Tuesday's postcard, and a visit to the debt ceiling fiasco
May 23, 2023
Another sound of spring in the marsh, a howling yellow-headed blackbird
Editorial meetings for The Daily Rhubarb can take place anywhere, from a narrow ledge in the rimrock or while I’m searching my bathroom for dental floss. It’s a quorum of one. I most enjoy sharing stories and/or photos that inspire. Other days I feel obliged to serve the spinach that keeps it real.
Today’s a spinach salad. It’s about the so-called debt ceiling debate—a game of political chicken that threatens a self-inflicted blow to our economy and, possibly, great harm to millions of the most vulnerable in our society. Even the wealthy amongst us will suffer too, as interest rates soar and retirement earnings shrink. It will be bad for us, and the planet will suffer as well.
It would also be the result of a blatant ruse. There’s a good chance we’ll fall for it, so it’s at least worth the effort to unpack it.
Fortunately, MSNBC’s Chris Hayes (who, if nothing else, is about the brainiest man on television these days when it comes to explaining complex problems) did the brunt of the heavy lifting on the debt ceiling issue last night. It’s in the first eleven minutes of the video embedded in this link. Hayes’s umbrage and sarcasm offer the right punctuation for the topic.
The Republican Party that earned my parents’ votes for much of their lives is quite different now. Even before Donald Trump became President in 2016 the party was making large bets on inflammation, misinformation and public ignorance. At least since the sixties the identity of the GOP has been tied to “law & order,” higher military spending, while cutting spending for social programs for the poor and elderly. The Republicans have cast themselves as the party of fiscal discipline (out to corral those Cadillac-driving welfare queens). Yet, the numbers—as Hayes laid out with help from Rahul Mukherjeee at Axios—tell a different story. In the past forty years, federal spending actually went up at a higher rate under Republican administrations. Still, public opinion polls repeatedly show that Americans, on the subject of fiscal discipline, trust Republicans over Democrats. It’s as reliable as a fast-food cheeseburger.
Enter the “debt ceiling” crisis which—as Hayes well explains—is not about money or fiscal responsibility. It’s just about power. The populist anger created by right-wing talk and FOX News, et al., has created a “burn it all down” atmosphere when it comes to public policy of all sorts. It’s here as well, in our collective pocketbook.
Nominally, the votes on the budget and votes on the so-called “debt ceiling” are two different things. The Congress regularly votes to approve the federal budget, and the most recent vote was last December.
Eighty years ago, Congress gave itself the authority to raise the national debt limit so as to keep pace with expenses the Congress authorizes through its appropriations bills. (This does beg the question—since the 14th Amendment to the Constitution (1868) says the “validity” of the debt “shall not be questioned—as to why it is even necessary for Congress to vote to pay debt it has already voted to incur.)
Thus, it is a two-step process. The U.S. has never defaulted on its debt, although when it came close to doing so in 2011 (when Barack Obama was president and Republicans controlled the House of Representatives) the uncertainty introduced shook the financial markets and Standard & Poor’s downgraded U.S. bonds from AAA to AA+.
The reliability of U.S. debt may be the glue that holds the U.S. economy and much of the world’s economy together, so the specter of defaulting is unnerving, to say the least.
Who would benefit from such a thing?
The party line for why the Republicans are now threatening not to raise the debt limit is that the Congress is now, finally, out of patience with the national debt. Thus, the GOP majority in the House is demanding severe cuts to social programs (but additions to the military budget at the same time). The threat is that unless the cuts are made, a working majority of Republicans will not vote to raise the debt limit. Hence the looming crisis.
Depending on your politics this is either insane or an acceptable and perhaps brave act of fiscal prudence.
President Biden says it is an effort—a wager by the most extreme elements in the Republican Congress—to invite a financial crisis that voters will blame on him, so as to jeopardize his re-election chances.
So what would President Trump say? You know, Donald Trump, the Republican front-runner for 2024 and the 45th president of the United States. The same president under whom we added (through added spending and new tax cuts for the rich) nearly $8 trillion in debt obligations. What would he want Republicans to do?
Turns out he was asked that question, by a college student, Marta Saravia, during the so-called “Town Hall” event that CNN hosted in New Hampshire on May 10th.
His response? “I say to the Republicans out there – congressmen, senators – if they don’t give you massive cuts, you’re going to have to do a default.”
CNN’s Kaitlan Collins followed up, noting that when Trump was president he said that Congress “using the debt ceiling as a negotiating wedge just could not happen.”
“Sure,” Trump responded, “that’s when I was president.”
“So why is it different,” Collins replied, “now that you’re out of office?”
“Because now I’m not president,” Trump quickly snapped back.
What’s missing from the transcript, is the wave of laughter that washed over the room packed with Trump supporters.
It really is everything you need to know about the debt crisis. The joke is more important to Trump’s supporters than the reality of the situation and the economic stakes. It’s only dangerous hypocrisy if the other side does it.
If Trump were president then anything other than Congress dutifully approving the debt increase would be cast as a double-horrible breach of their duty to the nation. He would have called them traitors and even the media he despises would likely echo that rhetoric. But if a Democrat is in the White House, Republicans have a higher calling. Then, the more important thing is to own the libs, and the press. That’s always job 1. Let’s go Brandon…
Trump was right the first time. As Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has advocated, it makes no sense for Congress to vote on raising the debt ceiling after it’s already voted to expend the funds that require it to borrow the money.
But these are rogue times. The Republican base is fueled with populist anger that has found its voice in perhaps the most dangerously corrupt, authoritarian and narcissistic person our society has yet created. Beyond the base, a secondary cause of the danger is public ignorance and a press corp that feels safest in he-said, she-said journalism that obscures the bad faith. There’s just enough of it for this ruse to gain traction, to give the most extreme factions in the GOP confidence they can re-gain the White House by crippling the nation, and blaming it on Biden.
-tjc