...The hostage-takers are back: blackmail worked well last December, so why not try it again? This time House Republicans say they will refuse to raise the debt ceiling — a step that could inflict major economic damage — unless Mr. Obama agrees to large spending cuts, even as they rule out any tax increase whatsoever. And the question becomes what, if anything, will get the president to say no. ...Paul Krugman
Krugman is referring (of course) to the White House/House deal which wound up giving further tax cuts to the rich in return for maintaining an extension of tax cuts to the middle class.
What we have to face, though, is that the Republicans have no problem with destroying the economy. A slipping economy is the one thing, now, that would guarantee Obama's loss of the presidency in 2012. So Republicans are very willing to risk putting the economy in the tank. There's no question but that this is lethal game-playing. Republicans have turned their eyes away from reality and the people they're supposed to serve. This brinkmanship can wind up having consequences that are a great deal more than political.
Normally, a party controlling neither the White House nor the Senate would acknowledge that it isn’t in a position to impose its agenda on the nation. But the modern G.O.P. doesn’t believe in following normal rules.
So what will happen if the ceiling isn’t raised? It has become fashionable on the right to assert that it would be no big deal. On Saturday the editorial page of The Wall Street Journal ridiculed those worried about the consequences of hitting the ceiling as the “Armageddon lobby.”
It’s hard to know whether the “what, us worry?” types believe what they’re saying, or whether they’re just staking out a bargaining position. But in any case, they’re almost surely wrong: seriously bad consequences will follow if the debt ceiling isn’t raised.
So what's Obama done about it so far? He has said there's a line in the sand, but the line hasn't been drawn. The president, Krugman writes, "can’t call the extortionists’ bluff unless he’s willing to confront them, and accept the associated risks."
Already there are signs that they could back down. The situation Republicans have gotten themselves into worries them. How much political credibility would they have if they bring the economy to its knees? Never mind (they clearly show) what it could do to people who are already suffering from thirty years of their casually destructive economics.
Enough, Krugman says. Obama needs to stand up to them.
At some point — and sooner rather than later — the president has to draw a line. Otherwise, he might as well move out of the White House, and hand the keys over to the Tea Party.
Maybe. But there's something else: aren't we getting used to Obama allowing the Republicans to take us to the brink of disaster? Allowing the media to paint very, very scary pictures of our future? And always because Republicans are taking us to the brink? Hasn't the president learned that the Republicans lose points every time?
I think voters have shown over and over again that they like the drama associated with rash ("decisive") action but not the action itself. But not be a part of it.
The American people are used watching scary, rash action, then turning off the television and going to a nice, safe bed. If Republican actions force people to feel as well as see the mayhem, well, that's another issue altogether.
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Take what's-his-name Ryan, for example. Now there's a Republican who insisted on gambling. He's losing.
It's morning in America! Americans are awake and angry!
Republicans on Capitol Hill may be in the process of learning a hard lesson: Meddling with Medicare, whatever the nation’s fiscal circumstances, just isn’t popular.
They are feeling the heat now because of House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan’s (R-Wis.) controversial plan to turn Medicare into a type of voucher system. Presented as a serious attempt to fix the program’s projected shortfalls, the proposal instead appears to have turned the political tide back toward the congressional Democrats, who were on the ropes after last November’s midterms.
Fifty-three percent of voters recently surveyed by The Hill said they would not accept any reduction in Medicare benefits even if doing so would help get the national debt and federal deficits under control. ...The Hill
Yeah, yeah. But they'll go back to Republicans when they're in the voting booth. Not! Look at New York state Democrat Kathy Hochul's campaign in a special election up in Republican territory.
Recent polls show her competitive or slightly ahead of Republican nominee Jane Corwin, although a Tea Party candidate complicates the handicapping of that race.
“I think the Ryan budget has given us the impetus,” Hochul told MSNBC last week. She added that, in conversations with voters in the upstate district, conservatives and liberals alike “were talking about two things: jobs and protecting Medicare. And the Republicans in Washington appear to be tone-deaf to that.”
