Talk is cheap and, no matter how sincere a person is, actions speak louder than words. In the face of reality, the flustered rhetoric that surrounded the “sequester” of federal spending, which loomed up first at the beginning of January and then at the beginning of March, has begun to unravel. Most likely, we all can remember the panicked tone of politicians as the “sequester” approached.

For example, when the postponed date for the sequester’s implementation, March 1, 2013, arrived, President Barack Obama referred to it as “dumb, arbitrary cuts to things that businesses depend on and workers depend on, like education, and research, and infrastructure, and defense.” “Unnecessary,” he called them, and said that, “at a time when too many Americans are still looking for work,” they are “inexcusable.” And the cuts to be implemented this year were only $85 billion.

For all this near-hysteria, however, the U.S. Senate has not passed a budget in nearly four years. One would think that 100 of the world’s most prestigious politicians would understand the importance of passing a unified, comprehensive, spending policy. Indeed, since the entire Obama presidency has been funded with continuing resolutions that more or less keep current spending going, a lingering economic recession is no surprise.

Last week, however, the Senate finally did it, passing a budget resolution with a vote of 50-49. Shortly before that, the House of Representatives passed a continuing resolution that funded the federal government through Sept. 30, the end of the fiscal year. When it did, the House’s members began to push back against the across-the-board spending cuts of the sequester, assigning the cuts in a more discretionary way.

In the words of the Washington Post, “The legislation includes provisions that will blunt the impact of the sequester.” Because the continuing resolution might allow the Department of Defense to stave off furloughs for some 800,000 employees, the Department announced furlough notices will be given until April 5. In addition, many meat inspectors will be kept on the job by shuffling around appropriations to the Department of Agriculture.

Apparently, now that (among other effects) the White House has canceled tours, the Navy’s Blue Angels will discontinue their appearances at air shows and the Federal Aviation Administration has begun shutting down 149 air traffic control towers, the House — including majority Republicans — are rethinking the wisdom and prudence of making indiscriminate spending cuts.

Things like furloughing 800,000 Department of Defense employees and thousands of meat inspectors should never happen, if they are indeed as negative or detrimental as claimed.

Although Congress is collectively rethinking sequestration, its members show nothing more than the traits of procrastinating college students. Realizing that the sequester is unwise or imprudent is still a far leap from taking the wise, prudent steps of trying to solve the problem of harmful budget cuts instead of, say, campaigning for re-election or regurgitating the same worn out phrases.

Since Congress is a political institution with many members, passing legislation requires politicking. It requires reaching out to the other guy, at least trying to understand — not just hear, but to listen and understand — what he says and, with him, crafting a workable solution.

Congress’ failure to pass a budget for the past few years and its reliance on continuing resolutions and inability to create a unified spending policy that makes priorities indicate an inability to do politics. The often-denigrated “politics as usual” are, in fact, not politics. Interacting with others becomes difficult when we shut ourselves off from each other, and from reality. 

Politics is interaction, not stubbornness. Amending the sequester is an example of politics; allowing it to come about, is not.