Posted on 05/18/2011 4:08:25 PM PDT by Sub-Driver
W.H. warns of debt 'calamity' By ABBY PHILLIP | 05/18/11 4:12 PM Updated: 05/18/11 4:56 PM
In an effort to clamp down on misinformation about the debt ceiling and to ratchet up the pressure on Congress to act, the Obama administration said Wednesday that there is no Plan B for the government if Congress fails to raise the borrowing limit.
Unlike the budget standoff in March, where a plan would have gone into place if the government shut down, an administration official warned that there is no secret plan that would kick in if the government runs out of borrowing power.
There is no plan that can preserve our credit rating, said a senior administration official, who briefed reporters under the condition of anonymity. There really is no alternative to raising the debt limit. It has to be raised before the deadline ... well in advance of the deadline.
Adding to their own warning against the risk of default, administration officials cited similar arguments being used by previous Republican administrations: That the consequences of the United States defaulting on debt are as terrible as they are varied. They include market chaos, financial institution failures, higher interest rates, flight from the dollar, and loss of confidence in all government obligations, which would produce a global economic and financial calamity, they said, quoting from former Reagan chief of staff James Baker in a letter to Congress on the debt limit in 1987.
The heightened pitch of the administration's message on the debt limit reflects a growing concern that a sense of urgency is being lost after the debt ceiling was reached, as expected, on May 16.
(Excerpt) Read more at politico.com ...
obama is the “calamity”, the debt is the results!
Failure to raise the debt ceiling IN NO WAY means default. Current revenues are sufficient to pay the interest payments on the debt.
Obama & Co., including many Pubs, just want to spend more money & incur more debt w/o cutting anything from current spending. They can't stand the idea of an approaching election with no money to hand out to buy support. It is as simple as that.
If we raise the ceiling now, we will face an even bigger problem when we reach the new ceiling in a year or so.
It is foolish to raise the ceiling w/o some serious plan to reduce both the deficit & the debt. Since Congress has no plan & shows no inclination to cut spending, the debt ceiling is the ONLY impediment to their irresponsibility.
Any Congressman or Senator who votes to raise the debt ceiling is no patriot. They are voting to put this country in further peril & closer to REAL default.
I also find it interesting that the “Great Depression of 1932” resulted in the Federal Government defaulting on it debts.
The Feds needed more gold so they told the holders of American War Bonds (WWI) that they could no longer be redeemed for gold. A Supreme Court case that followed said, on a 5-4 vote, that Congress shouldn't be hampered in the way it ran the nation; so, adhering to established Federal Laws dealing with currency control wasn't required.
The “Great Depression of 2011” is still unfolding but the Federal Government is going to “delay” (aka a short term default) in playing its retirement obligations to their ex-employees. Plus if half the rumors come true there will be no more private IRAs because they will be converted to Federal Retirement Bonds.
Ever wonder why the extreme depressions seem to happen only when Democrats control everything?
Oh, like it was SO urgent, of paramount galactic importance that Bush sign away OUR money to bail out the banks, or calamity would result?
Or that we desperately needed thousands of coders to thwart the y2k bug otherwise the sky would FALL!
I don’t believe anything any WH admin says anymore, regardless of who resides therein. They are all CHUMPS.
OK. So let’s say we take obama at his word and the government will default.
And this would be a bad thing?
I guess the most immediate problem would be that no one would lend the USG additional money.
And this would be a bad thing?
And the government would have to spend no more than it took in.
And this would be a bad thing?
And the communist chinese and saudi arabia would be caught out with a lot of our devalued debt.
And this would be a bad thing?
And our political leadership, such as it is, would be forced to the consequences of it’s financial profligacy instead of pushing the problem onto future generations.
And this would be a bad thing?
Right....there’s no “plan”...uh huh
Whatever...this to me, is just more fear mongering. It’s ESSENTIAL, an EMERGENCY, it’ll be a CATASTROPHE, if we DON’T raise the debt ceiling. The world will collapse, the federal government will shut down.
We can’t have that happen now can we? We MUST trust this government on what they say, and take their word. If they say it’s an emergency and there’s no other way, they have no plan, we HAVE to raise that debt ceiling and let them continue spending. /sarc
PFFFFFT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Sure there is. Radically cut spending by 2.5 *TRILLION* dollars per year for the next 50 years.
In point of fact, that's the ONLY plan on Planet Earth that "can preserve our credit rating."
There is NOTHING else that will do it.
...an administration official warned that there is no âsecret planâ that would kick in if the government runs out of borrowing power.There's no need for a secret plan -- the only solution available is the repeal of Obamacare.
Actually... it was because people saw, years ahead of time, that there was a potential problem that the programmers were able to avert the problem. All the Y2K doom-and-gloom scenarios would only have been plausible had those programmers NOT been busy. My husband worked as a contractor at the time--he updated many computer systems at major companies to avoid that problem.
What we're dealing with now is completely different. We're being told that we face disaster if the politicians don't continue the same bad policies that made this situation so bad in the first place.
Translation -
“We’ve gotten ourselves in so piteously deep that we have no earthly idea how to get out of this hole we’ve dug.”
The fact that there is no Plan B showcases the utter incompetence of this entire Administration.
&&&
I wish it was mere incompetence. These jerks know exactly what they are doing, and their plan to bring down the US by destroying our economy is working out just the way they had hoped.
Fear tactics, as par from this idiot-ridden administration and liberal democrats, in general.
Personally, I want to see this predicted debt “calamity”......bring these frakin’ idiots back down to Earth quickly. Hell, if I am lucky, maybe tar and feathering will be back en vogue by then.... =.=
The fact that we are here today to debate raising Americas debt limit is a sign of leadership failure. It is a sign that the U.S. Government cant pay its own bills. It is a sign that we now depend on ongoing financial assistance from foreign countries to finance our governments reckless fiscal policies. Increasing Americas debt weakens us domestically and internationally. Leadership means that the buck stops here. Instead, Washington is shifting the burden of bad choices today onto the backs of our children and grandchildren. America has a debt problem and a failure of leadership. Americans deserve better.
Why does this mental picture appear in my mind?
He doesn’t even have a plan? This one is pretty easy. He can’t spend money he doesn’t have, so, absent any direction from congress, the executive can pretty much decide what they want to stop spending money on.
He’d be a fool to stop paying interest on the debt. He has his people out saying how disastrous that would be, so it wouldn’t make sense to do the disastrous thing.
My fear is that he’ll cut things the country really needs, like military spending, in order to make the pain fall on republican voters, and still fund his pet projects.
This is the reason I oppose letting the debt ceiling stand with no action — not because I think we should raise it, but because if we don’t, and with Obama having spending authority, conservatives will be screwed. I figure all the things we like get stop-work orders.
If Obama was really gutsy, he would order an increase in withholding taxes. They don’t count as borrowing, it would hurt people more the more money they make, and he’d be able to keep spending, while it would look like the government was taking in higher revenues.
By next year, he’d find another way to blame us when the huge tax refunds came due.
Who’s fault is this?
Do i keep my money in life ins. annuities, IRAs, or savings accts...?
life ins if the policy is correct and gives you the payoff at 70. Many during the 80’s were written this way.
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