Congress officially broken; fire them all

OPINION:

Imagine, if you will, a world where you could simply decide not to do the one core function of your job, yet still expect your direct deposit to hit your account every two weeks like clockwork.

If a barista decided making coffee was just too much of a hassle, or a pilot decided landing the plane was a drag, they would be looking for new employment before lunch. Yet here we are watching the federal government shut down again because Congress — our collective, elected employee that we pay — can’t manage to do its job.

The new fiscal year kicked off on Oct. 1, but Congress didn’t pass any of the dozen annual appropriations bills required to fund the government. It didn’t even manage to pass a stopgap spending bill to buy itself a little more procrastination time.

Congress’ chronic inability to follow its own rules is hardly breaking news; it’s practically tradition. In the nearly five decades that the current budgeting system has been in place, Congress has passed all its required appropriations measures on time exactly four times: fiscal years 1977, 1989, 1995 and 1997.

If you’re keeping score, that means the last time they turned in their homework on time was in the era of Spice Girls and dial-up internet.

It wasn’t supposed to be this way. The 1974 Congressional Budget Act laid out a process that sounds almost quaint in its orderliness. It starts with the president submitting a budget proposal by the first Monday in February. Then, by April 15 — a date most Americans associate with panic-filing taxes — Congress is supposed to agree on a budget resolution. This isn’t even a law; it’s just a blueprint.

Even this baby step is apparently too high a hurdle. That April 15 deadline? Congress has missed or ignored it entirely in 45 of the past 51 fiscal years. Last year was particularly special: They adopted a budget resolution in April, which sounds great until you realize it was for the fiscal year that was already half over.

After the blueprint comes the actual work: passing 12 separate appropriations bills by Oct. 1. In theory, this allows for debate and scrutiny (I know firsthand; when I was the new guy on Capitol Hill, I had to cover these debates for a couple of years). In practice, this hasn’t happened since 1996. For more than a decade, Congress hasn’t passed a single one of these bills on time.

Instead, Congress relies on continuing resolutions — legislative duct tape that keeps the government running at last year’s spending levels. When it finally does get around to passing a budget, it’s usually in the form of a 3,000-page “omnibus” package, a legislative turducken stuffed with thousands of pages that no one but the most junior of staffers has read.

The result of this procrastination is what we are seeing now: a shutdown. During these times, national parks close, passport applications are delayed, and federal workers from air traffic controllers to the military are asked to work without pay or sent home.

This brings us to the most infuriating irony of the situation: While federal employees are wondering how to pay their mortgages, the people responsible for the mess are still getting paid.

Enter two Republican lawmakers, Sen. Jon Husted of Ohio and Sen. Rick Scott of Florida, who seem to think that what’s good for the goose is good for the gander. They’re backing the No Budget, No Pay Act, a bipartisan bill with a simple premise: If Congress doesn’t fund the government, then Congress doesn’t get a paycheck.

“I voted to keep the government open. But even still, if Congress can’t accomplish its most basic responsibility of funding the government, lawmakers shouldn’t be paid,” Mr. Husted said. “There must be consequences when we fail to do our jobs.”

The legislation prohibits back pay for members of Congress during periods when the government is not properly funded. It’s a novel concept in Washington: accountability.

The current system is broken. We have moved from a structured process of 12 separate bills to a chaotic reliance on CRs and omnibus monstrosities, and finally, to simply shutting down the whole thing when the bickering gets too loud. If we can’t force our elected officials to be efficient, perhaps we can at least force them to share in the financial anxiety they cause everyone else.

After all, if you don’t do your job, you don’t get paid. Why should the 535 people running the country be the only exception?

• Joseph Curl covered the White House and politics for a decade for The Washington Times. He can be reached at josephcurl@gmail.com and on Twitter @josephcurl.