As day one of the government shutdown continues, many people are left wondering what happened? If the leaders of both parties said they didn't want the government to shut down and President Barack Obama, along with congressional Democrats, were poised to negotiate in good faith and make reasonable compromises, how did we get where we are?

Alison Lundergan Grimes started her stump speech to union members, local Democratic Party officials and others in Paducah, Ky., with a quote from Sen. Mitch McConnell: “Public sector unions are a 50-year mistake. Unions are to blame for distrust of our government. Unions are power hungry and no longer serve the public interest.”

Then the 34-year-old Democrat who wants McConnell’s job lowered the boom:

He didn’t realize what he was describing was how Kentuckians feel about his service in Washington.

OMG! Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) says he won’t stand in the way of a vote on President Obama’s nominees to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB). Well, sort of. McConnell says that out of the president’s bipartisan package of five nominees, Republicans won’t filibuster the two Republicans and just one of the three Democratic nominees.

The son of a United Steelworkers (USW) member is leading a Murray (Ky.) State University student protest against their school's choice of U.S. Sen. Mitch McConnell as this year's graduation speaker May 11. The lad is Devin Griggs, who won the outstanding labor youth award from the Kentucky State AFL-CIO at the state convention in 2011.

Berry Craig, recording secretary for the Paducah-based Western Kentucky AFL-CIO Area Council and a professor of history at West Kentucky Community and Technical College, is a former daily newspaper and Associated Press columnist and currently a member of AFT Local 1360. Craig sends us this.

Retired Kentucky United Steelworkers (USW) member Jim Pence is doing his bit to help retire Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.). “Social media is the way to go,” said Pence, who lives in Glendale, Ky., and belonged to USW Local 423 in Louisville. Pence has opened a pair of Facebook pages: Ditch Mitch and 1,000,000 Strong Against Senator Mitch McConnell in 2014.

The compromise version of filibuster reform that the U.S. Senate approved Thursday is “a missed opportunity to move forward or even ensure debate on the critical issues facing our nation," said Communications Workers of America (CWA) President Larry Cohen.

The reforms do streamline some filibuster rules by limiting filibusters on what is known as the “motion to proceed.”

Even a heartless Grinch should understand that cutting Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid benefits is a really bad idea.

Republican congressional leaders offered their budget counter-proposal Monday in response to President Obama's proposal, but it does little more than rehash previous offers that were clearly rejected by the voters in November's election.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and other Republican senators objected to a report from the Congressional Research Service (CRS), the Economic Policy Institute (EPI) reported, which led to the report being withdrawn by the CRS. The report shows that CRS found no correlation between reductions in top tax rates and economic growth, and little association with savings, investment or productivity.

CRS writes:

The evidence does not suggest necessarily a relationship between tax policy with regard to the top tax rates and the size of the economic pie, but there may be a relationship to how the economic pie is sliced.

Berry Craig, recording secretary for the Paducah-based Western Kentucky AFL-CIO Area Council and a professor of history at West Kentucky Community and Technical College, is a former daily newspaper and Associated Press columnist and currently a member of AFT Local 1360. Craig sends us this.

The hours are long but, says Kentucky United Steelworkers (USW) member Chris Ormes, “I'm loving it. I'm at ground zero, and that's where I want to be."

Ormes, 37, president of USW Local 1241 in Bardstown, Ky., says ground zero is Ohio. The state's electoral votes likely will decide who wins the presidential election. He is a foot soldier in a small army of union volunteers who are toiling 12- and even 14-hour days to help President Obama take the Buckeye State.