A “what if” scenario circulated through the Cheney Free Press office last week.
Just what if our editorial staff simply got tired on one of our long Tuesday — sometimes into Wednesday — newspaper production days? What if we just left that story on a crucial city council decision off the front page, opting instead for a big blank space?
Or what if that big advertisement a merchant needed to promote a sale never made the paper because the graphics staff was tired and they decided it was simply time to go home?
There would sure be people needing to answer questions.
But that is what Congress did when they decided their scheduled vacation — they're away from Aug. 8 through Sept. 5 — was more important than taking care of the business we pay them $174,000 a year to do.
What was left unfinished wasn't just run-of the-Hill business. As Congress — our employees with a combined 82 percent disapproval rating already — scattered for home they did so without approving money to fund the Federal Aviation Administration. That left some 4,000 FAA workers furloughed, potentially jeopardizing the safety of the traveling public.
The shutdown also sidelined an estimated 70,000 workers, many in construction projects, and curtailed the collection of $30 million a day in uncollected taxes that go to various airport projects.
And it's all because of an oh-so-familiar script: partisan bickering.
To their credit, congressional leaders hammered out yet another extension, albeit at the 11th hour last Thursday. That will keep the FAA flying through the middle part of September when lawmakers can continue to try to come to a deal on a final answer to funding that has been so very hard to agree to on Capitol Hill.
The FAA has been operating on temporary budget extensions since 2007 when the last reauthorization expired. Congress is seeking long-term funding for the agency but once again there are issues on both sides of the aisle that have gotten in the way.
Republicans want to overturn a rule that was approved last year allowing airline and railroad employees to form a union by a simple majority of those voting. That's keeping some Democrats from supporting elimination of subsidies to a handful of small airports.
Even though we likely don't pay much attention to the FAA in our daily lives, we should. And so should Congress.
Have the inspections been made on the airplane like they are supposed to? The last thing you want to have happen is an airplane drop out of the sky. Hopefully, in their own self-interest, the airlines were maintaining those inspections on their own.
As we all move forward it's interesting to take a look back in history.
It was nearly 30 years ago to the day that Congress came up with their Band-Aid fix to keep the FAA flying — Aug. 5, 1981 — when President Ronald Reagan fired 11,000 air traffic controllers for refusing orders to return to work from a strike. The FAA basically started from scratch to refill those positions.
Perhaps when Tuesday, Nov. 6, 2012 rolls around, it's time to give those 535 members of Congress a permanent holiday and replace them with people willing to get the job done first and vacation later.
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