Dwain Northey (Gen X)

The Republican Party, the self-anointed guardians of “fiscal responsibility,” have once again demonstrated their unparalleled mastery of the art of doing absolutely nothing — except, of course, threatening to shut down the government while pointing fingers at the Democrats for not cleaning up their mess. Bravo, GOP. Really, give yourselves a round of applause. If governing were a performance, you’d be headlining the world’s longest-running farce.

Let’s start with the basics: Congress has one job it absolutely must do every year. Just one. Pass a budget. That’s it. That’s the bare minimum requirement of stewardship over the world’s largest economy. And yet, Republicans — those tireless warriors against “wasteful spending” — haven’t managed to pass an actual budget since Nancy Pelosi’s last one. Instead, they’ve been limping along on continuing resolutions like a college kid living on expired ramen noodles and dollar store energy drinks. The government only keeps its lights on because Democrats, yes Democrats, keep extending these temporary Band-Aids over the gaping wound of Republican incompetence.

But here comes the twist: the GOP, in its infinite wisdom, has decided that since they can’t govern, they’ll just shut it all down. Because nothing says “we care about the American people” like furloughing federal workers, closing national parks, stalling veterans’ benefits, and putting paychecks for military families on the chopping block. Of course, they won’t call it what it is — hostage-taking by legislative toddlers. No, no. They’ll spin it as “Democrat obstruction.” The party that has spent years throwing wrenches into the machinery of government now cries crocodile tears about how Democrats won’t compromise. Compromise on what? On funding bills they haven’t even written? On policies they can’t agree on within their own caucus?

The GOP has become the political equivalent of a drunk driver careening down the highway, swerving all over the road, and then blaming the cops for pulling them over. They scream about “fiscal responsibility” while their favored leader racked up trillions in debt with tax cuts for billionaires. They clutch their pearls about deficits while refusing to touch the bloated Pentagon budget, which eats more cash than the next ten countries’ militaries combined. They cry that Democrats “spend too much” — and yet, when given the gavel, they can’t even cobble together a coherent plan to balance the checkbook.

And here’s the kicker: they don’t actually want a budget. Passing a real budget would mean putting their priorities in black and white for the world to see. It would mean admitting that their promises don’t add up, that you can’t slash taxes, increase military spending, gut social programs, and still pretend to be deficit hawks. Continuing resolutions are their perfect cover: they can huff and puff about “waste” without ever being forced to make hard choices or reveal just how hollow their platform really is.

So instead, they choose dysfunction as a political weapon. They want chaos, because chaos gives them talking points. If the government shuts down, Republicans get to trot out their favorite scapegoat: “The Democrats made us do it.” Yes, of course. The Democrats forced Republicans not to pass a budget. The Democrats forced them into their endless infighting, their refusal to compromise, their obsession with appeasing the most unhinged voices in their caucus. It’s all Nancy Pelosi’s fault, somehow, even though she left the Speaker’s chair ages ago. By GOP logic, she must still be lurking in the shadows, pulling the strings like some liberal puppet master, single-handedly stopping Republicans from lifting their pens and writing an actual budget.

This is not governance. It’s sabotage. And it’s sabotage carried out by people who swear they love America but treat its institutions like chew toys. Republicans like to style themselves as patriots, defenders of the republic, heirs to the Founding Fathers. But the Founders, for all their flaws, at least understood the concept of responsibility. Today’s GOP is more like a toddler who drops an ice cream cone, then screams that someone else should pay for a new one.

The truth is painfully clear: the GOP doesn’t want to govern because governing requires competence, accountability, and yes, compromise. What they want is permanent grievance theater, where the government lurches from one self-inflicted crisis to another, while Fox News runs the highlight reel. They thrive on dysfunction because dysfunction lets them play the victim. And when the lights go out, when the paychecks stop, when the country stumbles? Well, they’ll just point at the Democrats again and hope the voters don’t notice who actually lit the match.