All I can say is that I watched both in real time and stand by my opinions of just how severe these various periods were. Note, for example, O'Neil allowing the passage of Reagan's tax rate cuts. Sure, he was about as utterly vicious a class warrior as we've ever seen on the modern political stage (e.g. https://www.nationalreview.com/nrd/articles/336185/good-ol-t...), but he could have totally shut down Reagan's agenda if he was willing to pay the political cost, the House leadership has near absolute control over the agenda, which wasn't true for the Senate in modern times until Harry Reid.

Although you do have a point about how the MSM treats budget conflicts for a Democratic vs. a Republican Congress. One complicating factor is that the Republicans did not control both houses during the period 1955-1993.

If you look at Speaker O'Neil's history, the Democrats did not control both houses during some of those shutdowns. He did shutdown big parts of Reagan's agenda in the first years of Reagan's presidency.

The difference today is other people have audiences. So, instead of becoming the bastions of accuracy and fact checking, the NY Times, ABC, NBC, etc. have continued to be pundits. Washington hasn't changed one bit since the 1800 election, its the fourth estate that tries to influence instead of inform.