Today, the House will vote on a bill that would authorize the Treasury Department to prioritize debt payments in the event that the debt limit is exceeded. The bill has no chance in the Senate and would be vetoed by the president in the unlikely event that it landed on his desk. So, the bill is a 100% ass-covering exercise. But will it really cover their ass? It seems to me that the mere discussion of prioritizing debt payments might be enough to warrant another downgrade in our credit rating.
Just imagine if you loaned money to someone and then overheard them talking about how they couldn’t pay off all their debts. You’d like to know that your loan is a high priority, but how willing would you be to make another loan?
The credit rating agencies operate with the same logic. Any discussion of partial default is ample reason to downgrade our rating.
how many times do I have to say this..
the GOP is committing ECONOMIC TREASON AGAINST THIS COUNTRY.
YES!
It doesn’t matter how many times you say it, or yell it.
What matters is that the corporate media won’t say it. Or anything remotely resembling it.
With a corrupt corporate media, no progress is possible.
I think we need a media revolution. The media are our biggest obstacle to progress at this point.
The debt limit should be abolished. It serves no purpose except as a ransom tool.
the bill is a 100% ass
-coveringexercise.There really is no excuse for these do nothings.
I think that most of the Republican politicians and leaders know that they are fighting about the debt ceiling for purely cynical reasons but the followers do not.
I have been seeing the Republicans I grew up with complaining about long security lines at airports, understaffed fire departments, etc. These are the same people who constantly scream about cutting spending and lowering taxes and how much they hate the government.
It makes no sense.
It does indeed make no sense.
But “conservatives” long ago lost the ability to think. They are functionally braindead. We are shackled to a corpse.
The wages of 30+ years of “conservative” sewage 24/7 on almost every media outlet.
The S&P downgrade last year didn’t help the republicans, but it certainly didn’t help the country. Cantor called it a “wake up call”, but the Republicans got the major blame. And they were unable to prevent the marginal tax raise on the rich.
For S&P’s key role in the financial meltdown of 2008, fraudulently overrating securities, the US is currently suing them to the tune of 5 billion $. It’s a strong case and a serious suit.
http://billmoyers.com/2013/02/05/neil-barofsky-on-sps-5-billion-penalty/
The latest report on the deficit puts the GOP in a weak position.
http://www.thepeoplesview.net/2013/05/paying-down-debt-obama-smashes.html
I heard about Cantor’s “prioritizing the debt” idea at least a month ago. It’s been in the works a while, but the timing is bad for the GOP. I don’t think it has any credibility at all. And as you say, it’s not going anywhere anyway. Republicans screaming any old crap about the debt is not news.
Didn’t the credit ratings agencies take a PR hit when they lowered our rating, too? Seems like lowering a credit rating based on a silly Bill that has no chance of going anywhere around the same time as $35 Billion dollars are being paid on that debt would be a bad move on their part.
If an individual or company tried to do this it would be illegal. You are not allowed to favor some creditors over others….
Yes, I read about this yesterday, and I was wondering what they think they’re accomplishing with this stupid bill. Either trying to shift the blame or to send some kind of message, but whatever it is they’re overlooking the twelve magic words:
So instead of the purse strings let’s imagine they control the spigot. And you’ve got all these thirsty people lining up for a drink of water, but they’re not going to turn on the spigot because freedom. Instead, their solution is to try to order Obama to tell all the thirsty people they can’t have any water, but they can have their choice of urine or bleach.
Fortunately, the Constitution doesn’t give Congress the power to order the president how not to spend the money they aren’t giving him.
Killing the credit rating ups the interest rates folks will expect on government securities. More money from revenue gets diverted to the bankers. Mission accomplished.
IOW, Republicans are in a win-win situation as far as their primary constituency.
They don’t care if they destroy the credit rating.
The US Treasury note is the foundation of basically every financial scheme that the Wall Street Wizrds dream up. Everything relies on these assets. Undermine them, destabilize them, make them volatile, and many of these Wall Street schemes get very shaky.
So what’s Wall Street have to say about the latest insanity of their Repub Frankenstein monster? Why do equities continue to soar when the US Treasury is under serious assault?
Our economy (and country) simply makes no sense. Talk about uncertainty. Hello, bizness “journalists”, hello, anyone out there?