Friday was the closest the government has ever come to shutting down in my memory, and I had a front row seat as an intern in DC. I wasn't covering the "shutdown showdown." That task was given to the Daily Herald's fabulous politics and projects reporter, Kerry Lester, who wrote two great stories - As shutdown looms, suburban members look to debt ceiling, and Hultgren: "Cautiously optimistic" deal will be made.
Still, as a 21-year-old, a student, a politics writer and a DC-first-timer, I had an interesting day.
I spent a lot of my time that stormy Friday on Twitter. I followed the feeds of my favorite political news outlets covering the day's events and the politicians pulling the strings. Some fun hashtags popped up. For example, #govtshutdownpickuplines. Huffington Post compiled some of the best government shutdown pickup lines. Another interesting tag was #uterusshutdown, used by some tweeters upset over the Republican attempt to defund Planned Parenthood. (John Stewart and Steven Colbert on Monday each ripped Senator John Kyl a new one over his false claim on the Senate floor that 90% of what Planned Parenthood does is abortions. Watch those clips of The Daily Show and The Colbert Report.)
Twitter led me to another interesting discovery that day, that made government shutdown look a bit less bleak - deals at Capitol Hill bars for government employees if the government shuts down. One bar, Union Pub, was offering patrons with a valid government ID penny drafts from 5-6 p.m. starting Monday. Lounge 201 was offering half-priced martinis all night long Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. I live in an apartment building entirely comprised of interns, many government employees working at the House, Senate or White House. After I shared this with them, they were a little sad the government didn't shut down.
One last little social media tidbit here... a fellow reporting intern in my building alerted to me on this movement on Facebook earlier last week, while it was still small. A Facebook group entitled "If Boehner shuts down the government I am taking my trash to his house" emerged on the social media scene, in protest of DC trash services being stopped in the event of a government shutdown. When I checked today at 5:44 p.m., 8,553 people had RSVP'd to attend. The event received a lot of media coverage.
After a long day of pent-up frustration with our government, my intern apartment-mates and I hit up Hill Mexican restaurant Tortilla Coast for margaritas. It was PACKED with suited up Hill workers and reporters doing the same, even a table of congressmen. There, I got into a heated argument with a Senate intern about the political game our government parties were playing.
I also discovered a little website "Isthegovernmentshutdown.com". In large, uppercase letters, the website simply read "NO". Throughout the night, my friends asked me to check whether it had changed to "YES".
And as you know, it did not.
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