Posted by Tina
The President’s choice to fill the shoes of departing HHS Secretary Kathlene Sebelius is Sylvia Burwell, the woman who’s been credited with shutting down government parks and war memorials during the budget crisis. At the time she had just been appointed to the Office of Management and Budget:
A single person shut down the entire U.S. government for the first time in 17 years.
Not a congressman, but an unelected woman named Sylvia Burwell who, as the relatively new director of the Office of Management and Budget, sent the email that initiated the process that has closed national parks, visitors’ centers and even the “panda-cam” at the National Zoo.
“Agencies should now execute plans for an orderly shutdown due to the absence of appropriations,” Burwell wrote in a memo to heads of executive departments and agencies Monday night as it became clear lawmakers had failed to agree on a budget deal. “We urge Congress to act quickly to pass a Continuing Resolution to provide a short-term bridge that ensures sufficient time to pass a budget for the remainder of the fiscal year.”
Her appointment as OMB Director received bipartisan support (96-0). Her extreme government shutdown? Not so much! See also here.
Perfect!
No, Sylvia Burwell did not shut down the government and she is not responsible for the shutdown of the parks and memorials. Republicans orchestrated the shutdown as a way to protest the Affordable Care Act.
GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS (1/6/2013): Senator John Cornyn … he said “it may be necessary to partially shut down the government in order to secure the long-term fiscal well being of our country.
REP. PETER KING, R-NY (10/6/2013): We are the ones who did shut the government down.
REP. JOE WALSH, R-IL (2/2011): We will do what we have to do to shut down the government if we have to.
REP. LOUIE GOHMERT, R-TX (11/2010): Government’s gonna have to shut down.
REP. MIKE PENCE, R-IN (3/2011): I say, shut it down!
http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/mon-january-27-2014/where-are-we-now-
Republicans then realized for the first time in years that the government does some things that Republicans liked, such as providing tours for veterans, and that their shutdown cut off funding for such things. So they floated a few bills to cherry-pick a few items to keep open despite the shutdown they caused, and Democrats refused to take the bait. That Burwell sent a memo does not make her responsible for the shutdown.
No amount of revisionist history is going to change these facts. Republican congressmen were caught on tape actively cheerleading for a government shutdown. Only the willfully ignorant will choose to forget this.
Yes, Republicans had the unmitigated gall to take a stand bout the ACA and the budget but closing the parks was a stunt that was totally unnecessary. Democrats fooled no one with their childish theatrics.
History is not being revised, simply fleshed out.
Bill Clinton managed a similar shutdown without resorting to petty stunts intended to hurt elderly veterans and little kids that had traveled miles at considerable cost. The Obama administration seems to enjoy playing the bully in its approach to politics.
Obama’s lame budgets have never been received well or approved. In fact they never even receive Democrat votes in Harry’s Senate. Harry Reid has failed to pass a budget in the Senate, even though its required by law, in at least four of the last six years. He has refused to bring over 40 bills to the floor for consideration that are related to jobs. Seems to be pouting over Democrats losing the super majority that produced Obamacare without a single Republican vote.
Ted Cruz and a handful of Republicans were blamed for the shut down but the whole truth is much more complex. The Democrats could have approached healthcare in a bipartisan way…they did not. Contention over the budget had to do with a healthcare law that the majority of Americans didn’t want and whose representatives did not have a hand in creating. Harry Reid and President Obama could have kept government open by signing the budget passed by the House while they continued to negotiate over the contentious healthcare budget. They refused to exercise that option. They also could have shut the government down without closing memorials and parks but they stubbornly chose to play dirty politics rather than take responsibility and do their jobs in a bipartisan fashion.
The President and Harry Reid were just as responsible for the shut down as Ted Cruz and the House Republicans.
Republicans in the House have passed budgets every single year that they’ve held the House. Their opposition to the ACA reflected the unpopularity of a law that was sold to the people with lies and deception. Republicans were using a tool of government open to them as the House majority in an attempt to urge cooperation over the budget.
The Obama administration chose to make the shut down a circus and this woman, Sylvia Mathews Burwell, sent the memo to make it happen.
Obama’s hard ball politics and his bullying tactics may please his radical base but they don’t demonstrate the kind of leadership that America needs and expects of its representatives.
This woman will bring the same character brand to HHS. More background information here.
The “willfully ignorant” are much smarter, and more aware, than some people think.
How ironic that Sylvia has been Obumble’s Budget Director before being assigned to HHS – when Obumble hasn’t had a budget since he was first elected Prez!
“Continuing Resolutions” are NOT a budget!