I have full faith that the Republican caucus in the House of Representatives will wreck the economy, and I give them full credit for that disastrous notion. That is my commitment to full faith and credit as I watch this entire unfolding mess <\/a>in Washington. From the Washington Post:<\/em><\/p>\n Treasury Secretary Janet L. Yellen told lawmakers that officials will alter certain federal investments to preserve the nation\u2019s credit until summer \u2014 largely through technical moves that will buy lawmakers time to pass legislation that raises or suspends the amount the government is allowed to borrow, currently capped at $31.4 trillion. \u201cI respectfully urge Congress to act promptly to protect the full faith and credit of the United States,\u201d Yellen wrote to House Speaker Kevin McCarthy<\/a> (R-Calif.) on Thursday. Newly emboldened House Republicans are trying to leverage the standoff to extract major spending cuts, insisting that previous Congresses and administrations have spent too much on social programs. Some GOP lawmakers have even raised the prospect of seeking changes to entitlement programs, including Social Security and Medicare. But the White House has said it will not negotiate on the debt ceiling, and President Biden has pledged to oppose any attempt to cut entitlements.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n The debt ceiling is an anachronism the way that lead paint is an anachronism. By now, we should know better than to eat paint chips, and the Congress should know better than to muck around with the debt ceiling. In fact, there is a strong argument<\/a> to be made now to get rid of the debt ceiling entirely. Unfortunately, it has become such a political weapon against Democratic presidents that it’s impossible to imagine a Republican congressional majority of any kind unilaterally laying it down.<\/p>\n As these things go, we are still in the Wishful Thinking stage of this very predictable crisis. A representative from Moody’s told the Post <\/em>that “a debt limit impasse will likely be resolved before a missed interest payment occurs because of public, political and financial market pressures on Congress reflecting concerns about the potentially severe consequences that a missed payment could have on financial markets and the economy.\u201d And some people actually believe<\/a> that a) moderate Republicans will be reasonable on this; b) moderate Republicans are honest brokers in the whole business; and c) that moderate Republicans are actually, well, moderate.<\/p>\n Good luck with that. From CNN:<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t think that a clean debt ceiling is in order, and I certainly don\u2019t think that a default is in order,\u201d Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick, a moderate whose Pennsylvania district Biden carried, told CNN, indicating he planned to engage in bipartisan talks next week over a compromise proposal when lawmakers return to Washington[…]\u201cI\u2019m not in favor of Biden\u2019s no-negotiating strategy, and I\u2019m not inclined to help,\u201d said Rep. Don Bacon, a Republican whose Nebraska district Biden carried, indicating Republicans campaigned against government spending and inflation. \u201cThe GOP can\u2019t demand the moon, and Biden can\u2019t refuse to negotiate. There needs to be give-and-take on both sides.\u201d<\/p>\n Bacon said there needs to be \u201cgood faith\u201d talks with the White House and some \u201ccommitment for fiscal restraint\u201d before he would even consider signing onto a discharge petition. Republican Rep. Mike Lawler, a New York freshman who also hails from a Biden district, said that Democrats aren\u2019t going to be able to work around McCarthy and the House GOP majority. \u201cThey need to come to a realization pretty quickly they are no longer in a one-party controlled government, and it requires negotiation,\u201d Lawler told CNN, adding that it\u2019s \u201cvery rational and reasonable\u201d for two parties to meet in the middle. \u201cIt\u2019s not Republicans acquiescing to Democrats.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cOur debt is not sustainable, and the White House insisting on more debt without budget reform isn\u2019t serious,\u201d said Rep. Nancy Mace, who hails from a South Carolina swing district, calling it an \u201cinherent problem that we must get serious about.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n Except, of course, that one has nothing to do with the other, which is why what the Republicans are doing is pure extortion. But don’t worry, the Useful Idiot Caucus is on the case. <\/p>\n Fitzpatrick, a leader of the bipartisan Problem Solvers Caucus, told CNN that he plans to engage next week in discussions within that group about a new plan to change the law over how the debt limit is set. Josh Gottheimer, a New Jersey Democrat and co-leader of the bipartisan group, confirmed that the members are trying to work on a bipartisan deal. \u201cWe\u2019re working together because we have to find a bipartisan way forward,\u201d Gottheimer said. \u201cThere\u2019s simply too much at stake.\u201d <\/p><\/blockquote>\n And just when you thought there was one too many cooks stirring this broth of bad faith, another makes<\/a> his inevitable appearance. From Bloomberg Government:<\/em><\/p>\n Manchin (W.Va.) said he already discussed a possible compromise with Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), whose fractious caucus has sought to extract concrete spending cuts and a balanced budget plan in exchange for any increase in the debt ceiling. Manchin, speaking to Fox Business in Davos, Switzerland, where he\u2019s attending the World Economic Forum, said he wants to package a debt ceiling increase with votes to create special commissions to examine shoring up the Social Security and Medicare trust funds, as well as another intended to reduce the overall US debt. \u201cWe have to work together. It has to be bipartisan and it has always been bipartisan as far as the debt ceiling,\u201d Manchin said. \u201cI think what we have to do is realize we have a problem, we have a debt problem.\u201d Manchin said he supports the Trust Act, a proposal by Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) to impanel commissions to recommend solutions to the eventual insolvency of the Medicare and Social Security trust funds.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Are we really going back to the Trust Act? That unholy adoptee of the defunct Simpson-Bowles commission\u2014one of the most worthless expenditures of time and money in the history of modern American politics, a commission that couldn’t even agree on its own proposals but announced them anyway\u2014and probably President Barack Obama’s biggest fiscal mistake? Both Simpson and Bowles love the Trust Act, which is reason enough for the rest of us not to trust a dipthong of it.<\/p>\n This is extortion, pure and simple, and the sooner everybody opposed to extortion explains it just that way, the sooner we can get rid of the mechanism itself and pay our damn bills. I mean, the federal government shouldn\u2019t be a deadbeat just because the past president was.<\/p>\n Charles P Pierce is the author of four books, most recently Idiot America<\/em>, and has been a working journalist since 1976. He lives near Boston and has three children.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n I have full faith that the Republican caucus in the House of Representatives will wreck the economy, and I give them full credit for that disastrous notion. That is my commitment to full faith and credit as I watch this entire unfolding mess in Washington. From the Washington Post: Treasury Secretary Janet L. Yellen told …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":44885,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[161],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.brandon.ddtest.info\/multisite-test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44884"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.brandon.ddtest.info\/multisite-test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.brandon.ddtest.info\/multisite-test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.brandon.ddtest.info\/multisite-test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.brandon.ddtest.info\/multisite-test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44884"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.brandon.ddtest.info\/multisite-test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44884\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.brandon.ddtest.info\/multisite-test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/44885"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.brandon.ddtest.info\/multisite-test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44884"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.brandon.ddtest.info\/multisite-test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44884"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.brandon.ddtest.info\/multisite-test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44884"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Headshot](\"https:\/\/hips.hearstapps.com\/rover\/profile_photos\/0b1812cd-e29f-44af-a0d3-74c35dc4b603.jpg\" "\\"This")
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