Got that? National Parks are rising in importance, as some sort of “essential” government service to Tea Party “wacko bird” Republicans? Here’s the AP reporting that the House is in indeed planning to vote on reopening national parks.

Unlike some of my Reason colleagues, I didn’t think that Cruz’s extended health-care speech was a bad thing or a mistake (indeed, to the extent it was a long-winded peroration on the proper role of government, I think it even was pretty smart). And I don’t share fear of a government shutdown that’s designed to delay Obamacare and/or reduce federal spending by wringing compromises out of a president who refuses to negotiate because the Democrats had a a majority in 2010.

But in a Washington where 95 percent of Department of Education employees were sent home today because they are “non-essential,” I’d think twice about simply moving to restore pre-shutdown funding to the government. It would be nice to dust off actual budget proposals and start talking about what the government should do and how much (or how much little) it should spend in pursuit of those goals.