The New York Stock Exchange is about to open, and it occurs to me that a nice, dramatic dip might be just the thing to wake some people up.
The Hill reports that the Senate Tea Party Caucus and some House GOP freshmen have produced a bill called the Full Faith and Credit Act and want John Boehner to bring it to the floor of the House for a vote. The bill would direct the White House to prioritize federal payments to the nation’s creditors, Social Security recipients and soldiers serving in Afghanistan and Iraq.
They seem to think that warnings about seniors and soldiers not getting their checks are just scare stories, and they are worried the scare stories will turn voters against the GOP.
This reminds me of one of Bill Clinton’s less than stellar moments, while he was still governor of Arkansas. While campaigning for president, Gov. Clinton did not stop the execution of a brain damaged man named Rickey Ray Rector. Rector was so out of it that he saved a slice of pecan pie from his last meal so he could eat it after they brought him back from the death chamber.
Think of the “Full Faith and Credit” Act as that slice of pecan pie. If the congressional teabaggers think the American people won’t notice the consequences of default as long as the old folks and soldiers get their checks, they have no idea what’s about to happen.
News stories this morning suggest that most of the movers and shakers of finance still believe default is unlikely, mostly because it is unthinkable. But unless something big and dramatic happens this week to spook the baggers, I don’t know what’s going to stop it.
The movers and shakers supported the teapartiers the crazies (albeit behind the curtain and under the table) and never thought about the monster they were helping to create. Now they are finding it hard to control the monster and they don’t think a default will happen because they don’t one. Sorry guys, there’s an old saying about watching what you wish for because you might get it. They wanted crazy people who were against the Democrats no matter what and that’s what they got.
Well, the Asian markets only had moderate drops.
Same with Europe, right now.
It’s almost as if they expect us to take a dose of sanity in the next few days.
Our market’s are down a bit, but only around 1%.
I expect it to get worse and worse as the week wears on.
The question is, does anyone care, or have they covered themselves?
By this time, I’m sure the big money boys and girls will have leveraged themselves nicely by putting money on Republicans tanking our economy.
The best thing about being one of the truly rich assholes, isn’t just that you never have to say that you’re sorry, it’s that you just don’t even care.
You know, everyone jokes (sort of) about seniors and the poor eating cat food. Has anyone seen the price of cat food recently? I think they’re out to outright starve us soon.
Great analogy, Maha..
Oh, and tell the Warden that when I come back later for my pecan pie after my date with the electric chair, it’d better have some whipped cream on it, or I’m reporting his ass for cruel and unusual punishment!
Have these movers and shakers forgotten that they used to work down the Street from a company called Lehman Brothers? They should realize that the “unthinkable” happens with increasing frequency now that the GOP has abandoned all the previous rules.
Since the President will take allthe heat no matter what he does, I think he should just go ahead and cover the gap by executive order, if it comes to that, and even give himself a few extra trillions to play with. He can always say he is just doing what the Constitution requires regarding the full faith and credit of the US Government. He will have the effect of a clean bill without having to give the Republicans a thing! It is not as if they were voting on new spending anyway, since this is just to pay for money they already voted to spend.
Let’s return to calling that part of the budget which is comprised of funds already allocated, promised if you will, by the federal government – the non-discretionary side of the budget. Somewhere along the line, those funds, especially SS, have become referred to as ‘entitlements.’ They are not. They are obligations to be met – non-discretionary (they can’t be screwed with or denied) to people who have deposited their money with the American government for years with the promise that on retirement their money would be there to support them in their retirement.
The defeat of Obama is more important than anything else in the world to these brain dead cretins tha have fallen for the TeaParty sop.
I agree with Bill Bush. Good idea.
I like Bill Bush’s idea also. I keep thinking about when Reagan fired the air traffic contollers..He did by claiming that PATCO’s strike was a threat to our national security or some bullshit like that…Whatever his claim was he defended it by saying that he had an obligation to our nation to take the actions that he took. And I see Obama as having a duty to prevent the destruction of the full faith and credit of the United States by the same authority—whatever it is.. I have no problem seeing the prevention of a default as being in the realm of national security.
And let’s not forget Georgie Bush whose need to save us from Al-Qaida forced him to do wiretaps in violation of the Constitution..and nobody cared enough to challenge that authority. If it weren’t for Bush we’d all be speaking Pashtun .. 🙂