The next fiscal showdown in Washington shouldn’t happen.
About the middle of May the debt limit will be reached and Republicans are saying they won’t vote to lift the limit unless the Democrats agree to additional — and very large — spending cuts.
This threat to the nation’s standing in the world’s credit markets is as close to treason as an American can come without being hauled off to prison.
If the United States government is prohibited from paying its bills and must shut down because Congress refuses to act, the consequences would be catastrophic. It is impossible to imagine any action the president’s political opponents could take that would make our country more vulnerable to its enemies.
Giving aid and comfort to an enemy is a definition of treason.
No, this is not being overly dramatic. Raising the debt limit — a limit which should not exist in the first place — is necessary to keep the country in business. The debt, lord knows, was created by Congress over decades under several presidents of both parties, by Congresses controlled by both parties, because all of those duly elected representatives, senators and presidents were unable or unwilling to raise as much money with taxes as they spent.
The current administration has not only agreed to significant reductions in expenditures but just announced a program to reduce deficits by $4 trillion over the next decade.
The Republican announcement that they will shut the government down in a few weeks if the president and his party do not agree to draconian additional cuts this year is to argue that President Barack Obama and the Democrats in Congress must now take full responsibility for a national debt created over generations. That is an argument based on lies; lies which threaten our nation’s future.
— Emerson Lynn, jr.
