Do you believe Obama would have used the 14th Amendment had midnight come on August 2nd?

Now we can have this counterfactual discussion in hindsight.

Had the US been in a situation of imminent default on midnight August 2nd (or whatever the deadline date was) with no debt ceiling increase from Congress, do you think Obama would have pulled the trigger, invoked the 14th and simply raised the debt ceiling on his own? Or would he have thrown his hands up in the air and let the nation go into default?

Obama is so averse to conflict and combat that it is really hard to say.

this was ready to go in motion if necessary, risks and all. No way this administration or any past administration would have let the U.S. default. IMHO

But even that can be hard to discern from. It's a what if counterfactual.

Right in the middle.

:rofl:

Or he would have triangulated the 7th and 21st to get to the 14th. Prohibition Part Deux.

It would have gone to court, and immediately been lost.

I don't see him ever doing such a thing. It would be a modern-day version of crossing the Rubicon, if only in miniature. In that scenario, I see him as far more Pompey than Caesar.

His likely response if there had been no compromise would have been to watch the default happen, then make a speech which was even-handed in the blame while offering platitudes. Honestly, I don't think it would be too much different from what we've seen the last couple of weeks. He offers a weak condemnation of a pack of raving barbarians while trotting out some "solution" that is just a chimera.

I don't like to sound so pessimistic, but it's always been apparent that he just doesn't have the heart to fight. I think he's spent his life trying to be above the fray without realizing that an elected position is very much in the fray.

Link



I'll bet it's not even a passing thought on Martha's Vineyard tonight.

Certainly the Repig leadership had their couriers on standby to get a motion to the USSC within minutes of any such ruling, and
we can be equally certain that the Supreme Court's response has already been written and for whose side they would rule.

Most likely Obama already heard from a majority of Justices, warning him against any such step.

Like ordering Tim Geithner to proceed with Treasury auctions anyway.

I don't know, but Abraham Lincoln and Andrew Jackson both ignored the USSC on two occasions and there were no consequences.

The courts would likely treat the constitutional issues as nonjusticiable under the "political question" doctrine, as they do in the case of war powers.

http://upload.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=433&topic_id=726122&mesg_id=726227

Main thread:

http://upload.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=433&topic_id=726122&mesg_id=726122

I believe he probably had his OLC combing all over it day and night for weeks, along with any other options (see link), and he would very reluctantly done the crucial thing. As fraught as invoking the 14th was with potential political fallout, the political repercussions for failure to act in the final hour would have been far greater for him.

http://upload.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=433&topic_id=726122&mesg_id=726122

The 14th does not address RAISING the debt limit. Court would have flipped it in a heartbeat.

blamed for failing to stop the collapse.