DN Editorial: The government already shut down

TALK ABOUT a government shutdown. From the local to the federal level, there are urgent issues that need to be addressed in intelligent ways. What do we get from our politicians instead? Welcome to the Age of Paralysis.

It's the era where even the simplest matter becomes tangled in politics or personal differences, where the worst are filled with passionate intensity while the best lack conviction or the means to do the right thing. The result is a government caught in a permanent freeze frame - unable to advance on almost any issue.

In Washington, a cadre of Republicans threaten to shut down government unless ObamaCare is repealed. Their brinksmanship is dangerous; it could imperil the entire U.S. economy. Their motives look like pure spite: Are they against ObamaCare or the very idea of Barack Obama? Their tactics are so extreme, their language so vile, you wonder if they are politicians or psychopaths. Still, they rule the day.

In Harrisburg, the lunatic fringe of the Republican Party has moved to center stage. Tea-party Republicans in the state House are holding a highway- and mass-transit funding bill hostage because it would increase motor license fees and fuel taxes to raise $2.5 billion for PennDOT. The money is desperately needed so the state can begin long-deferred maintenance on roads and bridges. But, these Republicans say no - no to any tax increases, no to government. They would prefer to see the roads crumble; the bridges tumble and the state's mass transit come to a grinding halt.

In this effort, they are aided and abetted by House Democrats. Anxious to score political points against Gov. Corbett, they have failed to provide a single vote for the transportation bill. Why? So that Corbett loses. He wants the bill, so they do not. It makes perfect sense to the warped partisan mind. To the rest of us, it looks reprehensible, because it is.

(Yet, as pointed out by Daily News columnist John Baer, this same Legislature found time to pass "Involuntary Breath Holding Awareness Day." Doesn't that mean they are breaking their own law?)

In the one-party town of Philadelphia, we do not have political differences. Instead, personal animosity rules the day. In City Council, the rule of thumb is: If Mayor Nutter is for it, they are against it. If he is against it, they are for it. It's that simple. And it doesn't matter what the "it" is.

There is no rational reason that Nutter and City Council President Darrell Clarke can't sit across a table and hash out their differences on ways to help the school district. Surely, there has to be some middle ground. But rational has nothing to do with this blood feud. Council is intent to stick it to the mayor at every opportunity. Nutter has more than two years left on his term. Two more years of politics as personal vendetta. It makes us cringe.

Pollsters regularly ask the American people if they think the country is headed in the right direction or the wrong direction. In recent polls on the local, state and national level, close to three out of every four people said "wrong direction."

The Age of Paralysis has given birth to a deep pessimism among the people about the future of their country. Somebody better start moving soon.