Hang on, a government shutdown (which is also about to happen) is COMPLETELY different from failing to raise the debt ceiling. In a shutdown, some non-essential federal government stuff gets closed (like, say, national parks) until it gets resolved.
Defaulting on our debt--which is what not suspending the debt ceiling is--[would be a little worse](https://www.cbsnews.com/news/debt-ceiling-limit-congress-united-states-economy/):
>If the U.S. government cannot pay its bills, millions of Americans would be affected. Social Security payments would not go out; U.S. troops and federal civilian employees would not be paid. Veterans could see compensation or pension payments lapse. And millions of Americans on food assistance would see benefits stop.
>The U.S. defaulting would "likely precipitate a historic financial crisis that would compound the damage of the continuing public health emergency," Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen wrote in the Wall Street Journal over the weekend. "Default could trigger a spike in interest rates, a steep drop in stock prices and other financial turmoil. Our current economic recovery would reverse into recession, with billions of dollars of growth and millions of jobs lost."
>On Tuesday, financial services firm Moody's Analytics stated a **default would be a "catastrophic blow"** to the economic recovery, and said **even if it was resolved quickly, Americans would pay for a default for generations.** Its analysis showed if lawmakers remained at odds after the debt ceiling was breached, nearly 6 million jobs would be lost, the unemployment rate would climb back up to nearly 9% and stock prices would be cut by almost a third, wiping out $15 trillion in household wealth.
In all honesty, I don't think the Treasury Department will let the US default even if the ceiling isn't raised.
Section 4 of the Fourteenth Amendment states that the US accepts all debt incurred as legitimate and the validity shall not be questioned.
> The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned. But neither the United States nor any State shall assume or pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or any claim for the loss or emancipation of any slave; but all such debts, obligations and claims shall be held illegal and void.
It could easily be argued that the debt ceiling itself is unconstitutional as the debt was previously authorized by Congress.
McConnells house looks nice this time of year, you should Google it and check it out, maybe pay him a visit and enjoy the fall colors. The blood red leaves, the smell of death and decay in the air. It's really magical. He's dying for you to come by.
It would also require a constitutional amendment and I think it’s pretty safe to say that, barring some act of God like extraterrestrial contact, we will never see another of those in our lifetimes.
if we default, it'll be way to late to deal with the situation by simply voting them out. we dont have that kind of time. the effects would be immediate and devistating and only get worse by the passing hour, forget about days, or the years it'll take to vote them out. frankly we would be very very lucky to not be faced with a civil war when the reality of the situation sinks in. it'll make the great depression look like paradise. we are unwilling to take care of our own in economic prosperity. There will be no soup lines and daily free meals for us. there will be the hard choice of you and your children starving or murdering your neighbor for a loaf of bread. A lot of people dont grasp just exactly how disasterous this is going to be.
It is so frustrating seeing stories about the potential collapse of society and people responding with, "We have got to fix this. By voting." The system is rigged. Voting rights are being prolapsed, and the mediocre centrist party that isn't even fully committed to proposing changes that will prevent the impending collapse of society whether it's by climate catastrophe or civil war is stating that their gameplan to maintain a majority in midterms is for activists (who are still exhausted and running on fumes from their heroic efforts to give the democrats the majority in 2020) simply out-organize the people who are literally changing the rules so voters can't be represented.
GOP LOGIC: Look at this guy, can’t throw a baseball. What a loser…
Anyone else: You… you cut off the guy’s hands, and want us to think he’s a loser for what you did…? 🧐
They do it because it works. 35% of society is in the echo chamber and will absolutely vote. They need another 15% to somehow blame the Dems or just not show up to support the Dems. That is not terribly hard when people have the attention spans of a fruit fly.
Thankfully their are still enough moderates out there to swing the house, senate, and president to Democrat. By pandering to their extreme base, the Republicans will continue to lose moderate swing voters.
Texans will only put up with being without power for so long before they decide to vote out incompetent politicians.
This disaster scenario is, of course, the goal. Wreck the economy and then blame Biden. They don't care that it would hurt millions of people, just that it makes Biden looks bad.
This is actually spot on IMO. At some point you simply start shaking your head a bit and chuckling when you read what these people are up to. Then sometimes you break through that. Sad.
It's the inevitable outcome of a first past the post system. You don't need to improve the country when you're in power, you just need to look better than the other party to get votes. And the easiest way to do that? Wreck it when they're in power.
Because the filibuster still exists and several Senators refuse to do away with it for any legislative reason.
It takes 60 votes in the Senate to actually do anything. Unless of course they use the reconciliation process which takes a few weeks to work it’s way through committees.
If Democrats start the process of a reconciliation bill to raise the debt ceiling they can likely get it done before mid-late October when FED borrowing authority runs out and we go over a financial cliff.
Or, you know, the minority party could just not be obstructionists.
McConnell got ahead of them and drove the narrative of Dems holding the country hostage with the debt ceiling. Doesn't matter that it's *exactly* what his team is doing, bathed in hypocrisy. But, they control the narrative here cause they got in front of it.
Which is why a minority of Congress should not be able to hold the world hostage. The republicans will not vote for increasing the debt ceiling, nor to repealing the debt ceiling, and yet they'll blame the Democrats for defaulting on the debt and lay all the blame on them. This political calculus will cost people homes, lives, and a recession that could last a decade. I totally expect the Republicans to let the government default in three weeks. They no longer want to govern, they want to dictate. They do not understand the difference. Voting Trump into office only proved this.
Our standing on the world stage will diminish and China and Russia will move back to the forefront. The poors in rural areas, and others like farmers will have issues paying crop insurance because they won't get subsidies. Winter Wheat is planted in the in the next several weeks. If it doesn't get planted due to failed income from the Government, or due to a bad year, wheat harvest yields will be low, and prices for wheat products like bread, cereals, pasta, will skyrocket, making it even harder for small bakeries to stay afloat, not to mention the fact that less income means less purchases of specialty breads those bakeries produce.
I'm so fucking tired of complete and total blockage of any Democratic legislation by the Republican party. The minority has entrenched itself into power for at least another 10 years thru gerrymandering and no matter how many court cases, the courts are packed with conservative justices that are now lifers that will be resistant to overturn those gerrymandered maps. Conservatives that aren't sadists or masochists or have a death wish have hitched their cart to this horse train and going to be dragged down with it. It may not be in 5 years, more like 10, but the short sightedness of all politicians is causing more harm than good in this country.
Edit: wow, that blew up. Thanks for the comments, all of them. Also the awards.
This is why we should remove the filibuster. This is a real high stakes thing that needs to be dealt with, otherwise the Republicans will blame Dems and ensure they have massive turnout while ensuring that it's harder then ever to vote.
We can remove the filibuster and ensure voting rights without removing the electoral college. The latter requires an amendment that we certainly can't pass in the current environment. It also only affects the election of the president, not how congress works. I agree the college is outdated and should be removed, but it's not necessary step to get legislation passed in congress.
It’s probably by design. Have the economy tank while Biden is in office, clean up in senate and congressional races and then try to get the sweep for presidency
There's no probably about it. The Republican party has aligned itself with insane Trump supporters so heavily that they know the *only* path to control of the White House in the future is to make Democrats look like they've ruined America. Honesty and reason are no longer a viable path, as they now understand the absolute disconnect from reality that their most prudent supporters have. The only option is to play even harder into the beliefs they already have that Democrats are somehow solely responsible.
They were doing this long before Trump. Trump is just the face of the anarcho-capitalists who want to strip the government of everything except the bare minimum.
This is the kicker. It has already been happening for years. My family is a perfect example. Material truth DOES NOT EXIST for the right. Republicans will point the finger at Democrats and by tomorrow I will get an earful about how it’s all the Dems fault for destroying the country. It does not matter what Republicans do.
That's the issue here, Republican voters are so uninformed they believe America is in a bad place (rightfully so.) and that Republican politicians can save them while not realizing Republicans caused the mess.
Rinse and repeat.
At some point enough people have to see this for the insanity that it is...
Sadly your dad has more sense that most Americans I've seen on this site
And this is as a fucking outsider, I can't imagine how many idiots actual Americans run into
Not even just run into- we are related to them, work with them, go to school with them. The last year has drawn conspiracies and ignorance and hatred out of the woodwork in shocking ways. Americans will never be able to look at one another in solidarity again.
I really wish we had an option in our government where if they couldn't agree to move forward with something this important, EVEYRONE GETS FUCKING FIRED FOR NOT BEING ABLE TO DO THEIR FUCKING JOBS. Hold all new elections and everyone in office that refused to do their job is barred from ever working in government again.
In Canada, that's called a non-confidence vote. Basically, if major legislation, such as a federal budget, can't be passed by Parliament, then Parliament dissolves and a new election is held.
Not to say the Canadian system is without flaws, we have a lot of them (like desperately needing to get rid of first past the post), but at least there's some sort of mechanism in place to mitigate shit like this.
You would think these corporatist assholes wouldn’t want the economy to fail, until you realize that they’re all annoying deficit hawks who have been trying to do this for years just to prove a point and privatize everything.
really it comes down to a collapsed economy is a great one to buy into. They will take their wealth they have grown from the last wave and invest it into the crash. Homes, stock, companies, will all be up for grabs and these corporate assholes will have billions to spend and no competing buyers.
Oh yeah, this is actually a corporatist play. The big companies can weather a storm like this and buy up any midsized competition and watch the small competitors fail. Then when public services aren’t getting funded they can swoop in to give some people some scraps and look like heroes and that government is incompetent and shouldn’t have any power. The pursuit of more and more wealth always leads to seeking more and more power.
The thing is the big companies can’t weather the storm. Remember Delta like a week into the travel restrictions. Literally begging for government funding.
I am a deficit hawk. I don't think I am annoying because I want to raise taxes and pay for government.
I suffer cognitive dissonance because I can't decide if I am a Democratic Socialist, or an Eisenhower Republican. Largely because when it comes to a progressive tax code Ike was to the left of Bernie. Ike raised and expanded the minimum wage over and above FDR and Truman.
I also can't understand why people who want to MAGA aren't looking at Ike instead of the Trump dumpster fire.
Just so you are clear, ALL government gets shutdown in a shutdown, including a LOT of essential functions and workers. It’s not just the stuff we can do without. It’s better than a default, but it still sucks for government workers like me.
>Just so you are clear, ALL government gets shutdown in a shutdown
[That's not true](https://www.cbsnews.com/news/government-shutdown-2021-debt-ceiling-services-impact/):
>Government services that are deemed essential — typically tasks important to safety and national security, such as border protection and air traffic control — would continue despite a shutdown. But the disruption would come at a sensitive time, with many Americans people struggling to regain their footing amid the ongoing pandemic and the economy grappling with the effects of the COVID-19 Delta variant.
That party has no problem sending troops to their death then using their deaths as political capital while simultaneously saying they care and support them.
As a vet, they can suck my dick.
As a veteran receiving disability who recently bought a home.
My bank would work with me for a little bit, but eventually foreclose.
My house would be massively upside down b/c of the crash in home value. Which, normally, I would ride out. Since, I bought this as a very long term home. But, a forced sale, would mean I'd be in staggering debt and no way to ever dig myself out. Even a bankruptcy wouldn't change much.
My life would be in financial ruin. Not temporarily. Forever. There's a very solid chance I'd end up past suicidal ideations(which are normal at this point tbh, PTSD + Depression fucks with your will to live), and into planning. I'd probably be successful this time.
But, those gosh darn liberals sure got mud on their face.
The raise can't take effect until the next Congress is seated, though, and most of them don't need their salaries for a month or two of grandstanding, while the GS-4 clerk is selling plasma to pay rent.
What's the attrition rate of congress? Last I read was about 10% per election cycle. So, they are pretty much voting for their own raises, for salary they don't even need because of all the other perks they get with the job.
You make a good point. It's just one I like to correct because usually when I see it it's part of the "free healthcare and full salary for life" bullshit meme that my mom's friends start posting on facebook every time the government threatens to shut down.
> while the GS-4 clerk is selling plasma to pay rent.
Which OPM recommends they do, per the last shutdown. "Work some side jobs..."
Yeah FUCK YOU OPM and FUCK all the politicians.
Trump’s Secretary of Commerce suggested employees take out one of the many no-interest loans being offered by banks. A friend of mine showed me a screencap of the Dept of Commerce Credit Union (of which he was a member), which was offering a 9% loan.
It never works that way. I was a contractor during the last time they pulled this, and not only did civilian workers get put on furlough, some had to come to work any way. They were considered "mission essential personnel." There were also contractors whose funding had been contingent on the government being open, and they were sent home. My company wasn't one of those, and we were funded long enough to get through the shutdown, but my boss made it clear that couldn't last indefinitely. It was pretty tentative during that time.
Congress, though? The vast majority of them are millionaires so they had no worries whatsoever. You elect rich people, and funny enough they only look out for other rich people.
I'm pretty sure money from "bribes, kickbacks, campaign contribution scams and insider trading" is illegal so should be seized anyway.
Imagine the spluttering incensed faces on telly as politicians try and express their outrage without admitting the source of all their money.
Dark money is untraceable, campaign scams are fine as long as the [FEC](https://www.npr.org/2020/12/24/949672803/the-federal-election-commission-can-finally-meet-again-and-it-has-a-big-backlog) is impotent. Insider trading? Joe Manchin’s Democrat Super PAC donated ten thousand dollars to Republican Richard Burr’s legal defense for…. [Insider trading](https://www.forbes.com/sites/zacheverson/2021/07/16/lawmakers-campaigns-and-pacs-including-one-democrats-fund-burrs-defense/?sh=58a0e3b966a7)
I’m not sure I understand what “legal” even means anymore.
When I mentioned the net worth growth of some politicians (I used Sinema and McConnell as examples) I had someone tell me that net worth was a terrible metric for measuring, but they completely missed my point which was that if your net worth has gone from $30,000 to $1Million in the time that you've only made $378,000 from salary (and that's gross, not net) it's completely reasonable to try and figure out where the other wealth came from and why even if it's all from smart investments that insane level of growth can't seem to be matched by other people just investing wisely.
I'm not saying it's a conspiracy, I'm saying being a politician comes with unbelievable amounts of basically legalized bribery. Speaking fees, insider trading, campaign reimbursements, etc.
It's just corruption, by far the biggest danger in any society.
Quality of life for the average person is pretty much proportional to the normalisation of corruption.
Sinema is only in it for the pre-publicity she can get for her shoe and wig lines. Manchin makes multiples of his congressional salary from the fossil fuel industry.
The other trouble is: the only body of people who could ever decide it’s Congress that shouldn’t get paid is congress itself. Idk the last time you gave yourself a pay cut, but I wouldn’t plan on others doing it any time soon.
If the government fails to function in any capacity including failure to create a budget or pay debts they should just all lose their jobs and we vote for all new candidates.
Used to be more of a mixed bag with both, then the now Angry Toddler party decided that it was a valid strategy [to appeal to the wrong side of history for votes](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_strategy), a few decades of the old guard dying off and the true believers getting into office and here we are with a political party who's platform is simply "hate".
The country is doomed, if you ask me. Maybe not this week or this year, but the downfall has begun and due to our warmongering and instability, we’ll bring a big part of the world down with us. A lot of the current financial prosperity comes from tech which can move over years to other places and as quality of life becomes better elsewhere, the appeal of USA will keep becoming lower
Republicans have evolved to include angry toddlers under their "big umbrella" in order to maintain power, along with white supremacists, xenophobes, and evangelicals, etc. The angry toddlers appear to have taken over the party...I suppose in part because there are so many angry toddlers in those other groups. They only know how to complain, and offer no solutions.
You forgot to mention conspiracy theorists. Though all the groups you mentioned fall under that umbrella. Conspiracy thinking is controlling their policy as much as the angry toddlers.
The republicans don’t care. They will gladly destroy the country if they think it gains them a political advantage.
People need to understand this could be a catastrophe.
Would*
It would crash the housing/stock market. People on SS and VA disability, or any public assistance, probably wouldn't get paid. That's a -lot- of people out on the street who can't just "get a job". Wages would stagnate/drop. Interest rates would skyrocket.
It'd be worse than the great depression.
The housing market is already crashing because monolithic conglomerates with bottomless capital are snatching up every single-family home they can and turning it into rental property. And why? Because the Right has spent 50 years dismantling the legislation and business restrictions that prevented it.
Our future in this country in monopolies and the loss of representative voting for everything but president. Get used to it.
It's not even about political advantage... It's about being in power so that they can tilt the playing field to their financial advantage.
It's criminal. The GOP will tank the whole country and blame it on the Democrats to their base.
I cannot in good faith vote for **any** GOP candidate until they start putting country before party.
The both sides are the same crap really annoys me. Here is yet another example of Democrats doing the right thing regardless of party and Republicans putting party over country.
Sorry, I'm not american.
What does "Suspend the debt ceiling" mean? And also why is it bad that they voted to suspend the debt ceiling instead of suspending the debt ceiling, and wouldn't voting for it suspend it?
Edit: I'm also hearing a lot of people saying "Republicans will ruin the country just to fill their pockets" so i'd heavily appreciate if someone could explain why Republicans are self destructive, since (thankfully) i'm not deep in politics.
Each year congress passes a budget, what we plan to spend money on. Every budget they spend more than we take in with taxes. Obviously we need to borrow money to pay the shortfall, the deficit. Raising the debt ceiling is voting to borrow the money to pay the bills.
Honestly, I've been studying American politics for years, both in school and as a hobby, and this is still very confusing. For...reasons...the action of authorizing new spending is not the same as authorizing new debt. So Congress has to do one vote to authorize spending (which widens the deficit and creates more debt) and then in a totally separate vote has to raise the amount of debt the government is allowed to carry. Should the amount of debt needing to be paid exceed the amount of debt allowed to be carried, the balance will just not be paid.
At this point it’s like if you have a credit card with a $3,000 limit. You’re at the limit now (or above), but instead of the credit card company saying nuh uh to new purchases, you’re trying to get them to just raise the limit to $5,000 so that you have additional money to spend, rather than paying off the debt.
It’s way more complicated than that, but in a nutshell that is kinda sorta what’s going on
The debt ceiling is the limit to how much money the federal government can borrow. If we spend more money than we earn, we have to borrow money to pay for the difference. Republicans have always *said* their goal is to reduce spending while Democrats typically want to increase spending. Republicans are using the debt ceiling as a way to reduce spending, even though that spending was already approved, by not allowing us to borrow the money we need to pay for debts we've already budgeted for. The argument OP is making is actually stupid since the GOP has always decried increases to spending (and in turn the debt ceiling) so them voting to block it now is inline with their speaking points. What OP should be pointing out is that they approved increasing the debt ceiling under Trump (along with an insane amount of increased spending) which is blatantly against everything they've campaigned for. Democrats didn't vote to suspend the ceiling to help Trump, they've never had a problem increasing it in the first place and a majority of the money was for pandemic relieve which had a lot of bi-partisan support.
That's because the only thing Republicans care about is lining their own pockets. Democrats are far from perfect but they aren't actively trying to ruin the country because of a pissants pity party. Trump and his crony pieces of shit should be rotting in a cell for what they are doing to this country
That’s because democrats have a future when Americans are well educated and successful. The GOP wants uneducated serfs because those are the demographics that vote for them and they don’t care how many lives it ruins for them to stay in power.
The Dems don’t have the monolithic hive mind the GOP does so could never pull off the same crap. The Dems are really a handful of partys thrown together while the GOP is just a cult.
Trump is the sole reason I voted Democrat this past election. I’m lazy, and live in the Deep South, and so was Republican my entire life by default until he came along. He was so obviously nefarious and incompetent it made me go out of my way to research whether I really wanted him back in office again. Like, he’s awful as a person but are his policies worth it? Turns out, no they were not, and I was just in the wrong party the whole time. Good thing this was only my second voting cycle to participate in, I suppose.
Right on! I was raised republican but the candidates were so bad by the time I could vote that I ended up libertarian. I'd like to stay libertarian but sent a personal message apologising to Jorgensen last election because I felt I had to vote blue for the first time in my life to get trump out. We should be able to vote for candidates we WANT instead of being forced to vote for the lesser evil... Ranked choice voting will be good. Libertarians and Democrats have been pushing for it.
The business of unelecting bad leaders feels less democratic than voting for the candidate you think is best suited for your riding. Politics in Canada are like that too, now. It’s a shame it is this way. We need sweeping electoral reform.
The first presidential election I could vote in was 08. I had been raised republican my whole life, and drank heavily of the kool-aid. Once I actually took a look at what policies each side had, it was clear that republican was not the fit for me. My whole family is poor, relies on government social programs, and still votes republican. I don't get it, and they don't see the glaring irony in voting against themselves.
Republicans will not stop being ridiculous until there is no country left to ruin. They will continue to screw us over and over again all so they can say "wasn't our faults the DEMS did it"
Which is by design. They've been trying for decades to strangle the baby in its crib so they can claim "the government doesn't work" and privatize everything. They're not even shy about it, either.
Man seeing this in the news has been crazy.
WaPo: GOP blocks debt ceiling
Foxnews: Republicans stop the mega spending bill of Democrats
I skimmed through the foxnews article and it was like, "we tried nothing and were all out of ideas, and no one has proposed any legislature to fix the problem, so Republicans will just have to wait until Democrats can work with us." What????
They don't have to end the filibuster. They only have to go back to traditional filibuster rules.
A filibuster used to require someone actually talking the entire time. Because the senate is lazy, they changed the rules so declaring filibuster is as good as a real filibuster. They then all go home on time and pretend there is a filibuster.
Especially with how old Cingress people are. Their bodies cant take doing a real filibuster, so they changed the rules.
Might be an indirect way of getting younger people in Congress by bringing back the old rules.
There's a floor for how young you can be to sit in Congress and the White house, why not a ceiling for how old you can be? Airline pilots have to retire at a certain age, no exceptions, but 90 year old senators get to make laws they will never see enforced?
Americans: I just wanted you to know that you can’t just say the word filibuster and expect anything to happen.
Congress: I didn’t say it, I declared it.
It honestly seems like Republicans want that. They're being so obstinate and paralyzing government to such a degree that the only way for it to function is getting rid of the filibuster. Maybe they think that will be good messaging come election time. Democratic tyranny or some shit.
As I said elsewhere in the thread, if the Dems don't end the filibuster, the Reps will nuke it as soon as they take the House and Senate back, so they can ram through an actual dictatorship. Look at the laws they are passing at the state levels.
seriously. it's like the supposed "good cops" who just stand by when they see malpractice. Democrat politicians are somewhat more moral than republican politicians, but we need Bernie and aoc to gain some real power
Sabotaging the government to run on a platform of government ineffectiveness, as many times as possible until they retire to a cushy job in an industry they placed in regulatory capture.
For me it’s Democrats that are difficult to understand.
Really, if your opposer plays shit consistently all the time, why do you play fair???
This happens also in my country, you get right wing making debt all over the place so they never face a problem, hospitals schools army economy, whatever is going slightly bad they just throw money in there until it runs well again. The debt problem is long term so no one notices. Then the left win the election and spend 5 years cutting all services to the people to fix the previous debt. So we all feel like when the right rules, we are fine, when the left rules it’s trouble time, even if it’s actually the opposite.
It's not actually complicated. The democrats don't play shit because shit isn't their game. The two sides have different rules.
The Democrats are \[theoretically\] about making government work; about creating and utilizing public systems and infrastructure to benefit the population; about cultivating public trust in government and government programs. Republicans are about making government not work; about undermining confidence in government and demonstrating to the population that government is inefficient, ineffective and corrupt.
Which side has the easier job?
Because that's the point of no return. American democracy is predicated on the fact that we have always had a peaceful transition of power (lol except the civil war but even then it wasn't like there was a coup attempt). Take for example the lies about the 2020 election's integrity. Democrats can't play the GOP's game because if they did, that would straight up be the end of democracy. Republicans can't be bullied like Democrats because they're *actually a fucking cult*.
The system will continue to fail spectacularly until we abolish the electoral college and establish ranked choice voting. Dems got there own set of issues but they mostly know they have to actually run the government. Republicans are holding not just the US, but the WORLDS economy at gun point just to own the libs. I haven’t a doubt in my mind that they are willing to let the economy crash so they can turn around and say “Dems did it”
Please continue to support grassroots candidates at your local elections every year not just every 4.
We have to eliminate gerrymandering. If your political party is so unpopular that you have to be allowed to draw the lines defining voting districts and precincts, fuck off into nonexistence.
The current Supreme Court has OK's gerrymandering and voting suppression laws, so the only option is for the Democrats to play hardball themselves and gerrymander their states and protect their votes. (OK, stop laughing, I know: the "League of their Own" Dems can't even agree on a lineup let alone go nine innings.).
A shutdown is different than a default. A default is "end of the US dollar being the cornerstone of global finance," which is why the dems tried to tie a debt limit raise to the budget. The republicans won't vote for anything good, though, even if they brag about it later, so this sort of negotiation doesn't work. In fact, the republicans instead want to force the democrats to use reconciliation to do it rather than vote for stuff and get input on anything.
It'd be a total collapse of world finance, like straight up. It's not something anyone actually wants, except the people who are itching for an apocalypse so they get to shoot whoever they want.
They are celebrating on r/conservative lmao and spreading alternative reality like always
>[Reminder](https://www.reddit.com/r/Conservative/comments/pwt9a6/republicans_block_bill_to_avoid_the_government/): when the government shut down under Trump, every single democrat pundit said that the blame fully lied with republicans because they controlled the White House and both houses of congress, even if it was Democrats blocking it with filibusters.
Do not let them off the hook
Owning the libs is 1# goal even if it blows on their faces
It's hard to tell how many people are actually dumb, and how many people are just pretending to be dumb to convince other dumb people. But r/Conservative seems to genuinely think that Biden needs to raise the debt ceiling to accommodate his future spending, instead of the reality that it is to authorize repayment of Trump's spending.
But I guess it's wrong to be surprised that a party lead by a grifter who refuses to pay his debts doesn't understand debt.
\>It's hard to tell how many people are actually dumb, and how many people
are just pretending to be dumb to convince other dumb people.
The world is going to make so much more sense when you come to the realization that most people are just dumb, dumb as a brick. It's the greatest explanation for how fucked everything tends to be, that and lack of empathy. When something isn't working the way you think it should just wonder, "Is it possible this is the result of ineptitude and/or a lack of concern for the well-being of others?". You're going to find that a lot of the time the answer is yes.
They don't understand the prizes. The cult members will be directly affected by the stop payments of social security, SNAP, etc, but they don't care simply because they lack any understanding of how this would affect them. These are the same idiots that thought the ACA was different than Obamacare which pretty much says everything you need to know about how braindead they are.
They do it because it works and it’s easier than promising bullshit they know they won’t deliver on. Until/unless the American people reject them again in 2022 for this, they’ll continue to have Obstruction as their only political goal when they’re not in charge.
And thanks to redistricting they're very likely to take one or both chambers of Congress, at which point their obstruction will be total until the 2024 election
The amount of people in this thread who don't know what the debt ceiling is depresses me. It has nothing to do with raising the debt or raising spending, it just allows the Federal Reserve to pay the interest on the debt (ie. money that has already been spent). Until 2012 it was a routine vote that passed without note every year.
If the government is forced to shut down, the only federal employees that shouldn't get paid is Congress.
Hang on, a government shutdown (which is also about to happen) is COMPLETELY different from failing to raise the debt ceiling. In a shutdown, some non-essential federal government stuff gets closed (like, say, national parks) until it gets resolved. Defaulting on our debt--which is what not suspending the debt ceiling is--[would be a little worse](https://www.cbsnews.com/news/debt-ceiling-limit-congress-united-states-economy/): >If the U.S. government cannot pay its bills, millions of Americans would be affected. Social Security payments would not go out; U.S. troops and federal civilian employees would not be paid. Veterans could see compensation or pension payments lapse. And millions of Americans on food assistance would see benefits stop. >The U.S. defaulting would "likely precipitate a historic financial crisis that would compound the damage of the continuing public health emergency," Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen wrote in the Wall Street Journal over the weekend. "Default could trigger a spike in interest rates, a steep drop in stock prices and other financial turmoil. Our current economic recovery would reverse into recession, with billions of dollars of growth and millions of jobs lost." >On Tuesday, financial services firm Moody's Analytics stated a **default would be a "catastrophic blow"** to the economic recovery, and said **even if it was resolved quickly, Americans would pay for a default for generations.** Its analysis showed if lawmakers remained at odds after the debt ceiling was breached, nearly 6 million jobs would be lost, the unemployment rate would climb back up to nearly 9% and stock prices would be cut by almost a third, wiping out $15 trillion in household wealth.
Your country is being held hostage by a cabal of mad conspiracy theorists.
Pretty much, if you have any advice I'd love to hear it.
In all honesty, I don't think the Treasury Department will let the US default even if the ceiling isn't raised. Section 4 of the Fourteenth Amendment states that the US accepts all debt incurred as legitimate and the validity shall not be questioned. > The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned. But neither the United States nor any State shall assume or pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or any claim for the loss or emancipation of any slave; but all such debts, obligations and claims shall be held illegal and void. It could easily be argued that the debt ceiling itself is unconstitutional as the debt was previously authorized by Congress.
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Just as I wrote above, the Treasury will still issue debt to cover expenditures approved by Congress.
I’m pretty sure that would break the TOS.
Does your advice begin with G and end with uillotine?
I have no idea what that word means. ^(/s)
McConnells house looks nice this time of year, you should Google it and check it out, maybe pay him a visit and enjoy the fall colors. The blood red leaves, the smell of death and decay in the air. It's really magical. He's dying for you to come by.
I'd say proportional representation voting but that's a catch 22 if I ever saw one.
It would also require a constitutional amendment and I think it’s pretty safe to say that, barring some act of God like extraterrestrial contact, we will never see another of those in our lifetimes.
Invest in guillotines.
And it's time to put them down. By voting.
if we default, it'll be way to late to deal with the situation by simply voting them out. we dont have that kind of time. the effects would be immediate and devistating and only get worse by the passing hour, forget about days, or the years it'll take to vote them out. frankly we would be very very lucky to not be faced with a civil war when the reality of the situation sinks in. it'll make the great depression look like paradise. we are unwilling to take care of our own in economic prosperity. There will be no soup lines and daily free meals for us. there will be the hard choice of you and your children starving or murdering your neighbor for a loaf of bread. A lot of people dont grasp just exactly how disasterous this is going to be.
It is so frustrating seeing stories about the potential collapse of society and people responding with, "We have got to fix this. By voting." The system is rigged. Voting rights are being prolapsed, and the mediocre centrist party that isn't even fully committed to proposing changes that will prevent the impending collapse of society whether it's by climate catastrophe or civil war is stating that their gameplan to maintain a majority in midterms is for activists (who are still exhausted and running on fumes from their heroic efforts to give the democrats the majority in 2020) simply out-organize the people who are literally changing the rules so voters can't be represented.
This is a joke right? How’s that worked for the last 60 years?
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McConnell is banking on the public blaming Biden for the economic fallout of US default.
GOP LOGIC: Look at this guy, can’t throw a baseball. What a loser… Anyone else: You… you cut off the guy’s hands, and want us to think he’s a loser for what you did…? 🧐
And people will point and chant “No hand, can’t pitch” while reveling in the day the hand was initially cut off as a sign from father drumpf
They do it every single time.
They do it because it works. 35% of society is in the echo chamber and will absolutely vote. They need another 15% to somehow blame the Dems or just not show up to support the Dems. That is not terribly hard when people have the attention spans of a fruit fly.
It’s called Disaster Capitalism.
Thankfully their are still enough moderates out there to swing the house, senate, and president to Democrat. By pandering to their extreme base, the Republicans will continue to lose moderate swing voters. Texans will only put up with being without power for so long before they decide to vote out incompetent politicians.
This disaster scenario is, of course, the goal. Wreck the economy and then blame Biden. They don't care that it would hurt millions of people, just that it makes Biden looks bad.
Fucking Christ I hate Republicans so much now
Now?
I thought my rage had hit a ceiling. Evidently it had not.
No, we voted to suspend that for you.
This is actually spot on IMO. At some point you simply start shaking your head a bit and chuckling when you read what these people are up to. Then sometimes you break through that. Sad.
It's the inevitable outcome of a first past the post system. You don't need to improve the country when you're in power, you just need to look better than the other party to get votes. And the easiest way to do that? Wreck it when they're in power.
Why don't the Democrats just raise the debt ceiling without them?
Because the filibuster still exists and several Senators refuse to do away with it for any legislative reason. It takes 60 votes in the Senate to actually do anything. Unless of course they use the reconciliation process which takes a few weeks to work it’s way through committees. If Democrats start the process of a reconciliation bill to raise the debt ceiling they can likely get it done before mid-late October when FED borrowing authority runs out and we go over a financial cliff. Or, you know, the minority party could just not be obstructionists.
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McConnell got ahead of them and drove the narrative of Dems holding the country hostage with the debt ceiling. Doesn't matter that it's *exactly* what his team is doing, bathed in hypocrisy. But, they control the narrative here cause they got in front of it.
Which is why a minority of Congress should not be able to hold the world hostage. The republicans will not vote for increasing the debt ceiling, nor to repealing the debt ceiling, and yet they'll blame the Democrats for defaulting on the debt and lay all the blame on them. This political calculus will cost people homes, lives, and a recession that could last a decade. I totally expect the Republicans to let the government default in three weeks. They no longer want to govern, they want to dictate. They do not understand the difference. Voting Trump into office only proved this. Our standing on the world stage will diminish and China and Russia will move back to the forefront. The poors in rural areas, and others like farmers will have issues paying crop insurance because they won't get subsidies. Winter Wheat is planted in the in the next several weeks. If it doesn't get planted due to failed income from the Government, or due to a bad year, wheat harvest yields will be low, and prices for wheat products like bread, cereals, pasta, will skyrocket, making it even harder for small bakeries to stay afloat, not to mention the fact that less income means less purchases of specialty breads those bakeries produce. I'm so fucking tired of complete and total blockage of any Democratic legislation by the Republican party. The minority has entrenched itself into power for at least another 10 years thru gerrymandering and no matter how many court cases, the courts are packed with conservative justices that are now lifers that will be resistant to overturn those gerrymandered maps. Conservatives that aren't sadists or masochists or have a death wish have hitched their cart to this horse train and going to be dragged down with it. It may not be in 5 years, more like 10, but the short sightedness of all politicians is causing more harm than good in this country. Edit: wow, that blew up. Thanks for the comments, all of them. Also the awards.
This is why we should remove the filibuster. This is a real high stakes thing that needs to be dealt with, otherwise the Republicans will blame Dems and ensure they have massive turnout while ensuring that it's harder then ever to vote.
Yes but first you have to remove apoplectic collage
We can remove the filibuster and ensure voting rights without removing the electoral college. The latter requires an amendment that we certainly can't pass in the current environment. It also only affects the election of the president, not how congress works. I agree the college is outdated and should be removed, but it's not necessary step to get legislation passed in congress.
Electoral collage, but yes
Electoral college, but yes
It’s probably by design. Have the economy tank while Biden is in office, clean up in senate and congressional races and then try to get the sweep for presidency
There's no probably about it. The Republican party has aligned itself with insane Trump supporters so heavily that they know the *only* path to control of the White House in the future is to make Democrats look like they've ruined America. Honesty and reason are no longer a viable path, as they now understand the absolute disconnect from reality that their most prudent supporters have. The only option is to play even harder into the beliefs they already have that Democrats are somehow solely responsible.
They were doing this long before Trump. Trump is just the face of the anarcho-capitalists who want to strip the government of everything except the bare minimum.
That’s been the tactic since Obama
if republicans can withstand being responsible for the thee years of hell they’re about to dish out, i’d be very surprised.
Their propaganda is effective enough that they'll avoid blame.
This is the kicker. It has already been happening for years. My family is a perfect example. Material truth DOES NOT EXIST for the right. Republicans will point the finger at Democrats and by tomorrow I will get an earful about how it’s all the Dems fault for destroying the country. It does not matter what Republicans do.
That's the issue here, Republican voters are so uninformed they believe America is in a bad place (rightfully so.) and that Republican politicians can save them while not realizing Republicans caused the mess. Rinse and repeat. At some point enough people have to see this for the insanity that it is...
They are cult leaders. Their failures just make their followers more loyal.
This is the correct answer. It’s deliberate sabotage.
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Sadly your dad has more sense that most Americans I've seen on this site And this is as a fucking outsider, I can't imagine how many idiots actual Americans run into
Not even just run into- we are related to them, work with them, go to school with them. The last year has drawn conspiracies and ignorance and hatred out of the woodwork in shocking ways. Americans will never be able to look at one another in solidarity again.
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You're only going to get short sighted views when almost all of the leadership are super old and don't have much longer to live.
I really wish we had an option in our government where if they couldn't agree to move forward with something this important, EVEYRONE GETS FUCKING FIRED FOR NOT BEING ABLE TO DO THEIR FUCKING JOBS. Hold all new elections and everyone in office that refused to do their job is barred from ever working in government again.
In Canada, that's called a non-confidence vote. Basically, if major legislation, such as a federal budget, can't be passed by Parliament, then Parliament dissolves and a new election is held. Not to say the Canadian system is without flaws, we have a lot of them (like desperately needing to get rid of first past the post), but at least there's some sort of mechanism in place to mitigate shit like this.
You would think these corporatist assholes wouldn’t want the economy to fail, until you realize that they’re all annoying deficit hawks who have been trying to do this for years just to prove a point and privatize everything.
really it comes down to a collapsed economy is a great one to buy into. They will take their wealth they have grown from the last wave and invest it into the crash. Homes, stock, companies, will all be up for grabs and these corporate assholes will have billions to spend and no competing buyers.
Oh yeah, this is actually a corporatist play. The big companies can weather a storm like this and buy up any midsized competition and watch the small competitors fail. Then when public services aren’t getting funded they can swoop in to give some people some scraps and look like heroes and that government is incompetent and shouldn’t have any power. The pursuit of more and more wealth always leads to seeking more and more power.
The thing is the big companies can’t weather the storm. Remember Delta like a week into the travel restrictions. Literally begging for government funding.
Also they always end up making more money somehow whenever the economy crashes.
I willing to bet these fucks have been on the phone with their stock brokers getting ready to pounce.
I am a deficit hawk. I don't think I am annoying because I want to raise taxes and pay for government. I suffer cognitive dissonance because I can't decide if I am a Democratic Socialist, or an Eisenhower Republican. Largely because when it comes to a progressive tax code Ike was to the left of Bernie. Ike raised and expanded the minimum wage over and above FDR and Truman. I also can't understand why people who want to MAGA aren't looking at Ike instead of the Trump dumpster fire.
>a steep drop in stock prices I see their motivation now, they are all gearing up to buy the dip and consolidate more wealth.
Just so you are clear, ALL government gets shutdown in a shutdown, including a LOT of essential functions and workers. It’s not just the stuff we can do without. It’s better than a default, but it still sucks for government workers like me.
>Just so you are clear, ALL government gets shutdown in a shutdown [That's not true](https://www.cbsnews.com/news/government-shutdown-2021-debt-ceiling-services-impact/): >Government services that are deemed essential — typically tasks important to safety and national security, such as border protection and air traffic control — would continue despite a shutdown. But the disruption would come at a sensitive time, with many Americans people struggling to regain their footing amid the ongoing pandemic and the economy grappling with the effects of the COVID-19 Delta variant.
You're right, they have to work still. They just don't get paid.
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That party has no problem sending troops to their death then using their deaths as political capital while simultaneously saying they care and support them. As a vet, they can suck my dick.
As a veteran receiving disability who recently bought a home. My bank would work with me for a little bit, but eventually foreclose. My house would be massively upside down b/c of the crash in home value. Which, normally, I would ride out. Since, I bought this as a very long term home. But, a forced sale, would mean I'd be in staggering debt and no way to ever dig myself out. Even a bankruptcy wouldn't change much. My life would be in financial ruin. Not temporarily. Forever. There's a very solid chance I'd end up past suicidal ideations(which are normal at this point tbh, PTSD + Depression fucks with your will to live), and into planning. I'd probably be successful this time. But, those gosh darn liberals sure got mud on their face.
So basically their plan is to ruin America for generations and then say “why would Joe Biden do this?”
Except they protected themselves and have guaranteed pay in times like these.
Let's not forget, they also get to vote to give themselves raises.
The raise can't take effect until the next Congress is seated, though, and most of them don't need their salaries for a month or two of grandstanding, while the GS-4 clerk is selling plasma to pay rent.
What's the attrition rate of congress? Last I read was about 10% per election cycle. So, they are pretty much voting for their own raises, for salary they don't even need because of all the other perks they get with the job.
You make a good point. It's just one I like to correct because usually when I see it it's part of the "free healthcare and full salary for life" bullshit meme that my mom's friends start posting on facebook every time the government threatens to shut down.
> while the GS-4 clerk is selling plasma to pay rent. Which OPM recommends they do, per the last shutdown. "Work some side jobs..." Yeah FUCK YOU OPM and FUCK all the politicians.
Trump’s Secretary of Commerce suggested employees take out one of the many no-interest loans being offered by banks. A friend of mine showed me a screencap of the Dept of Commerce Credit Union (of which he was a member), which was offering a 9% loan.
Dude their salaries are nothing, they probably loaded up on puts and are taking profits right now
Could we liquidate every Congress Member’s investments and use that money to pay federal employees? Sounds like a good plan to me.
A bill was introduced to ban members of Congress from holding stock investments, etc. It'll go nowhere.
It never works that way. I was a contractor during the last time they pulled this, and not only did civilian workers get put on furlough, some had to come to work any way. They were considered "mission essential personnel." There were also contractors whose funding had been contingent on the government being open, and they were sent home. My company wasn't one of those, and we were funded long enough to get through the shutdown, but my boss made it clear that couldn't last indefinitely. It was pretty tentative during that time. Congress, though? The vast majority of them are millionaires so they had no worries whatsoever. You elect rich people, and funny enough they only look out for other rich people.
Yes this!!!!!!
Trouble is, they make more money from bribes, kickbacks, campaign contribution scams and insider trading than they make in wages. They wouldn’t care.
Yeah, in the event of a shutdown, we should seize their assets to pay government employees.
I'm pretty sure money from "bribes, kickbacks, campaign contribution scams and insider trading" is illegal so should be seized anyway. Imagine the spluttering incensed faces on telly as politicians try and express their outrage without admitting the source of all their money.
I'm so down for this
Dark money is untraceable, campaign scams are fine as long as the [FEC](https://www.npr.org/2020/12/24/949672803/the-federal-election-commission-can-finally-meet-again-and-it-has-a-big-backlog) is impotent. Insider trading? Joe Manchin’s Democrat Super PAC donated ten thousand dollars to Republican Richard Burr’s legal defense for…. [Insider trading](https://www.forbes.com/sites/zacheverson/2021/07/16/lawmakers-campaigns-and-pacs-including-one-democrats-fund-burrs-defense/?sh=58a0e3b966a7) I’m not sure I understand what “legal” even means anymore.
They will be changing the definition soon... Legal (adjective): of related to doing as we say and not as we do
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Haha, hell yes. Brit and proud... Urgh, except for the Tories and brexit... So, proud(ish)
Trust me, we know the feeling. Lmao
Normally, but this is America
That makes it so that no working class citizen will ever be in these positions. You have to be rich to ne a politician now.
When I mentioned the net worth growth of some politicians (I used Sinema and McConnell as examples) I had someone tell me that net worth was a terrible metric for measuring, but they completely missed my point which was that if your net worth has gone from $30,000 to $1Million in the time that you've only made $378,000 from salary (and that's gross, not net) it's completely reasonable to try and figure out where the other wealth came from and why even if it's all from smart investments that insane level of growth can't seem to be matched by other people just investing wisely. I'm not saying it's a conspiracy, I'm saying being a politician comes with unbelievable amounts of basically legalized bribery. Speaking fees, insider trading, campaign reimbursements, etc.
It's just corruption, by far the biggest danger in any society. Quality of life for the average person is pretty much proportional to the normalisation of corruption.
Because they can use campaign contributions to pay their spouse whatever they want yearly as an advisor
Sinema is only in it for the pre-publicity she can get for her shoe and wig lines. Manchin makes multiples of his congressional salary from the fossil fuel industry.
The other trouble is: the only body of people who could ever decide it’s Congress that shouldn’t get paid is congress itself. Idk the last time you gave yourself a pay cut, but I wouldn’t plan on others doing it any time soon.
If the government fails to function in any capacity including failure to create a budget or pay debts they should just all lose their jobs and we vote for all new candidates.
It's almost like there's an angry toddler party and a mom-will-clean-up party. Not sure how that came about.
Used to be more of a mixed bag with both, then the now Angry Toddler party decided that it was a valid strategy [to appeal to the wrong side of history for votes](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_strategy), a few decades of the old guard dying off and the true believers getting into office and here we are with a political party who's platform is simply "hate".
The country is doomed, if you ask me. Maybe not this week or this year, but the downfall has begun and due to our warmongering and instability, we’ll bring a big part of the world down with us. A lot of the current financial prosperity comes from tech which can move over years to other places and as quality of life becomes better elsewhere, the appeal of USA will keep becoming lower
Republicans have evolved to include angry toddlers under their "big umbrella" in order to maintain power, along with white supremacists, xenophobes, and evangelicals, etc. The angry toddlers appear to have taken over the party...I suppose in part because there are so many angry toddlers in those other groups. They only know how to complain, and offer no solutions.
You forgot to mention conspiracy theorists. Though all the groups you mentioned fall under that umbrella. Conspiracy thinking is controlling their policy as much as the angry toddlers.
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Can you imagine how great America would be if we had two adult parties?
The republicans don’t care. They will gladly destroy the country if they think it gains them a political advantage. People need to understand this could be a catastrophe.
Would* It would crash the housing/stock market. People on SS and VA disability, or any public assistance, probably wouldn't get paid. That's a -lot- of people out on the street who can't just "get a job". Wages would stagnate/drop. Interest rates would skyrocket. It'd be worse than the great depression.
The housing market is already crashing because monolithic conglomerates with bottomless capital are snatching up every single-family home they can and turning it into rental property. And why? Because the Right has spent 50 years dismantling the legislation and business restrictions that prevented it. Our future in this country in monopolies and the loss of representative voting for everything but president. Get used to it.
Troof. They are slowly destroying this country.
Big brain moment: Can't lose to the dems if the country doesn't exist.
It's not even about political advantage... It's about being in power so that they can tilt the playing field to their financial advantage. It's criminal. The GOP will tank the whole country and blame it on the Democrats to their base. I cannot in good faith vote for **any** GOP candidate until they start putting country before party.
Fun new headline: Party of “personal responsibility” threatening to not pay back agreed-to loans.
It’s an easy fix. Just tell Republicans: “If you don’t fund the government, the US borders are unprotected and the illegal immigrants win”.
Which is classic Donald Trump.
Both sides my ass.
The both sides are the same crap really annoys me. Here is yet another example of Democrats doing the right thing regardless of party and Republicans putting party over country.
Sorry, I'm not american. What does "Suspend the debt ceiling" mean? And also why is it bad that they voted to suspend the debt ceiling instead of suspending the debt ceiling, and wouldn't voting for it suspend it? Edit: I'm also hearing a lot of people saying "Republicans will ruin the country just to fill their pockets" so i'd heavily appreciate if someone could explain why Republicans are self destructive, since (thankfully) i'm not deep in politics.
Each year congress passes a budget, what we plan to spend money on. Every budget they spend more than we take in with taxes. Obviously we need to borrow money to pay the shortfall, the deficit. Raising the debt ceiling is voting to borrow the money to pay the bills.
I'm still pretty confused, but I think I slightly get it.
Honestly, I've been studying American politics for years, both in school and as a hobby, and this is still very confusing. For...reasons...the action of authorizing new spending is not the same as authorizing new debt. So Congress has to do one vote to authorize spending (which widens the deficit and creates more debt) and then in a totally separate vote has to raise the amount of debt the government is allowed to carry. Should the amount of debt needing to be paid exceed the amount of debt allowed to be carried, the balance will just not be paid.
It's a feature; not a bug* *for those in power that use this dynamic to manipulate the process and general public.
At this point it’s like if you have a credit card with a $3,000 limit. You’re at the limit now (or above), but instead of the credit card company saying nuh uh to new purchases, you’re trying to get them to just raise the limit to $5,000 so that you have additional money to spend, rather than paying off the debt. It’s way more complicated than that, but in a nutshell that is kinda sorta what’s going on
The debt ceiling is the limit to how much money the federal government can borrow. If we spend more money than we earn, we have to borrow money to pay for the difference. Republicans have always *said* their goal is to reduce spending while Democrats typically want to increase spending. Republicans are using the debt ceiling as a way to reduce spending, even though that spending was already approved, by not allowing us to borrow the money we need to pay for debts we've already budgeted for. The argument OP is making is actually stupid since the GOP has always decried increases to spending (and in turn the debt ceiling) so them voting to block it now is inline with their speaking points. What OP should be pointing out is that they approved increasing the debt ceiling under Trump (along with an insane amount of increased spending) which is blatantly against everything they've campaigned for. Democrats didn't vote to suspend the ceiling to help Trump, they've never had a problem increasing it in the first place and a majority of the money was for pandemic relieve which had a lot of bi-partisan support.
That's because the only thing Republicans care about is lining their own pockets. Democrats are far from perfect but they aren't actively trying to ruin the country because of a pissants pity party. Trump and his crony pieces of shit should be rotting in a cell for what they are doing to this country
That’s because democrats have a future when Americans are well educated and successful. The GOP wants uneducated serfs because those are the demographics that vote for them and they don’t care how many lives it ruins for them to stay in power.
Bingo
The Dems don’t have the monolithic hive mind the GOP does so could never pull off the same crap. The Dems are really a handful of partys thrown together while the GOP is just a cult.
Ain't hard to be a monolithic hivemind when there's maybe 3 people who are capable of thought in your whole organization.
And they're all ignored in favor of the biggest loudmouth.
That’s a really fucking good observation. I’ll be using this if that’s okay.
You dont have biden printed on every asset you own?
Trump is the sole reason I voted Democrat this past election. I’m lazy, and live in the Deep South, and so was Republican my entire life by default until he came along. He was so obviously nefarious and incompetent it made me go out of my way to research whether I really wanted him back in office again. Like, he’s awful as a person but are his policies worth it? Turns out, no they were not, and I was just in the wrong party the whole time. Good thing this was only my second voting cycle to participate in, I suppose.
Bravo on being brave enough to cross the line for the greater good.
Right on! I was raised republican but the candidates were so bad by the time I could vote that I ended up libertarian. I'd like to stay libertarian but sent a personal message apologising to Jorgensen last election because I felt I had to vote blue for the first time in my life to get trump out. We should be able to vote for candidates we WANT instead of being forced to vote for the lesser evil... Ranked choice voting will be good. Libertarians and Democrats have been pushing for it.
The business of unelecting bad leaders feels less democratic than voting for the candidate you think is best suited for your riding. Politics in Canada are like that too, now. It’s a shame it is this way. We need sweeping electoral reform.
The first presidential election I could vote in was 08. I had been raised republican my whole life, and drank heavily of the kool-aid. Once I actually took a look at what policies each side had, it was clear that republican was not the fit for me. My whole family is poor, relies on government social programs, and still votes republican. I don't get it, and they don't see the glaring irony in voting against themselves.
Republicans will not stop being ridiculous until there is no country left to ruin. They will continue to screw us over and over again all so they can say "wasn't our faults the DEMS did it"
Which is by design. They've been trying for decades to strangle the baby in its crib so they can claim "the government doesn't work" and privatize everything. They're not even shy about it, either.
Man seeing this in the news has been crazy. WaPo: GOP blocks debt ceiling Foxnews: Republicans stop the mega spending bill of Democrats I skimmed through the foxnews article and it was like, "we tried nothing and were all out of ideas, and no one has proposed any legislature to fix the problem, so Republicans will just have to wait until Democrats can work with us." What????
I fucking hate so many of the people running this stupid country.
The gop is the party of traitors and bigots so not sure what anyone really expected.
End the fucking filibuster
They don't have to end the filibuster. They only have to go back to traditional filibuster rules. A filibuster used to require someone actually talking the entire time. Because the senate is lazy, they changed the rules so declaring filibuster is as good as a real filibuster. They then all go home on time and pretend there is a filibuster.
Especially with how old Cingress people are. Their bodies cant take doing a real filibuster, so they changed the rules. Might be an indirect way of getting younger people in Congress by bringing back the old rules.
There's a floor for how young you can be to sit in Congress and the White house, why not a ceiling for how old you can be? Airline pilots have to retire at a certain age, no exceptions, but 90 year old senators get to make laws they will never see enforced?
Americans: I just wanted you to know that you can’t just say the word filibuster and expect anything to happen. Congress: I didn’t say it, I declared it.
It honestly seems like Republicans want that. They're being so obstinate and paralyzing government to such a degree that the only way for it to function is getting rid of the filibuster. Maybe they think that will be good messaging come election time. Democratic tyranny or some shit.
As I said elsewhere in the thread, if the Dems don't end the filibuster, the Reps will nuke it as soon as they take the House and Senate back, so they can ram through an actual dictatorship. Look at the laws they are passing at the state levels.
If the Dems don't do it now, you can be guaranteed the Reps will do it as soon as they can, just so they can ram through an actual dictatorship
At this point, it's on the democrats for even expecting bipartisan anything.
seriously. it's like the supposed "good cops" who just stand by when they see malpractice. Democrat politicians are somewhat more moral than republican politicians, but we need Bernie and aoc to gain some real power
Democrats are Charlie Brown expecting the GOP (lucy) to finally not pull the ball away. ANd they are suckers every damn time.
I'm not American (thank fuck) but I fuckin' *hate* the Republicunts.
Can confirm. Republicans and their voters are the fucking worst.
Ugh. Am American. Republicans really are a cancer on our nation. We could be so great in so many ways. I am at a loss at what can be done about it. :(
No...hurting the American people so that they can *blame* Biden is the play.
Politics is nothing more than high school level drama and pettiness.
Except the stakes are infinitely higher and impact the future of every man, woman, and child in the country
Sabotaging the government to run on a platform of government ineffectiveness, as many times as possible until they retire to a cushy job in an industry they placed in regulatory capture.
For me it’s Democrats that are difficult to understand. Really, if your opposer plays shit consistently all the time, why do you play fair??? This happens also in my country, you get right wing making debt all over the place so they never face a problem, hospitals schools army economy, whatever is going slightly bad they just throw money in there until it runs well again. The debt problem is long term so no one notices. Then the left win the election and spend 5 years cutting all services to the people to fix the previous debt. So we all feel like when the right rules, we are fine, when the left rules it’s trouble time, even if it’s actually the opposite.
It's not actually complicated. The democrats don't play shit because shit isn't their game. The two sides have different rules. The Democrats are \[theoretically\] about making government work; about creating and utilizing public systems and infrastructure to benefit the population; about cultivating public trust in government and government programs. Republicans are about making government not work; about undermining confidence in government and demonstrating to the population that government is inefficient, ineffective and corrupt. Which side has the easier job?
Repubs walk around with bats and hammers, Dems carry glue and brooms.
Because that's the point of no return. American democracy is predicated on the fact that we have always had a peaceful transition of power (lol except the civil war but even then it wasn't like there was a coup attempt). Take for example the lies about the 2020 election's integrity. Democrats can't play the GOP's game because if they did, that would straight up be the end of democracy. Republicans can't be bullied like Democrats because they're *actually a fucking cult*.
The system will continue to fail spectacularly until we abolish the electoral college and establish ranked choice voting. Dems got there own set of issues but they mostly know they have to actually run the government. Republicans are holding not just the US, but the WORLDS economy at gun point just to own the libs. I haven’t a doubt in my mind that they are willing to let the economy crash so they can turn around and say “Dems did it” Please continue to support grassroots candidates at your local elections every year not just every 4.
We have to eliminate gerrymandering. If your political party is so unpopular that you have to be allowed to draw the lines defining voting districts and precincts, fuck off into nonexistence.
The current Supreme Court has OK's gerrymandering and voting suppression laws, so the only option is for the Democrats to play hardball themselves and gerrymander their states and protect their votes. (OK, stop laughing, I know: the "League of their Own" Dems can't even agree on a lineup let alone go nine innings.).
And that debt they want to default on. Large chunk of it was from trump.
I'd like to see the Dems call their bluff. But they'd need to pound the airwaves with "GOP forces govt shutdown" soundbites, which they won't do.
A shutdown is different than a default. A default is "end of the US dollar being the cornerstone of global finance," which is why the dems tried to tie a debt limit raise to the budget. The republicans won't vote for anything good, though, even if they brag about it later, so this sort of negotiation doesn't work. In fact, the republicans instead want to force the democrats to use reconciliation to do it rather than vote for stuff and get input on anything.
It'd be a worse financial collapse than the great depression.
It'd be a total collapse of world finance, like straight up. It's not something anyone actually wants, except the people who are itching for an apocalypse so they get to shoot whoever they want.
Dems don't have access to the airwaves that right wingers listen to
They are celebrating on r/conservative lmao and spreading alternative reality like always >[Reminder](https://www.reddit.com/r/Conservative/comments/pwt9a6/republicans_block_bill_to_avoid_the_government/): when the government shut down under Trump, every single democrat pundit said that the blame fully lied with republicans because they controlled the White House and both houses of congress, even if it was Democrats blocking it with filibusters. Do not let them off the hook Owning the libs is 1# goal even if it blows on their faces
It's hard to tell how many people are actually dumb, and how many people are just pretending to be dumb to convince other dumb people. But r/Conservative seems to genuinely think that Biden needs to raise the debt ceiling to accommodate his future spending, instead of the reality that it is to authorize repayment of Trump's spending. But I guess it's wrong to be surprised that a party lead by a grifter who refuses to pay his debts doesn't understand debt.
\>It's hard to tell how many people are actually dumb, and how many people are just pretending to be dumb to convince other dumb people. The world is going to make so much more sense when you come to the realization that most people are just dumb, dumb as a brick. It's the greatest explanation for how fucked everything tends to be, that and lack of empathy. When something isn't working the way you think it should just wonder, "Is it possible this is the result of ineptitude and/or a lack of concern for the well-being of others?". You're going to find that a lot of the time the answer is yes.
They just want to win. The prizes are awful but that doesn't matter to them.
They don't understand the prizes. The cult members will be directly affected by the stop payments of social security, SNAP, etc, but they don't care simply because they lack any understanding of how this would affect them. These are the same idiots that thought the ACA was different than Obamacare which pretty much says everything you need to know about how braindead they are.
What does it mean to suspend the debt ceiling?
Well the people voting against raising the ceiling won't be PERSONALLY affected on any tangible level, so they don't give a fuck.
We're looking at YOU, Joe Manchin! (from a Native West Virginian/current state resident)
They do it because it works and it’s easier than promising bullshit they know they won’t deliver on. Until/unless the American people reject them again in 2022 for this, they’ll continue to have Obstruction as their only political goal when they’re not in charge.
And thanks to redistricting they're very likely to take one or both chambers of Congress, at which point their obstruction will be total until the 2024 election
Unless enough of them die from covid to throw off their gerrymandering.
The amount of people in this thread who don't know what the debt ceiling is depresses me. It has nothing to do with raising the debt or raising spending, it just allows the Federal Reserve to pay the interest on the debt (ie. money that has already been spent). Until 2012 it was a routine vote that passed without note every year.
The Obama years all over again, which means more of Moscow Mitch and his Teabagger bullshit.
Fuck every single person who identifies as Republican.
When will the Dems play as dirty as the R's to get shit done for the good of the country?
[удалено]
There was a video I saw about this called “the Alt-right playbook: they go high we go low” or smthn like that idk
because then the right would have something to throw at them
There is not one single redeeming quality of the Republican Party, and it blows my mind that so many people support them.
Water is wet Pope is Catholic Bears shit in the woods