Senate Republican aides are hoping that the letter doesn’t amass more than 50 signatures, since presumably most GOPers who do sign it are likely to vote No on the McConnell proposal. Walsh’s goal is to get more than 100 signatures on the letter, which would be a major statement of opposition to the McConnell plan in the House and would raise doubts about whether it can pass.
If the letter does get around 100 signatories, that would mean there are around 140 remaining Republicans. Even if all of them voted for the plan, that would mean you’d need roughly another 80 House Dems. That is probably gettable, though it may be difficult, given all the noise Dems are suddenly making against the proposal. One Dem aide tells me the question of how many Dems will support it turns heavily on the complexion of the $1.5 trillion in cuts that would be packaged with the McConnell proposal.
That all sounds pretty ominous. But it’s also possible, as Senate GOP and Dem aides are hoping, that there will be a drop dead moment of terror next week that will, shall we say, persuade people to rethink their positions a bit.
This would be the same Joe Walsh who...ahem...distinguished himself on Hardball yesterday:
Hell, even I don't know how big the U.S. Economy is...
...oh, that's right. I'm not an elected Congressman, trying to scold the rest of the country into ending entitlement programs, while keeping all the tax cuts for my true constituency, rich folks and corporations.
...and by "favorite", I mean, my Father will for the first time in his life give a max-out donation to any Presidential Candidate, namely Barack Obama, to make sure Rick Perry is not only defeated, but embarrassed in the coming 2012 election.
May not be 100% safe for work. View at your discretion.
My Dad, a lifelong Democrat and unapologetic Liberal, is going to see that headline (he gets an Email subscription to this blog, after all), and demand I take it down. He don't want to be confused with a Republican...ever.
"Let me put it this way," said Warren on yesterday's call. "I'm saving all the rocks in my pockets for Republicans. And if that's too partisan for you, then shame on me."
Elizabeth Warren is ready to name and shame. After 10 long months spent crafting a brand-new federal agency in her image and likeness, years before that willing the institution into statutory existence, only to be passed over on Sunday in favor of Richard Cordray just as the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is moving out of beta, Warren, on a press call late yesterday afternoon, was eager to share her clarity on who's to blame for the especially precarious position the new federal-friend-to-the-American-consumer now finds itself in.
Rich will be a strong leader for this agency. He has a proven track record of fighting for families during his time as head of the CFPB enforcement division, as Attorney General of Ohio, and throughout his career. He was one of the first senior executives I recruited for the agency, and his hard work and deep commitment make it clear he can make many important contributions in leading it. Rich is smart, he is tough, and he will make a stellar Director. I am very pleased for him and very pleased for the CFPB.
And if you watch the interview below, she gets even more specific.
This is a little seen, little read blog. I should not be doing more reporting than Atlantic Monthly professionals.
Rachel wisely held back, and let the Professor do her thing.
UPDATE: 11:57AM Pacific. Watching that last part again. Rachel pretty much asked her "Are you running for Senate", and not only did Dr. Warren not say no, that was as much in the affirmative as I'd seen her say. Dr. Warren still did not say she was running, but this was the closest I've seen her come to saying she was in.
Today's announcement kinda sealed that deal. After all, another entry would have to be Andrew Cuomo, currently Governor of New York, and possible 2016 Democratic Nominee for President of the United States.
The question of the day (with a hat tip to NC Steve 3.0 over at TPM) is whether Republican voters will consider today's incident a feature, or a bug. (You know which way I'm leaning.)
That’s when things got interesting. Ross dashed after Bachmann, repeatedly asking whether she had ever missed a House vote due to a migraine. She ignored him. Ross pursued her into a parking area behind the stage. Her aides grew alarmed. When Ross made a beeline for the white SUV waiting to carry Bachmann away, two Bachmann men pounced on him, grabbing and pushing him multiple times with what looked to me like unusual force. In fact, I have never seen a reporter treated so roughly at a campaign event, especially not a presidential one. Ross was finally able to break away and lob his question at Bachmann one more time, but she continued to ignore him.
Afterward, I asked Ross — a hard-nosed pro who nevertheless seemed slightly shaken — whether he had ever been treated so roughly. “A few times,” he told me. “Mostly by mafia people.”
I'm pretty sure Brian Ross has the video of this. Film at eleven!
Late yesterday GOP Rep. Joe Walsh, who is backed by the Tea Party, began circulating a letter among GOP colleagues that urges GOP leaders John Boehner and Eric Cantor to publicly oppose the McConnell plan and even to oppose it coming to the floor for a vote.
A Senate Republican aide tells me that GOP aides will be closely watching the number of signatures it amasses in order to gauge whether the McConnell proposal can get through the House.
“On behalf of the millions of Americans we represent, we strongly urge you to both publicly oppose Senator McConnell’s plan to raise the debt ceiling and ensure it never comes to the House floor for a vote,” the letter reads.
“We understand Senator Mitch McConnell’s frustration with the debt ceiling debate, but his plan enables Congress to avoid making the hard decisions,” the letter continues. “This plan is nothing more than politics as usual: it passes the buck to President Obama and robs the American people of their voice in Congress.
Senate Republican aides are hoping that the letter doesn’t amass more than 50 signatures, since presumably most GOPers who do sign it are likely to vote No on the McConnell proposal. Walsh’s goal is to get more than 100 signatures on the letter, which would be a major statement of opposition to the McConnell plan in the House and would raise doubts about whether it can pass.
For the record, we're talking about Joe Walsh of Illinois, not Joe Walsh, who's famous and actually worth something.
Okay, first things first. Read this paragraph. Don't watch the video yet. Just read the text, and see what you think.
“Congress consistently brings the Government to the edge of default before facing its responsibility. This brinkmanship threatens the holders of government bonds and those who rely on Social Security and veterans benefits. Interest rates would skyrocket, instability would occur in financial markets, and the Federal deficit would soar. The United States has a special responsibility to itself and the world to meet its obligations. It means we have a well-earned reputation for reliability and credibility — two things that set us apart from much of the world.”
Pretty much boilerplate Democratic thinking on the need to raise the Debt Ceiling, right?. That's the text of the speech you're about to hear on the embedded video.
But listen to it, and prepare to be shocked! Shocked I tells ya! Because this is a video from the House Democratic Caucus, espousing the "Liberal" position, and look who it is who's doing the speaking.
It just goes to show you. Republicans love Ronald Reagan. They worship Ronald Reagan. They just wouldn't let the actual Ronald Reagan into their party.
I've always been fascinated my fellow Liberal's obsession over Elizabeth Warren. It ranks right up there with our (their) collective obsession with Van Jones. It's a broken record already: "If X person is not given Y position, then this is the latest betrayal Barack Obama has given to the Liberal People of America."
Stop it.
I hope I don't have to prove my pro-Dr. Warren bona-fides on this space, but it you need proof, you need only look up my blogpost: Elizabeth Warren for Consumer Protection...if she wants it. (Written a year ago, just about to the day). Yes, she is that great. Yes, I want her to have the job...
...if she wants it.
Yes. If.
So, we've heard her say it plainly that she wants the job right? I mean that's been all over the place (by which I mean, it hasn't). Does she want another job, say, Scott Brown's? Does she want to go back to Harvard?
SIDEBAR: I mean, I know it's hard to believe but those Academic jobs are pretty damn sweet. Right now, dear ol' Dad goes into the office every day, but mostly does his own thing (which would be Researching Mathematics), teaches three classes, keeps a generous Office Hours schedule (which means his students can actually reach him and ask him questions), and gets well paid for his efforts. He can eat dinner with his wife. Go out on weekends and take vacations as necessary, and can actually shut off his phone from time to time.
Whoever is nominated to lead the CFPB is going to spend the next year of his life being filibustered by Republicans. The very best he can hope for is a recess appointment, in which case his tenure in the position would be relatively swift. So the question isn’t who you want leading the CFPB for the foreseeable future. It’s who you want spending his or her time being stopped from leading the CFPB for the foreseeable future. And it’s not clear that the answer to that question is “Elizabeth Warren.”
Warren, after all, has another option that she appears to be taking seriously: challenging Scott Brown in the 2012 election. For reasons I’ve outlined here and Bob Kuttner elaborates on here, there’s reason to think she would be a very effective candidate. But if she wants to do that, she can’t spend the next year being blocked from leading the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. She has to spend at least part of it preparing for her candidacy.
Now, I don’t think there’s any doubt that Warren would prefer to lead the agency she’s built than launch a Senate campaign that may or may not succeed. But launching a Senate campaign that may or may not succeed seems like a clearly more effective way to protect her agency and further her ideas than being blocked from leading the agency she’s built.
Meanwhile, Richard Cordray is actually in a very good position to spend the next year or two being blocked from running the CFPB. Cordray, a former Ohio attorney general with a great reputation in consumer-protection circles and Warren’s blessing, doesn’t have anything to run for until Ohio’s governorship opens in 2014. By all accounts, he’s a good choice to lead the agency now, if he can somehow get past the Republicans, and spending a few years publicly fighting to protect consumers is unlikely to hurt him back home.
Rich will be a strong leader for this agency. He has a proven track record of fighting for families during his time as head of the CFPB enforcement division, as Attorney General of Ohio, and throughout his career. He was one of the first senior executives I recruited for the agency, and his hard work and deep commitment make it clear he can make many important contributions in leading it. Rich is smart, he is tough, and he will make a stellar Director. I am very pleased for him and very pleased for the CFPB.
Make no mistake: this agency still has enemies in Washington, D.C. And they have a plan.
In May, forty-four Republican Senators wrote a letter saying that they will block anyone from serving as CFPB Director. Many of them don't like the agency or the ideas that led to its creation. They lost that fight last summer in a straight-up vote, but they say they will use a filibuster over a Director nomination to undercut the agency. Without a Director, however, the agency's authority over payday lenders, debt collectors and other non-bank financial companies can be challenged. The Republicans say that they will permit a Director only if the agency is amended to make it less independent and less likely to act.
I remain hopeful that those who want to cripple this consumer bureau will think again and remember that the financial crisis -- and the recession and job losses that it sparked -- began one lousy mortgage at a time. I also hope that when those Senators next go home, they ask their constituents how they feel about fine print, about signing contracts with terms that are incomprehensible, and about learning the true costs of a financial transaction only later when fees are piled on or interest rates are reset. I hope they will ask the people in their districts if they are opposed to an agency that is working to make prices clear or if they think budgets should be cut for an agency that is trying to make sure that trillion-dollar banks follow the law. I hope they will ask their constituents if they are opposed to the confirmation of someone who saved $2 billion for retirees, investors, and business owners as Ohio Attorney General and who has worked hard on the front lines fighting against fraudulent foreclosures and abusive lending practices.
This week is the culmination of two years of hard battles. The President put the consumer agency in his first outline of financial regulatory reform, and he never wavered in his support for it. The agency was declared dead several times, and weak versions and lousy bargains were offered again and again, but he stood fast. When he signed Dodd-Frank into law, creating the new agency, he offered me the chance to stand it up -- something for which I will always be grateful. The fights continued, and again, the President never wavered in his support. In fact, just last week he issued a veto threat if the Republicans try to move the agency's funding to the political process, and I know that in the future he won't allow opponents of reform to succeed in weakening the CFPB.
Still, while I agree with the sentiment, I'm pretty sure Bill Clinton could make a pretty good argument on his behalf. Bubba was better at the "I feel your pain" and off-the-cuff empathy speeches. The Boss is better at slowly, painful, and coldly eviscerating his opposition. Bubba was better at heightening emotion. The Boss was better at beating down his opponents.
Simply put, Clinton is a slap on the back; Obama is that hard elbow you get driving the lane that the refs don't call.
So (cough-cough) you may have noticed that I've been relying on quite a bit of Lawrence to do my blog this week. Then again, I've never seen my position on an issue, and my position on an issue so perfectly in alignment.
Strangely enough, I've never seen a intra-ideology dispute, like the one I've been having with dear ol' Dad this past week, so perfectly encapsulated in this discussion between Lawrence O'Donnell and Jonathan Alter (where I'm Lawrence and Dad is Jonathan Alter):
President Obama emphasizes the importance of compromise and shared sacrifice so that we can overcome our fiscal challenges and get our economy on a stronger footing going forward.
This was a great, great catch by the fine folks at The Only Adult In The Room, but given the headlines of the last couple of days, it bears repeating...
Of course, any time the President takes the time to kick the crap out of the Huffington Post...
President Obama recently took a beating from some on the left for suggesting that immediate deficit reduction is necessary to take the issue off the table and make it possible to spend more on liberal priorities later. And Obama of course has regularly been criticized by liberals for prioritizing deficit reduction and for effectively ceding the argument over government spending and job creation to the other side.
In a key moment at his presser today, Obama gave what I think is the most extensive reply to that criticism yet. It’s worth quoting at length (transcript slightly edited):
If you are a progressive, you should be concerned about debt and deficit just as much as if you’re a conservative. And the reason is because if the only thing we’re talking about over the next year, two years, five years is debt and deficits, then it’s very hard to start talking about how do we make investments in community colleges so that our kids are trained. How do we actually rebuild $2 trillion worth of crumbling infrastructure.
If you care about making investments in our kids, and making investments in our infrastructure, and making investments in basic research, then you should want our fiscal house in order so that every time we propose a new initiative, somebody doesn’t just throw up their hands and say “more big spending, more government.”
It would be very helpful for us to be able to say to the American people: “Our fiscal house is in order. So, now the question is, what should we be doing to win the future, and make ourselves more competitive, and create more jobs, and what aspects of what government’s doing are a waste, and we should eliminate.” And that’s the kind of debate that I’d like to have.
Obama’s argument is that progressives won’t be able to make the case to the public for more spending unless the deficit is neutralized as an issue. The idea seems to be that once Republicans and Democrats buy into a bipartisan plan that reduces the deficit, voters will more open when Dems propose government investment in our economy, infrastructure and future. They won’t be as easily distracted every time Republicans shout, “Boo, Big Government Liberal.”
Some liberals will respond that this risks ceding the short term argument in advance, with the result that the public never gets to hear the case for running deficits in a bad economy and dealing with them later. Liberals will also reply that Republicans will go right on tarring Dem policies as big spending liberalism run amok even if a deficit deal is reached — and that there's no taking such issues “off the table.”
I assume that Obama knows this, and thinks that even if this is true, the public will be less receptive to GOP arguments once the deficit has been neutralized as an issue — that the public will be more capable of actually listening to the ideas Dems are proposing. Jonathan Bernstein argues that there’s precedent for this: Once Clinton restored his credibility with the middle of the country in the wake of the 1994 disaster, he was able to pick (and win) major fights over the proper role of government and the safety net that set back the GOP drive to dismantle government for a decade.
I don’t know if this will work for Obama — unlike Clinton, he’s attempting this in the middle of a terrible economy. But either way, there’s no longer any doubt about the President’s reasoning as to why it’s appropriate for deficit reduction to throughly dominate our politics for the time being.
Lawrence had a busy night, which is why I'm pretty much giving you the first half of last night's show. And he engages in one of my favorite sports, Professional Left Bashing.
You'll note the part of the first segment where he reminds America that one of the first things then-President Bill Clinton did was cut Medicare Spending, and not one Liberal howled. (I seem to remember some howling, but Lawrence is right, it was nowhere near the cacophony it is today for President Obama's head-fake.):
Did you catch that part where Nancy Pelosi says that she too is in favor of the Four Trillion Package too? That should tell you right there, that the President's intentions on cutting Entitlements are a head-fake.
"The fall back position, the third option, and what I consider the least attractive option, is one in which we raise the debt ceiling without making any significant progress on reducing the deficit."
I can't wait to see what Lawrence has to say about that one, but my bet is, it continues to corner the Republicans. After bailing on the President's Four Trillion dollar plan to preserve tax cuts for the rich, their one major play remains, pass a clean Debt Ceiling Bill and blame the President for it.
It seems to me, at least following my logic, that the President is saying: "Hey, I don't want to do that either. I'm all for spending cuts. But, if this is all we can agree to, I guess we have to do it. Heavy sigh."
This morning, on “The Diane Rehm Show,” EPI’s Larry Mishel made a good point: The Republicans argue that increasing taxes by a dollar hurts the economy while cutting spending by a dollar helps the recovery, he said. That means they believe that taking a dollar out of a rich person’s pocket through taxes hurts demand while taking it out of a poor person’s pocket by cutting unemployment insurance doesn’t. He suggested there’s not a whole lot of evidence to support this claim.
But remember that Republicans also say that cutting tax expenditures counts as a tax increase. That implies that cutting a $1 billion subsidy for low-income housing will help the recovery while shaving $1 billion off of a tax break that subsidizes low-income housing purchases would impede the recovery. Can anyone defend that claim? Would anyone even like to try?
My bet is that we're going to go right up to the wire with this Kabuki Dance (Copyright, 2011, R.Johnson Ltd.), and at the end of the day, when there are neither votes to pass a "Grand Bargain" with Revenues, nor the maximalist, 100% spending cuts the Republicans want, and instead they pass a (mostly) clean bill with mostly Democratic votes, and the votes of Republicans who don't want to feel the wrath of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. At most, the GOP gets cuts that the President wanted to do anyway, and don't harm the overall Economy.
President Obama calls on both parties to come together to find a balanced approach to deficit reduction that lets us live within our means without hurting investments our economy needs to grow and create jobs.
This was also caught by Only Adult In The Room originally, and it's taken me a while to get to it. The best part is the opening thirty seconds, where the reporter reveals that she went to High School with Stanley Ann Dunham, and the President's reaction.
Other than that, it's the standard sit down over the Economy, the Debt Ceiling, etc.
Greg asked earlier, “Do House Democrats have any leverage in the debt talks?” Barack Obama’s quick statement today to reporters made it clear that: yes, they do.
By emphasizing that “Democrats and Republicans are going to be required in both chambers,” the president inched towards defining a standard under which any grand bargain will require majorities of both parties in both Houses of Congress.
In reality, Obama was basically acknowledging the mathematics and politics of the situation. We know that at least 50 of the 240 House Republicans, and probably a good deal more, are not going to vote for a debt limit increase no matter what. That means they’ll need at least about 30 Democrats, and probably a good deal more. If a deal is going to need close to half of House Democrats, then it almost certainly needs Nancy Pelosi.
The truly goofy thing about this whole mess is the outsized influence enjoyed by those 50 or so House Republicans that won’t be voting for any deal, no matter how much it might tilt towards conservative priorities. One would think that they’ve dealt themselves out. However, they — along with their slightly less rejectionist conservative collaborators — are the key restraint on John Boehner. As Jonathan Chait notes today, what their opposition does is make some of the deals that are mathematically possible into political poison for the Speaker. He isn’t going to endorse anything that won’t get the approval (in private at least — they may not vote that way) of a strong majority of the House Republican conference, because otherwise he risks a revolt.
For House Democrats, the best strategy (no surprise here) is unity. If they can maintain that, then they have quite a bit of leverage. If not, Boehner can start trying to pick off 25 or 30 or 35 Democrats, and perhaps he can make that work. My guess, however, is that ultimately nothing will pass unless it has genuine leadership support — and not just votes — from Democrats and Republicans in both chambers. Nancy Pelosi certainly knows that, and as the President himself said today, he’s very aware that he needs Democrats to get this done.
Hello, everybody. I’m going to make a very brief statement.
I just completed a meeting with all the congressional leaders from both chambers, from both parties, and I have to say that I thought it was a very constructive meeting. People were frank. We discussed the various options available to us. Everybody reconfirmed the importance of completing our work and raising the debt limit ceiling so that the full faith and credit of the United States of America is not impaired.
What we decided was that staffs, as well as leadership, will be working during the weekend, and that I will reconvene congressional leaders here on Sunday with the expectation that, at that point, the parties will at least know where each other’s bottom lines are and will hopefully be in a position to then start engaging in the hard bargaining that’s necessary to get a deal done.
I want to emphasize that nothing is agreed to until everything is agreed to. And the parties are still far apart on a wide range of issues. But, again, I thought that all the leaders here came in a spirit of compromise, in a spirit of wanting to solve problems on behalf of the American people. Everybody acknowledged that the issue of our debt and our deficit is something that needs to be tackled now. Everybody acknowledged that in order to do that, Democrats and Republicans are going to be required in each chamber. Everybody acknowledged that we have to get this done before the hard deadline of August 2nd to make sure that America does not default for the first time on its obligations. And everybody acknowledged that there’s going to be pain involved politically on all sides, but our biggest obligation is to make sure that we’re doing the right thing by the American people, creating an environment in which we can grow the economy and make sure that more and more people are being put back to work.
So I want to thank all the leaders. I thought it was a very constructive meeting. And I will be seeing them back here on Sunday. A lot of work will be done between now and then.
Basically, where we’re at is this. Talks on the Debt Ceiling have broken down. The GOP was originally invested in a Debt Ceiling deal that had an 85-15 split of spending cuts to tax increases, that number coming from a report from the Conservative American Enterprise Institute. This was a report highlighted in fact on Speaker Boehner’s website. (Bet you dollars to doughnuts that that report has been taken down).
The good news in all this is that the spending cut number (around 2.4 Trillion over ten years) has pretty much been agreed to. This would be the 85 number.
The best advice I’ve gotten for assessing the debt-ceiling negotiations was to “watch for the day when the White House goes public.” As long as the Obama administration was refusing to attack Republicans publicly, my source said, they believed they could cut a deal. And that held true. They were quiet when the negotiations were going on. They were restrained after Eric Cantor and Jon Kyl walked out last week. Press Secretary Jay Carney simply said, “We are confident that we can continue to seek common ground and that we will achieve a balanced approach to deficit reduction.” But today they went public.
Let me take a moment to answer one of Lawrence's questions. He asked, why didn't the Obama White House just use the Clinton model for deficit reduction?
Ummm, Lawrence. Have you met today's Republican party?
So what happens now?
Well, frankly…it depends on how batshit insane the Republicans are, and how pissed off the Chamber of Commerce actually gets.
If you’re a conservative, things look pretty simple. You’ve got a President in the White House you don’t like. You’ve got a stalled economy that stalled because of your policies and ideas, but you’re still committed to those same policies and ideas because even though they make the middle class miserable, they don't count in your world. All that does count are the people you really work for (Rich folks and Multinational corporations). If you cooperate with the sitting President (aka, doing your job) there’s a chance things will get better for the people. Can't have that, because that would mean the President would get re-elected. However, if you hold out for your most cherished, bat-shit insane policy ideas that you wouldn’t even let see the light of day under a Bush Administration, well, not only can you stall any economic momentum for a recovery (thereby damaging the President), but you can also appeal and excite your own base in the process. WIN-WIN!!!
I would first refer the Chamber of Commerce to the story of Pandora’s Box. You let these batshit insane Teabagger shitheads into the tent, this is what you get:
In case, you don't understand why I'm making this particular movie reference, or have (rightfully) forgotten Jurassic Park 2. The idiots (aka, the main characters) decided to "rescue" a baby T-Rex. That'd be Mama in the video, sniffing clothes that are soaked in the baby's blood. Think of them as tax breaks for Corporate Jet owners for the purposes of this argument. "Hilarity" ensues after that.
The more the Chamber stands by its threat to destroy any Republican who stands against a raise in the Debt Ceiling, the more likely there is to be a deal. Period.
My inclination the moment Keith brought it up was to dismiss it (after all, this is Keith we’re talking about). But then Lawrence brought it up as well.
"It's certainly worth exploring," Schumer said. "I think it needs a little more exploration and study. It's probably not right to pursue at this point and you wouldn't want to go ahead and issue the debt and then have the courts reverse it."
I still see this as officially a push by the Democrats to get this idea out there.
The Senator from Wall Street is right. We don’t know what the economic consequences would be of a debt default, we also don’t know how markets would react to the President simply ignoring Congress and continuing to borrow money.
If you were interested in buying up U.S. Bonds, how would you react to the President taking the podium and saying, basically, screw Cantor and Boehner. We’re going ahead, business as usual. My guess is a Bond buyer might hesitate, and say “Should we be buying this stuff. Is it safe? What does it mean?”
Basically, what I see happening is this. The Democrats rattle the Nuclear Option theory. Republicans howl in protest. Jim DeMint says the Constitution didn’t mean what it says. Someone tries to change the Constitution on Wikipedia, and ultimately, the GOP quietly agrees to the 83-17 split a week before the deadline and declares victory.
Of course, that'd mean dealing with a sane GOP. And frankly there's no evidence that they're out there.
I mean, for pity’s sake, you watch the Teabagger shithead caucus, always crying for their love of the Constitution is going to attack the President for sticking to the letter and law of the Constitution. Watch it happen. There’s never an egg-timer around when you need it. (Hat tip, Randi Rhodes).
The President is going to have to carry through with his unspoken threat, and while dear ol' Doctor Dad would disagree, I think the dire nature of what could happen would force to President to do it. I mean, if the GOP won’t deal fairly. If any bill the Democrats propose gets filibustered in the Senate. If the Teabaggers bite the hand of their Chamber of Commerce masters, what option is Obama going to have left?
As ugly as the consequences might be, they’d be worse if he did. If DeMint won’t come back to reality, pick the Constitutional fight, and pull the Debt Ceiling trigger. What would we have to lose?
Growing increasingly pessimistic about the prospects for a deal that would raise the debt ceiling, Democratic senators are revisiting a solution to the crisis that rests on a simple proposition: The debt ceiling itself is unconstitutional.
"The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law... shall not be questioned," reads the 14th Amendment.
"This is an issue that's been raised in some private debate between senators as to whether in fact we can default, or whether that provision of the Constitution can be held up as preventing default," Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.), an attorney, told The Huffington Post Tuesday. "I don't think, as of a couple weeks ago, when this was first raised, it was seen as a pressing option. But I'll tell you that it's going to get a pretty strong second look as a way of saying, 'Is there some way to save us from ourselves?'"
By declaring the debt ceiling unconstitutional, the White House could continue to meet its financial obligations, leaving Tea Party-backed Republicans in the difficult position of arguing against the plain wording of the Constitution. Bipartisan negotiators are debating the size of the cuts, now in the trillions, that will come along with raising the debt ceiling.
The two principals in the debt-ceiling talks, President Obama and House Speaker John Boehner, began talking on Monday with the same deadline: August 2, when the federal government will default on its debt. But Obama’s clock is running slower. And that means his leverage may ultimately be greater if he waits for several weeks before making a deal.
Obama’s political apogee will be in late July, when, if there’s no deal, the bond market will begin to panic, leading interest rates to rise and the stock market to fall. That’s when the public will begin to understand what happens when the U.S. can’t make its payments to creditors. That’s when the president can use his bully pulpit to call for an adult conversation.
That’s why Republicans want the White House to focus on vote counts right now. What combination of policies will exceed the necessary threshold for passage in the House and the Senate? Boehner is willing to concede that a debt-ceiling deal based on Rep. Paul Ryan’s budget plan may not get 218 votes. And Republicans have already conceded that they’re willing to cut significantly from defense appropriations to get them.
What Boehner would like the White House to concede early is that its effort to, say, end oil-company subsidies, raise taxes on individuals making $500,000 and up, or curtail sugar and ethanol tax breaks, would also fall short. If the vote were tomorrow, he’d probably get a higher spending-cut to deficit-trigger ratio from Democrats, too. He’d get close to $2 trillion in real cuts over 10 years.
Boehner's bottom line: real spending cuts that exceed the amount by which the debt limit is raised looks reasonable today. Since a large minority of his conference does not believe that the August 2 date is real, Boehner's aides insist that it's foolhardy to think they are any more likely to accept revenue raisers (including getting rid of tax breaks) as the weeks go by.
But Obama knows that vote counts in the absence of the crucible of crisis will differ when Wall Street, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and other traditionally Republican interests begin to nervously walk lawmakers out of their partisan garrisons.
And he’s betting that Republicans, having learned that his team is on nimble feet when it plays close to the edge of the cliff, will concede more up front than they did in December, when only the threat of a government shutdown (darn it, the Smithsonian would be closed!) loomed as the existential sword of Damocles. The longer Obama waits, the more Republicans will privately panic, knowing that their leverage decreases steadily as the weeks go by -- and exponentially at the turn of August.
After taking most of the month off to prepare for, then enjoy a vacation, I'm diving back into Ft. McHenry with (hopefully) renewed vigor.
Thus, I present the President's weekly address.
Speaking from Carnegie Mellon University, President Obama discusses the vital role advanced manufacturing will have in strengthening our economy and creating good, middle-class jobs.
The President outlines how the government is partnering with the private sector to ensure workers have the skills they need to be competitive and grow the economy.
Speaking from a Chrysler plant in Toledo, Ohio, the President commends the work of America's dedicated autoworkers, who have helped reinvigorate the domestic auto industry.
