With another government shutdown looming on the horizon, members of the government are telling us that the sky is falling and woe will befall the country. The only way to stop certain doom is to give politicians what they want. 

Sound familiar? It should, because this is how politicians manipulate you into giving them what they want on a lot of subjects. Climate change is a very good example, for instance, and both the government shutdown and climate change are the same in terms of destructiveness. 

We're going to be just fine. 

John Stossel already made a video about this five years ago, and with this upcoming shutdown, he decided to wheel it back out in order to show you just how much of a crisis a government shutdown isn't, but politicians and the corporate media are more than happy to work together to make you think it is. 

As Stossel points out, the Washington Post attempted to generate panic over it with words like "Shutdown sows chaos, confusion, and anxiety" and "Pain spreads widely!" The New York Times also got into the game with a headline that included, "It's all too much!" 

Yet, as Stossel points out, if you look around everyday America, nothing has changed. We go about our daily lives with zero interruption. Some of it even goes on "in spite of government," he says. 

Moreover, despite the fact that the government shuts down, its "endless rules are still in effect," he points out. The main drawback is that the over 800,000 government workers are going to have delayed checks, but their pay is coming after the shutdown ends. 

This hasn't stopped the media from finding other ways to try to make people panic, and many of them are ridiculous, as Stossel points out: 

Trump's administration isn't doing that, so PBS found a new crisis: "Trash cans spilling... (P)ark services can't clean up the mess until Congress and the president reach a spending deal," reported "NewsHour."

But volunteers appeared to pick up some of the trash.

Given a chance, private citizens often step in to do things government says only government can do.

The Washington Post ran a front-page headline about farmers "reeling... because they aren't receiving government support checks."

But why do farmers even get "support checks"?

One justification is "saving family farms." But the money goes to big farms.

Government doesn't need to "guarantee the food supply," another justification for subsidies. Most fruit and vegetable farmers get no subsidies, yet there are no shortages of peaches, plums, green beans, etc.

Subsidies are a scam created by politicians who get money from wheat, cotton, corn and soybean agribusinesses. Those farmers should suck it up and live without subsidies, too.

Stossel makes the overall point that we shouldn't even need this many workers in the first place. 

"We could take a chainsaw to so much of government," he says. 

He's right. Even the food inspections from the FDA that the government warns would stop are actually done by the Department of Agriculture... and they're still doing them even despite a shutdown. In truth, private business has more food safety measures than the government does thanks to competition anyway. 

Watch the whole video for yourself. Stossel is enlightening, as usual. 

Panic! Government will shut down if Congress doesn't pass a funding bill!

That's how most media cover it.

But during previous shut downs, what terrible things happened? None!

Life went on. Government demonstrated how needless most of it is.

I made this video about that: pic.twitter.com/NIPYeO2r6X

— John Stossel (@JohnStossel) December 20, 2024