Seized by a brief spasm of optimism, I hereby predict with gritted teeth that, one way or another, our elected minions in Washington will raise the federal debt ceiling – as they always have before – instead of driving us into default and destroying the full faith and credit of the United States.
But it may well happen without the participation of the Republican cultists, who seem determined not only to sabotage democracy at the ballot box but to wreck the economy in the interim. It’s tribalism run amuck. I guess fiscal health is now deemed to be a “liberal” concept, at least whenever a Democrat holds the White House.
Earlier this week the Senate’s cult wing voted No on a measure to stave off an October default that could trigger a recession (jeopardizing six million jobs and $15 trillion in household wealth, in the midst of Pandemic II), a default that could destabilize global markets and jeopardize the status of the dollar as the international reserve currency. In the immortal words of sabotage maestro Mitch McConnell, “We will not provide Republican votes for raising the debt limit.” He claims that raising the ceiling – enabling Uncle Sam to borrow more U.S. Treasury money in order to pay his bills – would be an excuse for the Democrats to spend trillions on trifles like, oh for instance, better medical care and child care and clean energy. What McConnell calls “partisan socialism.”
McConnell is full of manure, as he well knows, because in truth raising the debt ceiling is all about enabling Uncle Sam to pay yesterday’s bills – including the bills incurred by the Former Guy and the former Republican Congress. McConnell, you may be interested to learn, voted three times to raise or suspend the ceiling while Trump was busy adding $7.8 trillion to the debt. And Senate Democrats voted Yes as well, because, until now, raising or suspending the ceiling had been a bipartisan tradition. Like, 78 times in the last 60 years. Like, 49 times under Republican presidents and only 29 times under Democratic presidents.
It’s worth repeating: The debt ceiling doesn’t authorize any new federal spending; it merely allows the government to finance spending that Congress previously approved – including the nuts-and bolts federal transactions that everyone of red and blue hue takes for granted, like Medicaid payments, jobless payments, tuition assistance payments, military paychecks, and Social Security.
Why are Senate Republicans suddenly so cavalier about playing with people’s lives? Well, for starters, the cultist-in-chief decrees that it is a good thing. In a recent fundraising email, he said: “The only powerful tool that Republicans have to negotiate with is the Debt Ceiling, and they would be both foolish and unpatriotic not to use it.” So now it’s patriotic to sabotage our ability to pay our bills? Yet again, Samuel Johnson is proven right for saying in 1775 that “patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel.”
One particular president insisted that true patriotism requires us to pay our bills. We should never be driven “to the edge of default,” he said, because “The United States has a special responsibility to itself and the world to meet its obligation. It means we have a well-earned reputation for reliability and credibility – two things that set us apart from much of the world.”
So said Republican Ronald Reagan. Who benefited – with Democratic help – from 18 debt ceiling hikes.
But as we all know, if Ronald Reagan was alive today and seeking the GOP nomination, he’d never survive the Iowa caucus. He at least had a few governing precepts; today’s MAGA mob, still in thrall to its mobster, doesn’t care a whit about governing. If the Democrats can’t find a way to raise the debt ceiling on their own, and economic chaos ensues, Republicans would be happy to feast on the carnage; if the Democrats do find a way to raise the ceiling on their own (yes it’s doable), Republicans in ’22 would run campaign ads that equate big debt with big-spending Democrats (a dumbed-down message that would click with the credulous and bedazzle the ill-informed).
So much nihilism, so little time left to indulge it.
Once again Democrats are compelled to be the responsible grownups, tasked with maintaining civic order. It would be bad enough if the Republicans were merely children setting off firecrackers. But as evidenced each passing day, they’re far more dangerous than that.