Posted on 10/16/2013 12:15:04 PM PDT by 11th_VA
COLLEGE PARK, Md., Oct. 16 (UPI) -- To end the U.S. government shutdown and raise the debt ceiling without accepting any meaningful Republican conditions, U.S. President Barack Obama has resorted to falsehoods, wounded American democracy and damaged U.S. global leadership.
The president has accused the House GOP majority of refusing to pay bills Congress has already racked up, not doing its job and defying the outcome of the 2012 election. The $17 trillion outstanding national debt funded past spending and raising the debt ceiling is all about the government spending more than it taxes going forward.
The U.S. Constitution requires that revenue bills originate in the House of Representatives, not the president's desk. If Obama wants to spend more than the country can afford, it requires him to negotiate with the House -- that's where the framers put the money.
The House was given this power because it is closest to the pulse of the people, who in 2012 elected a majority of representatives promising to cut spending and reduce deficits.
Obama's victory in the 2012 presidential election turned on many issues, including immigration, foreign policies toward China and in the Middle East and the environment. It is disingenuous to say his election affirmed voter support for the Affordable Care Act.
Poll after poll -- at the time the ACA was passed, during the election and now -- revealed the majority of Americans don't like the law and want it substantially revised or repealed. The ethnic breakdown of election results indicate Obama's victory was much more the result of Mitt Romney's inability to appeal to Latino and Asian voters.
Each month the government collects $250 billion in taxes and, if the Congress decided not to raise the debt ceiling, U.S. Treasury Secretary Jack Lew would have adequate resources to pay the $23 billion in interest to the public.
Each month, the government spends about $315 billion. If the House judges the resulting accumulation of $65 billion in new debt to be too burdensome -- as the public has repeatedly expressed by electing conservatives to the House -- the president has a constitutional duty to negotiate with the House rather than demand "clean bills" and spend as he pleases. The House would be derelict to simply roll over to presidential demands for powers the Constitution doesn't provide.
To pressure House Republicans, Lew has purposefully cultivated fear in financial markets by falsely stating the United States must default if Congress fails to raise the debt ceiling. That would only happen if he failed to establish appropriate priorities for the $250 billion in taxes collected each month.
His doomsday rhetoric makes the U.S. government appear inept and irresponsible, has eroded the primary standing of U.S. securities in global markets and will weaken U.S. economic leadership in global forums for many years to come.
Senate negotiators will likely come to a deal acceptable to the president that reopens the government and raises the debt ceiling, and House Democrats and moderate Republicans will likely approve it.
The president's victory will be accomplished through deception and demagoguery, by violating the will of voters expressed in the 2012 congressional elections and the Constitution and damaging U.S. global standing. Those are mighty high prices to pay for a president's refusal to negotiate changes to a healthcare law voters clearly want changed and reducing budget deficits voters want slashed.
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(Peter Morici, an economist and professor at the University of Maryland Robert H. Smith School of Business, is a widely published columnist. Follow him on Twitter: @pmorici1)
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The Silent Majority doesn't march on Washington much, but now they are pissed ... It's gonna be an interesting Spring ...
GUNS are NEXT! Just watch, they have to get them before this shiite bomb goes off and Americans finally get off they’re fat asses and realize every kid born from this moment on does not live in the old country. we have been transformed.
Plus we get do this all over again in Jan and Feb. And this time the costs of Obamacare will not be hidden like they are now. Buy stock in popcorn.
Excellent article.
This: “His doomsday rhetoric makes the U.S. government appear inept and irresponsible, has eroded the primary standing of U.S. securities in global markets and will weaken U.S. economic leadership in global forums for many years to come.”
Pay heed to this. When the US dollar is no longer the reserve currency, we are going down. It will happen.
The false economy and the printing presses won’t save us then.
wouldn’t it be a nice surprise for Jersey to come thru?...
Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 1974
Balanced Budget and Emergency Deficit Control Act of 1985.
Budget Enforcement Act of 1990.
Balanced Budget Act of 1997.
Budget Control Act of 2011.
Yep, one more “act” ought to do it.
Congress violates most of the Constitution mutiple times a day.
I doubt one more law is going to have them returning to federalism. 95 % of them need a good ass kicking.
what does “all going down” mean exactly?....what is going to happen?....
Win? Putting a stake through the heart of the Constitution w/out a single bullet.
Now, where are the ‘let’s take back the GOP from the inside’ peeps. Wonder if they’ll hold their noses for another election cycle? and another...and...
It means massive unemployment, and those working will not have any expendable income so the manufacturing base will collapse, housing markets will tank and tourism will die.
What we went thru in the last 5 years is nothing to what is coming next spring/summer.
Then the House should craft a balanced budget, and then both houses should pass it and present it to the President to sign or veto. What are the chances of that happening any time soon?
Isn't this kind of what he wanted to do in the first place? If so, then, in his own mind, he succeeded.
Jersey and in a few weeks Virginia.
I’ll keep my fingers crossed, but am not hopeful about either. If the VA race can be quickly refocused on the collapse of healthcare.gov, Cuccinneli may just have a shot tho.
Democrats won by doing nothing. Status quo, same now as it was before. Nothing changed, spend, spend, spend. Waste our money and our childrens money, down to the 3rd and 4th generation of our children if America lasts that long.
If they pass an immigration bill, it may be too late.
He gets to max out another credit card and leave others to pay it.
Great deal for him; just has to say “give me what I want or I’ll burn the place down” and mean it. Easy.
As if the House couldn’t see the intentional EBT failure was as transparent as the fake BC and the 100% precinct votes for The Won.
And instead of dropping the program. much less defund it after the fact...
They will all continue to screw this country up by trying to fix Obamacare...
I feel this is a tail-spin the country will not be able to pull out of...
We will see the end of it in our lifetimes...
And instead of dropping the program. much less defund it after the fact...
They will all continue to screw this country up by trying to fix Obamacare...
I feel this is a tail-spin the country will not be able to pull out of...
We will see the end of it in our lifetimes...
I hope the people in Ohio, and Arizona and a few other neat places remember who the players were in this and who betrayed the public trust...
It may be too late to teach any of them a new word, called unemployment, but hey, y’all elected these shmups, the least y’all could do is fire them for the rest of us...
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