No one is blameless in this matter. I blame the feckless Republicans of the 115th Congress that couldn't carry out their Constitutional duty to create an annual budget, I blame the 116th House for being stubborn and obstructionist because Trump is breathing, and I blame Trump for trying to uphold the duties of his office and protecting our national security.
Now that the shutdown has entered its' 31st day, unless you read past the headlines of "TRUMP REFUSES TO SIGN BUDGET," you won't see that Trump has extended multiple compromises to Nancy Pelosi, all of which have been refused. He has offered to reduce the amount of funding he has asked for, as well as temporary protections for DREAMers (which was an Unconstitutional program by Obama, BTW).
So now I have to ask, "Who are the real obstructionists here?" Trump is asking for physical barriers along "high priority sections" of the border, and what he is asking for is, compared to the totality of the federal budget, a "rounding error." Look at it this way: $5 Billion is 0.5% of the deficit, and 0.12% of the total budget.
I respect both President Trump and Obstructionist Pelosi (I'm using that title from now on instead of "Speaker") for making their respective stands for what they think is right and important. They are also teaching most every American exactly how much they "need" the federal government. Yes, many families are affected (including my own and those close to me) by the restriction of federal government operations. The good news is, many will learn just how much they (don't) need the government. In reality, the longer this shutdown goes on, more and more Democrat voters will realize they can get along just fine and maybe better without government assistance. When those people discover this, they have a good chance of leaving the Democrats.
I also found out while writing this post that after 30 days (which was yesterday), the government can permanently lay off furloughed workers through a Reduction In Force (RIF) program. Why is this critical? Because the bureaucrats who are interfering with President Trump from advancing his agenda aren't in the office screwing things up.
This article from The Daily Caller from a "Senior Trump official" says the following:
Process is what we serve, process keeps us safe, process is our core value. It takes a lot of people to maintain the process. Process provides jobs. In fact, there are process experts and certified process managers who protect the process. Then there are the 5 percent with moxie (career managers). At any given time they can change, clarify or add to the process — even to distort or block policy counsel for the president.
Saboteurs peddling opinion as research, tasking their staff on pet projects or pitching wasteful grants to their friends. Most of my career colleagues actively work against the president’s agenda. This means I typically spend about 15 percent of my time on the president’s agenda and 85 percent of my time trying to stop sabotage, and we have no power to get rid of them. Until the shutdown.
Due to the lack of funding, many federal agencies are now operating more effectively from the top down on a fraction of their workforce, with only select essential personnel serving national security tasks. One might think this is how government should function, but bureaucracies operate from the bottom up — a collective of self-generated ideas. Ideas become initiatives, formalize into offices, they seek funds from Congress and become bureaus or sub-agencies, and maybe one day grow to be their own independent agency, like ours. The nature of a big administrative bureaucracy is to grow to serve itself. I watch it and fight it daily. [Emphasis mine]
In other words, the vast majority of "the swamp" that have interfered with Trumps agenda has been out of the office for the past month. And thanks to Obstructionist Pelosi, most of them are now gone permanently. Pelosi has just drained the swamp for Trump by being stupid and goadable.
In the long term, "Obstructionist Pelosi" is hurting her own power base and her desire of the expanding power of government more than helping it. So, keep holding out Nancy, you'll only destroy any chance the House will remain Democrat or win the White House in 2020.