debt ceiling

Looking for a lesson in the goings-on in D.C. these days? Here’s one: The more our nation's wealth concentrates, the more our democratic give-and-take becomes all take — by the rich.

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As online "Countdown Clocks" count the hours before there's a debt ceiling disaster, the spotlight is on the individuals and groups who can make or break a deal. We've heard a lot about the Senate's Gang of Six, members of the Administration, House leaders Boehner and Cantor, and the radical Tea Party Republicans who allegedly hold 'veto power' over any proposed deal.

But another group holds at least as much power as those radical Republicans, and it has the added advantage of representing views that are widely supporting by Americans in both political parties. That group is the House Progressive Caucus.

The media coverage is revealing. Tea Party Republican Joe Walsh holds no official position in Congress except that of a freshman Representative, and his economic views are far to the right of the American mainstream. Yet as we write this, a Google News search on "Joe Walsh" (excluding "guitar" and "Eagles" to eliminate "Rocky Mountain Way" Joe Walsh) gets 1,461 hits. Rep. Keith Ellison, on the other hand, co-chairs a large Congressional caucus whose support may be vital to the passage of any deal. Yet his name only gets 157 hits - a figure that falls even more when you eliminate references to his religion. more »

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Our deficit and debt came from cutting taxes on the rich and big corporations, increasing military spending and sweetheart deals with big pharma and health insurance companies. Elite “solutions” always involve cutting back what We, the People do for each other while keeping taxes low for the rich and big corporations. The latest “Gang of 6” solution is being pushed hard, manipulating a sense of inevitability, but is just more of the same. Don't be fooled, there is significant opposition. Grassroots organizations oppose it, progressives in Congress oppose it and The American Majority opposes it. But you won’t hear that from our elite media.

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I've written a lot about jumbo coin seigniorage as a way of getting around the debt ceiling problem over the past 7 months, and others more »

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Although specifics have yet to officially emerge, there is little doubt that among the Social Security benefit cuts the President is proposing will be a reduction in Social Security’s annual cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) through an obscure change in the COLA formula known as the chained CPI. more »

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Today, the MSM noticed that there's an issue of constitutionality related to the debt ceiling. more »

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Republicans are perpetrating a fraud. They say they're concerned about reducing government deficits. But you don't need to look at how they treat all of the country's biggest corporations (which is extremely well) or even how they kowtow to its richest 400 families, who now have 6900 times as much income as the average household, to know that's a lie.

You only need to look at the way they treat a handful of billionaires. They're holding the entire country's budget hostage because they don't want to raise taxes on the wealthy, and they don't want to eliminate a tax loophole that could be bringing in more than $4 billion each year ... from only 25 people.

The top 25 hedge fund managers in the United States collectively earned $22 billion last year, and yet they have their own cushy set of tax rules. If they operated under the same rules that apply to other people - police officers, for example, or teachers - the country could reduce its national debt by as much as $44 billion in the next ten years.

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How broken is today's political debate? The only politician standing up for most Republican voters on today’s most burning political issue is. … a Socialist.

The question is whether we reduce the deficit only through spending cuts, or also by raising taxes on the rich. This should be an easy issue for Democrats to stand on ... and run on. A recent New York Times/CBS News poll showed that 72% of of those surveyed agreed that federal taxes should be raised for households making more than $250,000 - including 55% of Republicans. Yet even with the GOP leadership far to the right of the country on this issue, Democrats haven’t taken an unequivocal position.

Who's speaking for this Republican majority (and most everybody else) in Washington? Only Sen. Bernie Sanders, Socialist from Vermont. Sanders has unequivocally said that he won't support a deal to raise the debt ceiling unless it includes higher taxes on on the rich. Where are the Democrats? Nancy Pelosi's been marginalized from the discussions, even though a deal won't be possible without the support of Democrats in Congress. The White House and Harry Reid have refused to take a firm stand. more »

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Negotiating with crazy people is always a bad idea and negotiating with hostage-takers is dangerous. But negotiating with crazy hostage-takers is worse than dangerously bad. The “debt-ceiling” deal being negotiated to keep the economy from being crashed could crash the economy anyway. more »

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The House is voting on a “clean” debt ceiling bill this evening -- a bill to raise the debt ceiling without any "hostage-taking" conditions. This is the right thing to do for the country and every Democrat should vote for this. more »

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