The whole premise of the article is fallacious. Nobody is suggesting that the Federal Government stop making payments on its debt. There is no reason to even if we don’t raise the debt limit.
Its like any other Ponzi scheme - you can use the funds you have to pay off the marks to whom you’ve promised a return or you can pay the board for your stable of racehorses, but you probably cannot do both... unless you find some new marks to pony up some brand new cash to keep the scam rolling.
What our maximum leader has said is that apparently he is willing to screw the marks, but keep the gravy train rolling for the goodies Uncle Sugar has used to buy votes with for the last 50 years unless a couple of hundred whores give him permission to find new marks in another month or two. I’m sure he will put in a few more trips to Tiffany’s or toss out another bridge to nowhere or juicy weapons contract to get the whores to swallow one more time.
This whole house of cards falling down is pretty much an exercise in basic math at this point. Even if by some QE miracle interest rates manage to stay at diddly.squat% for the next 10 years, our outstanding debt will consume every dollar of government revenue and everything else the federal government pays for, from .223 ammo to the dinner rolls for a meal in the white house, will be bought with borrowed money by then. A spike in interest rates brings that about sooner.
Ross Perot’s Hockey Stick showed up four years ago and none of our “leaders” can (or more to the point, will) do a damm thing about it.
What really happens is the Treasury issues new debt to raise funds to pay off old debt that is maturing . . . plus interest. If the debt limit isn’t raised, they cannot issue the new paper.
But, hey . . . I’m on your side.
Huh? That's not true. Congress mandates all sorts of spending. When that spending exceeds revenue, you have a deficit. I'm not aware of a mechanism whereby the Executive Branch can opt not to spend money on something Congress has ordered it to do -- if you want to give Obama that kind of power, be my guest, but I don't think we'll like the outcome. But that would be the only way I'm aware of for the President to prioritize debt payments over everything else the government does.