And now, for the rest of the story.
Here's why I think your take on this looming "crisis" is wrong.
The only way we literally "default" on the debt is to refuse to pay the interest. Those interest payments amount to only 15% of Treasury receipts collected from taxes in 2010. If we do not pay the interest it will because the president chooses not to. In other words, if a deal is not struck there will be NO default. And for the President to say there will be, or that seniors won't get their SSI checks, is complete falderale. It's political scare tactics.
What's more is Jay Carney, the White House Press Secretary, stated flatly to the Press that the PoTUS' "last and best offer" was to cut $2 Billion in spending ... in a $1 Trillion budget. Obama ruled as "off the table" any cuts, or even altering, Obamacare, Medicare, Medicaid, Green Projects, the stimulus bill (of which less than 20% has been spent to date) his high speed rail projects, and a half dozen other large ticket items. The GOP has countered with a proposal that would match dollar for dollar spending cuts with a raise in the debt limit - the "McConnell Plan", look it up. It even grants the President the power to choose the cuts for crying out loud!!! Something I adamantly object to. Still, if we're talking who is willing to compromise and who's not, does that seem a "reasonable" proposal? And what's MORE, the president has not put forth ONE, not ONE single proposal. Let me repeat that - there is NO White House Plan on the table, he is refusing to submit specifics such as McConnell and the GOP have done. Why? The truth is that the Obama team, and their surrogates have said as much publicly, believes that the 1990's shutdown is the model for how this plays out. Clinton came out smelling like roses, Gingrich the fertilizer. They feel the same will happen to Obama and Beohner/McConnell. So WHO is playing partisan politics?
In addition, the Tea Party acolytes are standing on principle, yes, that's true. But they were sent their for a specific reason. Hell, the entire 2008 GOP sweep was sent to DC for this reason - get spending under control. Why is it that the side that is standing on principle, the side that has put forth a measurable and specific plan, the side whom did not walk out on the talks, the side that has not ruled which programs are and are not off the cutting table, is the one to blame? It's asinine. The failure to compromise is because the President will put forth no offer outside of saying he'll go up to, UP TO, two billion dollars in cuts. What is the GOP supposed to do? Simply cave so they can avoid the potential for bad PR? Is that what we sent them their for? Is THAT the mandate from the 2008 landslide? Cave? Honestly, the president is refusing to negotiate, period. He rejects their proposals out of hand and offers none of his own, only vagaries. And solely because he believes he can win the PR battle in a default. So what is the GOP to do?
And by the way - be it the stimulus, the bailouts, or name your "emergency legislation", I'm tired of being told by my government that if we don't spend "X Trillion Dollars" that my country will fall apart. I don't buy it. I'm not scared. You cited "some economists" noting the dire consequences. Well, "some economists" that I have listened to debunk the idea of a default at all, not to mention the "crisis" an actual default will cause. And they add that the bottom line is this - if we keep spending we will go the way of Greece. Will their be short term consequences? Of course. But it doesn't take an economic degree to realize that if SOMEBODY doesn't stand up and draw a line in the sand on spending we will end up like a wink link in the EU. To raise the debt limit with no spending curbs, as the President wants, is to fix the short term while sacrificing the long term. And there's no EU around to bail out America. So SOMEBODY has got to stand up to the tide of spending madness washing through that city.
To put it simply - the bigger threat to the US economy is to continue to let this President SPEND. We do not have a revenue problem, we have a spending problem.
I'll close with this - in 2008 a then senator from Chicago voted "Nay" on raising the debt limit. He had to cease campaigning for president to come back and cast that nay vote. The measure pased over his objections, but he used his Constititional authority as a member of the Senate to attempt to prevent then President George W. Bush from borrowing even one more dollar. In fact, he urged President Bush and the congress to do what American families across the country were doing, living within their means. And when pressed by the media about the doom and gloom consequences of not raising the debt ceiling he dismissed it out of hand, refusing to have the conversation stating, and I quote: "To even discuss raising our debt limit is a failure in leadership."
Make that 2 posts in a row in which a Bund member agrees with Barak H. Obama.
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It would seem this evening that the President finally put his name on a plan. He is "co-sponsoring" a bill in the senate which would raise taxes and cap spending ... no cuts. My point stands though - we have gone this far in the proccess and only the GOP was negotiating via a specific plan. And they seem, in my opinion anyway, to be the only adults in the room on this. They've offered REAL compromise, and the President has stormed out of the room like a moody teenager and not lamented on any position.
I say let the default come - no more sacraficing the long term health of this nation for short term, get me through the next election, fixes. It's time we had this fight. Better now then when we're going around like Greece, hat in hand, begging for bail outs and mercy, talking about "the good old days" when we were once a super power.
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