain is like, oh. Time to wake up now. Yeah. And it's usually like 3 30, 4 o'clock in the morning. I'm like, no. And so I'll, I'll put it on again just to refresh it.

But it actually, it's been super helpful.

Dave: Yeah.

Reese: Honestly. Yeah. And I don't mind falling asleep to the tv, but sometimes I just need, I put on my little, my little. Headband.

Dave: Yeah, you're

Reese: eye mask

Dave: looking good

Reese: that has the Bluetooth in it. Yep. And you can sleep because it doesn't go like in your ear. And it's absolutely, honestly, I've been sleeping the best.

I've ever been sleeping.

Dave: Oh, good for you.

Reese: Because of putting that thing on, covering my eyes, putting on that. And it's not anything that makes me, like, my brain isn't trying to, I make up like little [00:12:00] scenarios before I, I fall asleep. Yeah. Like little stories where I'll play back like something dumb that I did and then I'll rehash it and I just.

Get into my head and then I can't sleep. This thing just kind of, I don't know what it does. It definitely, like, like you said, like it's

the,

Dave: memory eraser. Yeah. It massages your brain.

Reese: It really does.

Dave: So you don't

Reese: Yeah, it's great.

Dave: Yeah. It, it focuses your brain in a weird way. It's good.

Reese: This episode sponsored by Endel.

Dave: Well, we'll put a link in the show notes there so you can check that out. 'cause I think you should, I, I'm assuming

Reese: it's a great little app.

Dave: I'm, I'm assuming we'll have some type of a referral link in there, so I'll take a, a look at that. But. As now we're back. We've been on what you might call a, a little shutdown of our own.

Reese: Mm-hmm.

Dave: Because, uh, apparently you can just shut down the government.

Reese: Yeah, you can.

Dave: Apparently, that's the thing.

Reese: You can, and you can, what are we, 36, 37 days of a shutdown right now.

Dave: I think of, I think I looked as I was.

Reese: This is the longest one preparing ever

for this.

Dave: The long, longest one ever.

Reese: Yeah.

Dave: Which is funny.

Do you know what the second longest one was? [00:13:00]

Reese: I feel like the second longest one was during Obama.

Dave: No.

Reese: Oh.

Dave: Also during Trump. So, you know, he's gonna turn this around into Yeah. We, we have the longest shutdowns. We, we do thing,

Reese: we've got the longest shutdowns.

Dave: Yeah. And, and we, we beat the last one. Yep. And it was, uh, it was 35 days.

Reese: Nobody has a longer shutdown.

Dave: Wow.

Reese: I've been practicing.

Dave: I, I don't know what you've been practicing, but

Reese: I think that sounded pretty good.

Dave: Of what?

Reese: Of whatever the fuck I was just doing.

Dave: Mm-hmm. So,

Reese: well, I don't wanna make it too accurate 'cause I don't wanna trigger anybody and get them very upset.

Dave: So True.

True. So here's the thing though, y we were talking about this today and, and again our, our goal is not to really get political in it. Right? Although it's like a political related thing, right? Government related.

Reese: This is more educational because

Dave: this is more, I was just

Reese: like both of us wondering

Dave: even be a thing.

Reese: Yeah. Both of us were very,

Dave: that you can do

Reese: inquisitive and you know what you do when you don't really know something. You know what's a really good idea to do? Google it.

Dave: Yeah.

Reese: Takes two seconds. [00:14:00] Just Google it. Look it up. Ask the chat. GPT. I think that's very helpful. I think it's very helpful to do that.

Yeah. So I'm proud of you.

Dave: So I am in the deep throes of travel right now.

Reese: Yeah, you are. That was

Dave: a,

Reese: yep. That was a concern for me.

Dave: Yeah.

Reese: Because I was listening to the news and I'm just like, oh man,

Dave: so far so good.

Reese: That could be good for you.

Dave: But now all of the, 'cause now they just released a thing where they are shutting down like 10% of the flights.

Reese: Mm. Mm-hmm.

Dave: Because

Reese: it's mostly the air traffic control

Dave: because of the air traffic. So, so we'll get into some of this stuff here. Yeah. But this was kind of the impetus for us, like really thinking about this because like. If you think about it in your day to day, if you're like, you know, you're getting up, you go to work, you come home, you're not really that impacted by it unless you're in running into a situation where, I mean, I'm, I gotta go through TSA.

Mm-hmm. You've got the air traffic controllers, as you mentioned. Mm-hmm. So, like, luckily, knock on, knock on wood,

Reese: [00:15:00] uh, you didn't have to hit me in the head like that.

Dave: No issues so far,

Reese: right?

Dave: Eh, but we'll see. I've got 1, 2, 3. Three more trips.

Reese: Yeah,

Dave: starting next week, so,

Reese: well, this is the first time that I can really remember it being going on for so long that now it affected air travel, it's affecting SNAP programs.

Yeah. It's affecting, all sorts of things that normally don't, IM impact us fully. But, um, I'm, you know, it, it's,

Dave: but they do in an interesting way. Yeah. We'll, we'll talk about some of the ways that starts to come into right into account, but, so here's the, here's the deal, right? So I wanted to figure out Okay.

Like, what, so you can just basically, you can just, you can just turn off the government. Yeah. Apparently. And so, so

Reese: what a great job. Like you get to turn, turn off your job and still get paid.

Dave: So

Reese: I'm in the wrong line of business.

Dave: So the basics of this is essentially that Congress has to pass bills that fund government agencies,

Reese: right?[00:16:00]

Dave: And in order to pass those bills, of course people have to agree on them and if they don't agree on those bills or making a temporary extension, basically legally, all of those agencies that depend on the budget have to pause, which is what happened,

Reese: right?

Dave: And it basically forbids spending any money that hasn't been approved.

Which means since it technically has not been approved, those people do not get paid.

Reese: So can I tell you my understanding of it and then you can tell me what your research?

Dave: I will try.

Reese: Okay. So from my understanding, 'cause now I, I actually got to the point where I was like, I gotta do some research on this because.

This is wild, but

Dave: you gotta do some Reese-search.

Reese: Reese,

Dave: this is the Reese-search person.

Reese: This is the, the Reese-search portion of the show where I haven't done Reese-search. But I'm gonna talk about it anyway, but I'm gonna [00:17:00] have you verify it. So

Dave: I'll try

Reese: the, the, from what I know of what's going on, the Republicans were trying to pass a cl clean resolution.

And it's a clean bill that's just cut and dry. These are the things that we want.

And they did that the last time and everybody voted on it and it's fine. But now that it's Trump, they're like, so the Democrats wanna add in a couple of extra things and the Republicans are like no, because we already got rid of those things. We don't wanna fund that. But the Democrats are like, oh no, you should do this, otherwise we're not gonna vote.

And apparently there needs to be I wanna say like 60 something votes apor. A good portion of them are Republicans, but there's like six or seven that are Democrats and they're not voting for it. And now I'm seeing it as I think purposefully because it gives them

Dave: Well.

Reese: An advantage because we just had elections and that worked very out very well for them.

'cause all the Democrats got in because a majority of people, [00:18:00] and listen, it's again not to get political. Both sides are playing games.

Dave: Oh yeah.

Reese: That is not okay.

Dave: Yeah.

Reese: But the Democrats really see this as an advantage. 'cause they wanna hurt Trump. That's the way I kind of see it. I could be wrong, but I know it's something where the Democrats, if they just vote on this clean bill and then get together and talk it out, I think it would be fine.

But it makes Trump look bad and so that's so that's what I think. I see.

Dave: It's definitely,

Reese: I could be wrong.

Dave: It is very, uh, a political thing is so as somebody has something going on, we, we will talk a little bit more about kind of like where that part comes in,

Reese: right?

Dave: Where it's like they sneak stuff into the bills too and do all that.

But why don't we do this then? Why don't we just take a look at. From 1976, that's when the, the, that's when the modern budget process began. There had been roughly 10 plus major shutdowns and like little shorter ones. Mm-hmm. In between here. So the first one was under President Gerald Ford, and it lasted for 10 days.

And it was a dispute over [00:19:00] funding for the Department of Labor and Health Education and Welfare. And so that was the first official funding gap under the modern budget system. That's the first one.

Reese: All right, cool.

Dave: The second one was the following year under President Jimmy Carter, 1977 that had three separate shutdowns, and it was a total of 28 days of that happening.

And that was on funding disagreements over abortion restrictions in Medicaid.

Reese: Interesting.

Dave: And that was the mark, the first multiple shutdowns that occurred in a single year.

Reese: Hmm.

Dave: Now, 1978, the following year. Wow. It looks like there's, so far, there's one every year.

Reese: Mm-hmm.

Dave: Under president,

Reese: there is one every year

Dave: under President Jimmy Carter.

There was one for 18 days and that was caused by, uh, dispute over the Public Works funding and defense spending. And then in 1979, also under President Jimmy Carter, this one for 11 days. Was caused because of [00:20:00] congressional disputes over defense programs and congressional pay raises, which is interesting.

Reese: Ridiculous.

Dave: 1981. So we have a break. 1980. No, no funding shutdowns. President Ronald Reagan. This was just two days he needed more jelly beans.

Reese: Mm-hmm.

Dave: And he wanted to increase the budget for cherry flavored jelly beans. Makes, imagine. Imagine that's really happen.

Reese: That makes sense.

Dave: Yeah. No, uh, the cause was Reagan's push for domestic spending cuts and defense increases.

So more defense related items.

Reese: Mm-hmm.

Dave: Uh, 1984, also under President Ronald Reagan. This was just two days. This was a disagreement over crime bills and water projects. Uh, 1986, also under President Reagan. One day. Just one day. Quick one, conflict over anti-poverty and education programs. And then we get into 1990 under President HW Bush, uh, three days a dispute over deficit reduction measures and tax increases.

Then 1995 and [00:21:00] 1996, there were two shutdowns, uh, one of five days and one of 21 days under Bill Clinton, president Bill Clinton. There was a budget standoff between Clinton and House Speaker Newt Gingrich over Medicare education and spending cuts, and at the time. This was the longest in US history.

Reese: Ah. But I think part of that also was at, at that time, uh, getting a lock on the door of the Oval Office so that people couldn't go in and watch him get

Right. Uhhuh,

BJ's, Uhhuh under the desk came, oh, go ahead.

Go ahead. Oh,

Dave: 26 and then, so let's see, 2013, uh, was President Barack Obama.

Reese: Mm-hmm.

Dave: 16 days. And that was a conflict over funding the Affordable Care Act.

Reese: Which is part of what the issue is, I think with this as well,

Dave: I'm sure. '

Reese: cause they put us, they like a sunset where they, where the bill shuts off at a certain time. And that's what the Democrats are saying now that they wanna renew it.

Dave: So now a note on this one [00:22:00] that there were roughly 850,000 federal employees furloughed during that 16 day, uh, shutdown.

Reese: And I remember that being a big deal too. Yeah,

Dave: of course. Yeah. And then in 2018 and 2019 the big DT comes in. Mm-hmm. President Donald Trump. Mm-hmm. This was the longest in US history until 2025. Of course. Which was 35 days, and this was a dispute over. Everybody's favorite subject. Uh, the border wall funding.

Mm-hmm. Yep. Uh, and I'm just laughing because it's the

Reese: border wall.

Dave: Uh, but yeah. That

Reese: I make Mexico paid for the border wall. Yeah.

Dave: So that was a bad one. So, but that was a, the something

Reese: I was talking about, the imitation, not

Dave: the

Reese: Yeah,

Dave: I know. I know.

Reese: Okay.

Dave: That's a, that was an estimated 11 billion lost from the economy.

Reese: Yikes.

Dave: During that shutdown. And we'll talk a little bit about some other things that could have impacted there. And so then, and then. We're in 2025, which is of course currently still going on. I think we're at 38 days and counting. Uh, as I [00:23:00] printed this, it was said 36 plus. But yeah, I think we're at 38. Uh, this is a disagreement between the White House and Congress over overall spending limits and immigration related provisions.

Uh, this is now the longest shutdown in HU US history. Major impacts on travel, national parks, food aid programs, and. Federal paychecks.

Reese: Yeah, that's crazy.

Dave: So if we just look at some quick stats here, we've got a, a little over 10 major shutdowns for an average duration of 12 days. The longest, of course, is the one I just mentioned, which is current as of the recording of this podcast.

And then most common causes have been budget caps, social program funding, and as we mentioned earlier, political standoffs.

Reese: Right.

Dave: So that gets us to that. What I would call the fine print problem in all of this. Mm-hmm. Is, as you were starting to mention, is that many times it's not even the actual budget that they're fighting [00:24:00] about.

It is. The random stuff that they're sneaking into it.

Reese: Exactly. And so they call that pork, right?

Dave: It's like, okay, I'll tell you what we can't pay teachers until you agree to buy me a hot tub. Right? It's like stupid. That's basically dumb. That's basically what's happening in Congress.

Reese: And the thing is, is that they weaponized it and it's so disingenuous. I'm eating the olive. Sorry.

Dave: Mm.

Reese: And it's very upsetting and the fact that these, these bitches on both fricking sides still take a paycheck. There's a couple that said that they didn't, I'm not gonna mention who, but I heard interviews and they're not taking a paycheck, which I think is, oh, it's good.

But there should be more of them doing that, , because it's absolutely. Outrageous that they're still getting paid while all this other stuff is happening. Yeah. And they're not working.

Dave: Yeah,

Reese: they're not doing their job.

Dave: Let Well,

Reese: and if they really cared, they would've figured this out sooner, but they [00:25:00] don't care.

They're using it for political reasons, for political revenge, for all this, I think the, and the only thing I'm gonna say. To be political and it's a hill I will die on, and you can argue with me all you want, there needs to be 100% uh, what do you call it?

Dave: Term limits.

Reese: Term limits. Because Yeah, yeah.

Dave: That's what, yeah. Yeah.

It's, it's definitely, it's,

Reese: these people should not be, and I'll just say this other thing a couple of weeks ago, they had another No Kings rally. Trump is a king, but you have these people that have been. In government for 50, 60 years. They're like running for reelection. They're 85, 86, 87, almost 90 years old.

Dave: They're just in forever.

Reese: They run. And these people in their districts reelect them 'cause the name is familiar. So they get reelected. , And they're just racking up money.

They're civil servants. They work for us, and they have forgotten that. And that really, Ooh, it grinds my gears. Yeah. Well, [00:26:00] and they play these political games, and then, as my dad used to say, smartest guy, I know, divide and conquer, they get all of us fighting with each other, so we're not looking at them.

They're off, they're not doing their job, they're off gallivanting and doing interviews and going off on each other, and it's really. I dunno. They're gonna be sorry one day because people are gonna flip out one day.

Dave: One day. Well, just to your point, that the, so members of Congress and the president still get paid during shutdowns.

But some choose to donate or defer their salaries. So,

Reese: and I think and should,

Dave: so kudos to those that do.

Reese: You should verify that. 'cause I don't think Trump takes a paycheck.

Dave: I don't know. But regardless, this is just how the system is set up. Yeah. Right. So that's all I'm saying. Let's see. So the word shut down wasn't used until 1980.

Before that agencies just kept running until funds arrived.

Reese: Ooh.

Dave: Oh. So they didn't even do a shutdown.

Reese: That's cool.

Dave: Interesting.

Reese: What year was that? That that term started?

Dave: 1980.

Reese: Cool.

Dave: Yeah. All right. Uh, as I mentioned [00:27:00] earlier, the, the 20 18 20 19 shutdown cost the economy about 11 billion.

Reese: Yeah. What does it doing now?

Dave: It's, uh, I mean, we'll find out. It's, it's still going. This is the longest one. Uh, so there's some interesting facts there on that. Uh,

Reese: good research, babe.

Dave: Hey, thanks. And then during the 2013 shutdown. The National Zoo's Panda cam went dark and people were furious.

Reese: Oh.

Dave: Which is,

Reese: I'd be mad about that too.

Dave: Which is interesting because that's what they were furious about.

Reese: But Well also, here's the thing,

Dave: you know, whatcha gonna do

Reese: because of this shutdown also, NASA shut things down and we were not allowed. That timing is so coincidental. I may have to go get my tinfoil hat.

Dave: Oh.

Reese: Which is usually right next to me.

But, . NASA was showing part of the James Webb telescope to show the three I Atlas, which was supposed to be here conveniently, right at the time when the shutdown [00:28:00] started. And so the cameras were off and people couldn't see. Three I Atlas, which is here, by the way, in case anybody's interested.

A little side note.

Dave: Oh, here it goes. Okay, so we started with that five print thing. I just wanna come back to that here for a second before we get into like mm-hmm. What this ends up meaning for everyday people. But it's that random stuff that they sneak in, as you mentioned, and. Basically they add these policy riders to the bills, which are unrelated items like this.

Like that seems like that's gonna a rule that needs to change. Like you can't just add something that has nothing to do with

Reese: Right.

Dave: Whatever the thing is supposed to be about.

Reese: Which is crazy to me, like

Dave: it's stupid. It just,

Reese: it's very stupid.

Dave: I don't understand how these are supposed to be the smartest people.

Reese: And they're, they are the smartest people. They do these things on purpose.

Dave: Yeah. Because they, and, and we go, okay,

Reese: to quote Nancy Pelosi, well, we have to pass the bill to find out what's in the bill.

Dave: Yeah. Yeah.

Reese: She actually said that. And they do that purposefully because it

Dave: because they know. And so this is what happens when people actually do look and then if either side refuses to accept what the add-ons are, [00:29:00] then everything kind of comes to the, to the stop. So if you ever heard of the term, they want a clean bill. That's basically what they mean is they mean one that doesn't have all these extras perhaps,

Reese: and they have voted on this particular bill before without a issue.

They're just doing this now because they wanna add in all the stuff. When, when Trump came in, he just barreled through. Yeah. Did all the things he said he was gonna do and take out and do. And then these guys are like, nah, you know what? We wanna bring some of these things back. Trump is not gonna budge.

He's hardheaded. Yeah. There's no way he's gonna budge. He's

so

bad.

Dave: So it's basically those debates over the fine print that can really start to dry dri grind that whole entire government to the halt that is at right now. So what does that mean?

Reese: So how does it end?

Dave: Everyday people. Well, let's just talk about some of these things though.

So we already talked about like TTSA agents, right? We talked about air traffic controllers being out without pay, leading to people having delays. And of course, you know, burnout for people. Those flight reductions at several airports have started, as I mentioned, which means longer [00:30:00] lines and some flights are canceled.

Reese: Have you seen some of the videos of that? Oof.

Dave: So, no. But I don't trust anything that you see, you kind of have to go do it. See it for yourself because like, honestly, I went to the, I was coming from Houston just recently. I came home and it was like, you know, make sure you show up early just in case

Reese: it was fine.

Dave: There was literally like, like, it seemed like there were less workers there, but there were also very few people there to, so it was just, it was fine. Like I didn't have to really wait any longer than I normally would've. And to be fair, since this has happened, all of my flights have been on time. Which is, again, I'm knocking,

Reese: that's messed up.

Dave: Knocking on your head again.

Reese: Yeah, thanks.

Dave: But, , and so then let's see passport and visa processing. Slow down or pause. National parks, as we mentioned the, the cam that, that went down, but those, those either close or they run with minimal staff. So as you can imagine, trash piles up, bathrooms close.

Uh, you mentioned the, the WIC or the food assistant programs that could run out our funds and the shutdown drags on. [00:31:00] Federal workers and contractors, miss paychecks and some permanently lose income. So what happens is typically the federal workers have to get back pay, they'll get retroactive pay mm-hmm.

If they were working during that time. But if you're a contractor, you actually don't get any. Back pay.

Reese: Oof.

Dave: So you can just be out of money.

Reese: Yikes.

Dave: And so the ripple effect of course, means there's fewer paychecks, which means there's less spending in local communities. Mm-hmm. And that's where you get to that 11 billion in, in economic, deficit or whatever.

Uh, yeah. Yeah. So,

Reese: which sucks because it also negates whether you like it or not, whatever Elon Musk came in to do and clean up stuff, it kind of negated a good portion of that, of the money that they saved during the whole, what was Elon Musk's thing? My brain is. Functioning. We came in with Doge and whatever, saved whatever, by cutting all these things and, and people were upset about some of them, but.

Now I feel like, all right, that was for naught because now we're gonna be backed up.

Dave: Well, well, here's [00:32:00] the reality is I think all of this is for naught because it's all, it's for Knotts. It's, it's all just to say political games. It's for the politic. Yeah.

Reese: It's all the political games.

Dave: It's all should mention the game.

It's part of it. So, I'll, I have some questions here, but just, yeah. Yes. Is there a way out, how does this all end eventually? So eventually it's either public pressure, economic strain, or media attention that actually pushes lawmakers to come to a compromise and do something. And sometimes they actually reach a full budget deal but it's rare in a stalemate. And then federal employees then receive back pay because that came into law, as I mentioned, uh, since 2019. But as I mentioned, the contractors do not. , Once the funding is restored, the agencies reopen and slowly dig outta the backlog.

So nice. Just think of all of those things that, the government does so efficiently already. They come in and they have to clean up a mess to actually get going. And so essentially the public trust takes the biggest hit in all of this, right? And so. It's, uh, like a bad relationship in many ways.

Yeah. Like, like, right. Yeah. It's like it [00:33:00] drags on until someone says, okay, fine. We'll just split the check.

Reese: It's a very, to, it's a very toxic relationship,

to say the least.

Dave: And Yeah. But then there it could be millions of people just waiting to eat while

Yeah.

They're arguing.

Reese: I know. And that's, that's the, it's all the let them eat.

Cake garbage, honestly. Yeah, because it's, yeah. Again, I'm gonna mention the term public servant. These people are not public servants. They think that because they have power I mean, we really do have the ultimate power, but a lot of people don't see that, don't realize that, but because they think they have that power, they're just gonna keep playing these little games with each other.

And in all honesty, I mean, I hate to say it, I always used to have a little bit of faith. Government, especially American, government. I don't know what I was thinking, but now as I'm getting older and I'm, I'm more aware and I'm, I'm really paying attention to it. They don't care. It's, it makes me so sad.

It really does. I, my, the, as far as [00:34:00] public trust, I'm out. I'm tapping out.

Dave: Yeah. Well, let me ask you this. I mean, would you still go to work if your paycheck stopped?

Reese: Well, that's the thing. That's the thing, it's like. It depends. Honestly, teaching wise, if someone said to me, look, there's gonna be some hard times, we still need teachers.

At some point things will get back to normal. If it's like a month, can you come in and just donate some of your time?

Dave: Yeah.

Reese: Sure, because I love my students. I might do that, but if I worked for the government I do work for the government.

Dave: I know, I'm like,

Reese: but I'm saying, but I mean like a dmv DMV or air traffic control or something.

That is very stressful that I took this job knowing it was gonna be high stress, but I took it because I know like compensation wise, like it's good for me, my family. You wanna know what, no, I might go get another job so I can make money. For my family instead of waiting around for that. Some people have to make some tough decisions.

I, I, you know, I [00:35:00] don't know. I, I don't know.

Dave: Well, so here's some interesting things. Just in the 2018 shutdown, one in 10 TSA workers called in sick after missing paychecks. So to. Answer that question on whether or not they would still come to work and then in past shutdowns and that there's no judgment on that.

'cause I, I don't know, do no judgment at all. I think I, it depends, but, but I think, again, people come stepping up for people, uh, in past shutdowns. Some federal employees organized food drives for coworkers.

Reese: So there's been a lot of that. Going on as well. I think watching some of the communities come together to Yeah.

Help out, you know, and donate to food pantries and do things like that. I think that's when you really see the humanity of people. Yeah. Which, you know, for, for the most part, that's really lacking these days. But it's nice to see people

Yeah.

Come together in these situations.

Dave: Well, it's interesting too when, again, this is gonna vary.

Based on your reliance on a, on particular things. Right. But like, I guess like is there anything like, like the question is, right, what's something you [00:36:00] rely on that turns out to be government run? And I don't have an answer for that yet. Right? Like the TSA is the closest thing that I can say right now in my immediate, in our immediate situation.

Like that's what relies on, you know, that relies on something Government run.

Reese: Well I feel like. I feel like for us we're pretty independent. We've been pretty good. Yeah. You know, we've had our childhood things with, I. I know like for, for a good portion, my, my dad would constantly lose his job and there was always like a paycheck to paycheck thing.

I know you had your Yeah, yeah. You know, uh, bouts with government cheese and things like that growing up, yeah. And we learned from our parents not to be dependent on the government. Yeah. Because, you know, as, as great as our country is. You gotta find ways of being somewhat self-sufficient and, [00:37:00] you know Yeah.

Dave: You know, and look, and I, I, I think though, unfortunately, it's not like it's easy to say because that's the situation that you are in, right? Oh, no, a

Reese: hundred percent.

Dave: And, and, and I'm not a hundred percent, I'm not pointing that at you. I'm just saying in general, right?

Reese: No, a hundred percent.

Dave: And so, like, I get that there are people in different situations.

Your government, it's easier to say than

Reese: this government. I don't wanna get, like, it's

Dave: rough.

Reese: I don't wanna get us. Uh, wire tapped, but I'm just saying like,

Dave: yeah,

Reese: they're, they're not, you can't depend on the government. Yeah.

Dave: So you

Reese: just can't,

Dave: well, let me, let me say this then. Do you think most people will notice, notice a shutdown right away or only when it messes with their plans?

Reese: Oh, when it messes with their plans.

Dave: Yeah. I agree with that. All right. So let me ask you this one last question and then we'll kind of wrap this up here. Right. But like, what would you try to add into the family budget if you could sneak something in?

Reese: Oh my God.

Dave: That's a tough one, right?

Reese: It's really not because one thing immediately came into my brain.

Dave: Oh, what is it? Tell me first thing,

Reese: and I'm gonna tell you, and both our [00:38:00] children will agree with me. You're not gonna like what I'm gonna say, cool. But I, I would budget in another cat.

Dave: Ew.

Reese: What do you mean? Ew? How dare you?

Rude.

Dave: Because listen, wait till you're a, a, a widow and you have nobody else to hang around with. Because

Reese: let me tell you something, I, I'll have plenty of people to hang out when I'm a widow and let's be realistic. I'm going first.

Dave: Do you think so?

Reese: Oh, a hundred percent.

Dave: Probably not

Reese: with all my in. Maybe not.

No. 'cause I tell you. My vitamin intake.

Dave: It's quite amazing to watch. By the way.

Reese: I haven't had COVID.

Dave: It's like a 30 minute process.

Reese: I don't know if it's the whiskey that I'm drinking or the vitamins I'm taking.

Dave: Yeah, it's the pickled liver and uh,

Reese: I'm killing it. I'm killing life.

Dave: Yeah, you're killing life, right?

Reese: But once you're gone. I'm living La Vita. Locum man.

Dave: Yeah. Well then you can get all the cats you want.

Reese: All the cats.

Dave: But for now,

Reese: I'm be very busy with all my friends

that I have.

Dave: Lemme enjoy. Let me enjoy the little time that I have left without fucking cat hair on something in this fucking house.

Reese: [00:39:00] Listen, listen. I'm not gonna lie. I have found Magic. Sleeping in your yoga bag.

Dave: Oh, yeah. I, I know.

Reese: Every morning, every morning

Dave: fucking drives me nuts.

Reese: It's my favorite thing.

Dave: I was, I was pulling cat hair outta that.

Reese: I go, oh my God, you're so cute, but you need to get the fuck out of there. He's so,

Dave: yeah. Yeah.

Reese: Anyway,

Dave: any best Anyhow. So that's, that's what,

Reese: that's what I would what would you sneak in?

Dave: I don't know. Um,

Reese: what would you sneak in?

Dave: I don't know.

Reese: Because you're no fun. You wouldn't do anything that was like outrageous.

Dave: No. For me it would be like, just like it would be something, it would be, I would need funny money.

I would just need, I would throw,

Reese: would it be hilarious?

Dave: Yeah. Ha ha.

No, I would throw in money for whatever happened to be my fixation at that

particular time.

Reese: Oh, okay.

Dave: Like I wouldn't have like a one thing I'd be like, in this month I'm really into

Reese: Right.

Dave: Headphones.

Reese: Yes.

Dave: So I wanna buy all the headphones.

Reese: Yes.

Dave: Right.

Reese: You know what,

Dave: that's what my thing would be. And then next month I'm into. IPads. I want all the

iPads.

Reese: Well, now let's talk about Emel de Marcos over here.

Dave: Yeah. Yeah. Oh no. You mean [00:40:00] you with the shoes?

Shoes.

Reese: No. Listen, you're just as bad as I am.

Dave: Not with shoes.

Reese: Okay.

Dave: I buy one pair a year.

Reese: Listen,

Dave: pretty much.

Reese: List. Pretty much. One to two. Right now you're fixated on this one brand, which I totally get. Which is what I'm saying.

Dave: I just bought one pair of sneakers. Yeah,

Reese: but you bought all the accoutrement to it. You got I got the brush, I got the spray. I got the thing

Dave: because I don't wanna ruin the sneakers.

Reese: Well you did. Lemme tell you something. Lemme tell this, this.

Dave: It always happens to me. Go ahead. Go ahead.

Reese: You cut. Listen, fa, listen

Dave: fam. Oh my God.

Reese: Dave likes to, he's been doing this since COVID, working from home. He wears shoes all day long in the house to work.

Dave: Not anymore.

Reese: Well, you did the other day and

Dave: today I'm breaking into a pair of shoes

Reese: and you cooked Yeah.

And you spilled the shit on your new favorite sneakers that you got.

Dave: What happened was,

Reese: what happened? What happened was

Dave: was I, of course I'm cooking I'm slaving over the hot stove slaving to to to feed your ass.

Reese: [00:41:00] Yeah.

Dave: Like I do every day and

Reese: Aw, what? It's so hard for you.

Dave: I'm kidding.

Reese: You fucking love it.

Dave: I love it. I do love it.

Reese: I know you do.

Dave: And then of course, I, I drop the fucking wooden spoon.

Reese: I can't deal with you

Dave: that bounces off the floor and lands right on the fucking shit.

Reese: I didn't know it. I didn't know it hit the floor first.

First.

Dave: This is what Im saying,

Reese: your shoe,

Dave: this is what I'm saying. This, this is what happens to me.

It's like really? Of all the things.

Reese: And it's so funny,

Dave: like if I had put

Reese: so messy, messy, messy,

Dave: let's say I didn't have shoes, right? Let's say I got like a, I got a special. Pinky cover.

Reese: Yep.

Dave: It would've bounced off the thing. Yep. And I would've went to grab it and caught it with my pinky.

Reese: A hundred percent.

Dave: And it would've been like I caught the, the caught the whole thing with oil all over

it.

Reese: A hundred percent.

Dave: Right? Like that's all I'm saying. Like that's how it happens to me.

Reese: It's so funny to me's so ridiculous because you're so neat and careful, but you always end up,

Dave: it's something's

Reese: steaming yourself.

Dave: It's something stupid that happens.

It's, that's what I'm saying.

Reese: But listen, it's no dropping a bottle of white out. [00:42:00] Remember when I dropped the bottle? Remember did that of white out all over the kitchen table and on one of my favorite pairs of jeans.

Dave: Months to get that off the table.

Reese: Oh my God. It was the worst. But I mean, it, it did, but I had to get rid of my favorite pair of jeans, which was

Dave: Yeah.

Reese: Not the best. Yeah. But hey, this is, uh, this is how life is,

Dave: so, hey. Yeah, hey. Like, shit happens. Like the government just stops working for a while because of a few lines of fine print, and then it's, you know,

and some regular people

that

Reese: end up really politicians

Dave: paying for it. But here's hope in that,

Reese: Hey, what do you, uh, what do you call, uh

Dave: oh.

This is gonna be a joke, folks.

Reese: Yep. What do you call a couple hundred politicians at the bottom of the ocean? A good start waiting for, uh, waiting to hear Secret service.

Dave: Wait. Ready? Ready. Here's my joke. Here's the hope. In the next time something shuts down, it's just our laptops for the weekend.

Reese: Ew.

Crickets on that one.

Dave: [00:43:00] Yeah. Well, any who? I don't have the crickets on the screen. God dammit.

Reese: That's too bad.

Dave: Listen, friends,

Reese: should I do another Trump invitation?

Dave: No, please don't. Okay. Hey, tell you what, remember this.

Reese: Go donate to a food pantry

Dave: and maybe this is a message.

Reese: Take care of your neighbors.

Dave: Message to our friends in Congress. Life is a group project. Be kind to each other

Reese: seriously.

Outro Music: We put the hammer right down.