BOB SCHIEFFER: WASHINGTON HAS BECOME 'DYSFUNCTIONAL' AND 'DISGRACEFUL'

In his closing comments on Sunday’s CBS Face the Nation, Bob Schieffer really nails Congress for what it has become: Dysfunctional and Disgraceful.

SOME FINAL THOUGHTS
By Bob Schieffer

CBS Face the Nation
April 10, 2011

I am glad that Washington found a way to avoid shutting down the government, but excuse me for not applauding. When we're involved in three wars, the country is in a recession and people are out of work, you don’t have to be too smart to know this is not a good time to shutdown the government and figuring that out is no reason to offer congratulations. I hate to paint all of them with the same brush.

There are some fine and serious people in Congress and in the White House too for that matter. But Washington has become more than dysfunctional. Its inability to act has become disgraceful. If Washington had been willing to meet its responsibilities, the two sides would have resolved this last year. Last week’s argument was last year’s argument or should have been.

But there was an election last year and all sides were happy to put off the hard choices which brought us to this remarkable year in which Congress has been in session since January and managed to do absolutely nothing. I don’t know about you, but where I work, every once in a while they expect us to do something. It doesn’t seem to be a requirement in official Washington and now they are talking about who won and who lost this epic battle.

Don’t they understand there were no winners and losers. They just wasted a lot of time with partisan posturing until they were forced to do what they should have done last year. That is nothing to brag about and certainly nothing to applaud.