GOP Shutdown Final Tally: $2 To $6 Billion Which Was Worth It Because Obamacare Was Totally Repealed

 
 You ever wonder what success looks like? We often wonder, because we are bloggers who sit in unwashed pajamas, drink cheap whiskey and incessantly email BangMeHarder54@altavista.com to please do sex on us, so we don’t know any successes. But we are not Texi-Canadian Senators who have shut down the government to lodge our discontent for a three-year-old law. Folks like that know the sweet sweet smell of success, because they fight for fiscal responsibility and reduced spending, and they get RESULTS, right HuffPo? 

The federal government shutdown that lasted for 16 days in October is expected to cost the U.S. economy between $2 billion and $6 billion in economic output, according to a report by the Office of Management and Budget released Thursday afternoon.

Yep -- we saved $2 billi… hold on. WE FUCKING LOST UP TO $6 BILLION!!1!

While other estimates have put the loss closer to $24 billion, the OMB said that $2-$6 billion was a conservative estimate. Which is great, because it's not like the economy has been lurching through a painfully slow recovery, mainly because oftoo much spending by Washingtonausterity put in place by the GOP, right? Well, despite all the fancifully ludicrous claims that Obamacare would ruin the economy, it seems that the alternative -- shutting down the government and threatening economic collapse -- actually DOES fuck up the economy. WHO KNEW?

Approximately 120,000 fewer private sector jobs were created during the first two weeks of October… Forecasters additionally expect fourth quarter real GDP growth to be 0.2 to 0.6 percent lower than what it could have been had the shutdown and debt ceiling fight not taken place.

This sucks for America, but it should also send a message to the business community: STOP BANKROLLING TEABAGGING JIZZBRAINS. For serious, it’s your own goddam fault for encouraging a bunch of hate-filled bigots who like to play 18th-centrury dress-up to run for Congress. Take a time-out, think about what you have done, and get your shit together. Stop with the campaign donations to the fringey asshats already.

And don’t think that it was just the economy that got dinged. Oh no, fellow taxpayers, we have a bill to pay as well. Here are some goodies:

• The country's national parks lost roughly $500 million in visitor spending nationwide;

• Almost $4 billion in tax refunds were delayed because the Internal Revenue Service was shuttered;

• "hundreds of patients" were prevented from enrolling in clinical trials at the National Institutes of Health;

• The Food and Drug Administration delayed "nearly 500 food and feed domestic inspections and roughly 355 food safety inspections under State contracts.

And you know all those federal workers who were furloughed? Oh yeah, that’s another $2 billion in backpay for them.

So let’s all give a big, huge wonket slow-clap for the Tea Party:

They shut the gubmint down for 16 days, cost us literally billions of dollars, and for what? The GOP got no concessions for all this shit, but it put the U.S. a little further in debt, folks are a little worse off, and the recovery will take a little longer.

But here’s the kicker: because of gerrymandering, there probably won’t be any consequences for the folks who held our government hostage and caused billions in economic harm.

If that’s not American Exceptionalism, we don’t know what is.

[ Huffington Post ]