Both DEM’s & PUG’s agree that the ‘shutdown’ is in NAME only to appease the TEA PARTY folks, and that no actual ‘government worker’ will go without pay. So let’s fucking ask the “QUESTION”, what is this ‘shutdown’ about, if its not about sending ‘gubmint workers’ home?

US defence staff to return to work

Most of the 400,000 US defence department staff sent home amid a government shutdown are told to return to work after a legal interpretation.

The Pentagon on Saturday said it would call most of its 350,000 furloughed civilian workers back to their jobs, concluding that a recent law allows officials to consider them critical to protecting national security.

The Pentagon employs the largest share of the 800,000 federal workers sent home during the government shutdown. It has been forced to halt military training for many personnel, shutter commissaries, send intelligence analysts home and suspend a range of activities.

The Defense Department’s announcement came as the House of Representatives voted unanimously to provide back pay to all furloughed federal workers once the shutdown ends.

The 407-0 vote reflected rare agreement between Republicans and Democrats, who said that the federal workers should not be pawns in a larger political fight over government spending priorities.

Still, there was no sign that either party was ready to abandon its terms for ending the shutdown, which reached its fifth day on Saturday.

The White House supports retroactive pay for federal workers. The Senate won’t take up the measure until at least next week.

While workers deemed essential to public safety and national security have remained on the job, hundreds of thousands of federal workers will remain on furlough until the political stalemate ends, and a large range of federal services and activities will remain suspended. A dispute between the parties has left federal agencies largely unfunded for the new fiscal year, which began Tuesday.

“‘Hallelujah!’” Sen. Bill Nelson (D., Fla.), whose state is home to MacDill Air Force Base, said after learning that the furloughed military workers would be called back to work.

The Pentagon said it could recall workers under a law that President Barack Obama signed on Monday, just before the shutdown took effect. The law ensured that the 1.4 million active duty service members around the world, including troops in Afghanistan, would continue to get paid.

The law also allowed the Defense Department to recall civilians and contractors supporting the active-duty forces.

Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel and the Pentagon adopted a broad interpretation of the law. While it doesn’t give them leeway to bring everyone back, Mr. Hagel said on Saturday, the law allows the department to end furloughs for everyone who contributes to the “morale, well-being, capabilities and readiness of service members.”

That, Pentagon lawyers determined, includes people performing a broad range of activities, such as offering medical care, working in base commissaries, analyzing intelligence and training staff.

Robert Hale, the Pentagon’s comptroller, estimated that the department would bring back at least 90% of its furloughed workers. He said the number of department workers on furlough was about 350,000, refining earlier estimates that 400,000 would be sent home, or about half of all federal workers on furlough.

The Pentagon expects that inspectors working on defense contracts will return to work, which would alleviate some of the pressure on defense companies that have announced plans to lay off thousands of workers as a result of the showdown.

Effects of the shutdown had begun to weigh on defense contractors. Lockheed Martin Corp. on Friday announced plans to furlough 3,000 workers on Monday and said it could be forced to take additional steps if the government didn’t get back to normal business soon.

On Saturday, the company said it was too early decide whether it could cancel or reduce the furloughs following the Pentagon’s decision.

Mr. Hagel warned that if the shutdown persisted, he might be forced to renew the furloughs.

“If the lapse of appropriations continues, many of these workers will cease to be able to do their jobs,” he warned. “Critical parts, or supplies, will run out, and there will be limited authority for the department to purchase more. If there comes a time that workers are unable to do their work, I will be forced to once again send them home.”

On Capitol Hill, some Democrats worried the Pentagon’s decision could ease pressure to reopen the entire government all at once, as Democrats have demanded. House Republicans have passed bills funding discrete parts of the government. But legislation they have offered to fund all federal agencies has included provisions delaying or curtailing the new federal health law, which Democrats have rejected.

Mr. Obama has refused to consider changes to the health law as a condition of reopening the government, and he says he won’t negotiate over terms for raising the nation’s debt ceiling, saying Congress cannot ask for “ransom” in return for doing its duty.

“This shutdown has been brought about by the president’s unwillingness to sit down and talk with members of Congress,” House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R., Va.) said. “This administration has been almost absent when it comes to discussions and working out our differences, and we’re going to stay focused on trying to ease the pain of this shutdown.”

Democrats criticized House Republicans for advancing piecemeal bills rather than a single measure to bring all of the federal government back on the job.

“We are going to pay all the federal employees, as we should, but we’re going to pay them to stay at home,” said Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D., Md.), summarizing what he said was the Republican policy. “It’s an absolutely absurd position.”

Mr. Obama said in an interview released Saturday that he thinks Congress will vote to raise the U.S. borrowing limit so that the nation could pay all its obligations. He criticized House Speaker John Boehner (R., Ohio) for failing to hold a vote on doing so sooner.

“I’m pretty willing to bet that there are enough votes in the House of Representatives right now to make sure that the United States doesn’t end up being a deadbeat,” Mr. Obama told the Associated Press. “The only thing that’s preventing that from happening is Speaker Boehner calling the vote.”

Mr. Boehner has said the nation’s borrowing limit should not be raised unless paired with a deficit-reduction package or other GOP policy goals.