Now, as to the more serious issue (Paul simply isn't serious): what happens if we default? Really, not a lot. Who do we default to? 1) U.S. bondholders. But a default doesn't mean you don't pay people ANYTHING, it can mean you pay them only some of what they are owed. 2) Foreigners. The Chinese, because of keeping their currency fictitiously low, have in essence increased our debt. This would partially restore real values in their case. In the case of the Euros, it would shift a transfer of wealth from Euro bondholders to American taxpayers---in essence, a reverse of the Marshall Plan . . . or a repayment of it.
What default really does is to remove one of the major sources of trust in the USA that other nations, no matter how much they hate us, have always had: that we are financially solvent. In essence, this would be a financial "nationalization" of foreign wealth (and some American wealth too). It would undermine Hamilton's great objective of making the U.S. always credit worthy.
Is it worth it if it puts us on a balanced budget and the road to fiscal responsibility? Perhaps.
Maybe Trump and Rubio have it right. To me they are the only ones making sense. At least I can relate to what they say.
A debt default by itself solves nothing, at most it buys 3 years of time.
The core problem is over-spending growing at a rate so fast that a full debt default won’t even be felt after a few years...the new debt from over-spending will eclipse it.
Losing the worlds top credit rating would be unthinkable to conservatives just a few years ago now its considered no big deal a position the libs have held for years..the country is doomed by its own idiocy.
I have lived in a lot of third world countries, they don't control their own economies and destines because they don't have the credit standing in the world to do so.
This race to become a third world debtor nation spurred on by traitors in this country who call themselves patriots is utter madness. Incidentally these are the same folks who refuse to recognize the WOT and the fact that we are under attack on a variety of fronts by people who genuinely want to kill us all.
Attempt to restructure the debt by all means but don't start blaming the lenders for your freely-chosen debt. The lenders didn't hold a gun to your head. Your debt was legally authorized, and 'may not be denied'.
Sell assets, cut spending, remove barriers to domestic wealth-production. This is how to deal with debt.
Or secede and let the Monkeys in the blue states pay for their own sh*t. Which also works.
Or default, lose your embassies and external bases and go five years without a penny of foreign money.
But whatever you do, stop blaming other countries for your spending habits. It's just unmanly.