"It's hard to overstate how irresponsible this is, especially for a leading U.S. senator"

Posted with permission.

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2011_03/028426.php

CORNYN WANTS TO PLAY WITH FIRE; WILL WE ALL GET BURNED?.... Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) indicated on Friday his caucus is prepared to kill a debt-limit extension unless "something significant" is done about the debt McConnell helped create. On Twitter yesterday, Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), chairman of the NRSC, was even more explicit:



It's hard to overstate how irresponsible this is, especially for a leading U.S. senator.

House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) recently said failing to raise the debt limit "would be a financial disaster, not only for us, but for the worldwide economy." Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said failure to raise the debt limit would lead to "financial collapse and calamity throughout the world." Fox News' Charles Krauthammer said the consequences would be "catastrophic." Fox News' Dana Perino said Republicans are inviting "economic disaster." George Will said policymakers would have to be "suicidal."

Cornyn knows all of this, but doesn't care. He's the hostage taker, he's looking for "leverage," and he thinks he's found it.

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke recently warned congressional Republicans not to "play around with" a coming vote to raise the government's legal borrowing limit, adding that lawmakers shouldn't view the debt ceiling as a "bargaining chip." Austan Goolsbee, chairman of President Obama's Council of Economic Advisers, recently explained, "If we get to the point where you've damaged the full faith and credit of the United States, that would be the first default in history caused purely by insanity."

And yet, there's John Cornyn, not just saying crazy things in private, but taking his strategy public. "Do what I want," he's effectively telling Democrats, "or I'll cause a catastrophe on purpose."

Behold, the Republican Party of the 21st century.

Update: Remember, time is running out. The Treasury expects to hit the debt ceiling sometime between April 15 and the end of May.

—Steve Benen

"...but if you want to buy a week's worth of food for your family we'll take your house away."

The GOP's primary goal is to win & gain more power - not to cut the deficit, not to help the economy recover, not to serve the interests of the people.

Either A-They agree to raise the debt ceiling because Dems caved (which they most certainly will) on their plans to drown gummint in the bathtub or B-The country goes bankrupt and they get to blame the Dems for refusing to "compromise". Beautifully simple, no? And they WILL get away with it.

There'll be no choice; we will be hostages.

"I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter: So help me God."

If they are working together to harm the US (even if it is just financial ruin) aren't they in violation of their oaths? Can't these people be charged with sedition and arrested?

then raising the debt ceiling shouldn't be subject to a vote by Congress.

then raising the debt ceiling shouldn't be subject to a vote by Congress.

The GOP caused catastrophe already with the Bush Crash, but my Democratic legislators went along with the pretense that we should be bipartisan and weaken all our democratic ideals to get one or two of their precious votes.

I know I need to let go of the past, but how different would things be if all my Democratic legislators had banded together with their electoral mandate and pushed through strong democratic policies like universal health care and millions of jobs rebuilding our infrastructure with conservation and green technologies (to help us use oil more judiciously over a longer period), and withdrawing from the Bush Wars which have been so counterproductive in terms of our national security.

Millions would be working. Millions evicted from their homes would at least be able to get medical care without thinking of the cost. We would be further along toward complete withdrawal from the Bush Wars, anticipating better use of the billions poured into the private offshore accounts of war profiteers...

Will my Democratic legislators now finally band together to acknowledge and publicize the GOP's pure destructive motives? Will they speak out about the destructiveness or go along with the big new pretense that We All Need Shared Sacrifice? Will they please ask the cruel new crop of Republican governors about how they can be talking deficit reduction when they instituted corporate tax cuts that they are trying to fund by slashing budgets for their most vulnerable citizens?

Low Income Heating Assistance for our poor or Tax Cuts for Supplementing Offshore Accounts of Multinational Corporations?

How can we reduce giving US government business to corporations that pay no US taxes?

The investment banks threatened the world with economic calamity if their demands were not met. They got their bailout money with almost no strings attached.

It worked in December when the Republicans demanded an extension of the Bush tax cuts for the rich, or they would block everything else. They got what they wanted.

When you give in to extortionists, they'll keep demanding more and more.