Debt Rage

From this morning's Boston Globe:
Representative Jason Chaffetz, a Utah Republican, said he cannot support Boehner’s bill. "I simply cannot raise the debt ceiling if we are not going to fundamentally change the way we do business."

"It’s extremely disappointing that the House of Representatives was unable to work together in a bipartisan way to avoid default," Republican Senator Scott Brown said in a statement. "Frankly, this is pathetic. The American people deserve better. I call upon my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to rise above partisanship. The time to act is now."

The first quote is an attempt to make harming the global economy seem like a principled act. The second quote is an attempt to share blame with Democrats for the failure of the Republican controlled House to agree on anything. This is really pissing me off. Really.

As of this moment, no bill has been presented to the President for his signature. And yet Republicans will blame him for not signing a bill that he does not have. I think Obama deserves a great deal of blame. He is failing to do his job right now.

A few days ago, Speaker Boner compared the US Government to a household to make the point that cutbacks in spending are needed. Aside from the fact that the analogy is stupid because a government is nothing like a household, I would like to continue with it. Let's say a husband buys something on credit, something so big that it shifts the power structure of the household to the wife. The wife signs a pledge saying she won't pay the creditor a dime because she is against frivolous spending. The husband is not man enough to stand up to the self-righteous spendthrift. Where does that leave the creditor? I would say the creditor is pretty pissed at this principled couple.

The government of the United States of America is not a television sitcom couple. It is a financial entity of incomparable power and size. The government (and all Americans by extension) spent the money, we should pay our creditors. The time to argue about principles is when the money is being spent, not when the bills come due.

We should pay our creditors. We should pay them even if they are old folks, poor folks, illegal aliens, defense contractors, abortionists, oil companies, drug dealers, homosexuals, devil worshipers, the Chinese government, or Satan himself. It shouldn't matter what made us spend the money that we owe. It shouldn't matter who we owe the money to. Just cut the fucking checks and argue about spending in the next campaign cycle.