Congress has lost its mind...

[classicman]

Originally Posted by BigV

"The truth is, the President wants a blank check today." Are you kidding.

Please, stop being so shallow.

Shallow? that's not shallow, that's an outright lie. I understand the issues with different philosophies and all, but this is past the point of anything even remotely rational.
THEY (virtually all of them) are playing politics with this and as usual, we the people are the ones paying for their decisions.

[BigV]

whew! thank goodness. I just heard that Michelle Bachman will not vote for Boehner's plan, this two step baloney.

wait--there's more--oh, great. She further says that she will not vote for *any* bill that raises the debt ceiling. Poor Boehner, this is what he has to work with. We're fucked.

[classicman]

OMFG. . .

[richlevy]

Just wait until Obama starts placing the National Guard on alert on Aug 2nd. That should get everyone's attention.

[Griff]

Originally Posted by infinite monkey

I don't do telephones.

Perhaps even better I show up on his doorstep?

Not heard of one person here who's actually bothered with anything but whining here...but I'll keep in mind how ineffective my effort is, next time.

Thanks.

I wrote my Representative and one Senator two weeks ago.

[infinite monkey]

That is a much better answer. Good on you.

[piercehawkeye45]

Originally Posted by richlevy

Just wait until Obama starts placing the National Guard on alert on Aug 2nd. That should get everyone's attention.

Until he realizes he might not be able to pay them.

[ZenGum]

I only wander though this thread occasionally, so maybe this was mentioned already, but ...

There is a last resort.

Print cash.

It staves off insolvency for a while. In fact, since US debt is denominated in US dollars, it will mean your debt represents a smaller and smaller percentage of your GDP.

Problem is, it also causes devaluation and possibly hyperinflation. Anyone with cash in the bank, cash under the bed, or an income fixed in dollar amounts, will find their position somewhere between eroded and vapourised.

[BigV]

this is exactly what china has complained about already

they say they've lost hundreds of billions of dollars in value of their investments due to the dilution of the dollar by the quantitative easing programs. programs that literally just printed money.

keep trying please. we need all the ideas we can get, and you can't possibly be less informed than some members of congress, despite your merely occasional visits here.

[ZenGum]

China? #$%@ 'em.

Their practice of pegging the RMB to an artificially low rate against the US$ is the cause of about 1/4 of the US's problems. The fact that a US devaluation would screw China and OPEC is about the strongest argument in favour of it that I can think of.

China complaining about other countries messing about with currency games? Hypocrisy! That's rich. No, wait, its China that's rich.

[BigV]

I agree completely.

Unfortunately, I (the corporate/royal/national I) still have a problem.

[tw]

Originally Posted by ZenGum

There is a last resort.

Print cash.

Nixon and Ford did that. As a result, the dollar dropped to almost one fifth of its value. Stagflation. Eventually, Jimmy Carter and Greenspan did what was necessary to fix the problem. Interest rates approaching 20%. Wholesale selling of American assets - most of Hawaii, major NYC real estate, construction equipment, bankruptcies, massive unemployment, sell off everything inside factories, etc. It fixed the problem but cost Carter his job. And did not finish fixing until the second half of Reagan's first term.

We have a fundamental problem traceable to when these debts were incurred. "Reagan proved that deficits don't matter." So Cheney had no problem spending money we did not have - just like Nixon. Nixon did it in 1968/70. Cheney did it starting in 2001. Therefore jobs and recession happened in 1975/79. And 2008/now. We are simply paying for the debts incurred back then. Do you also want to bring back stagflation? We are in far better shape than we should have been.

Debts created by Cheney/George Jr are much larger. And continue to exist due to Mission Accomplished and their protection of bin Laden. Whereas Carter was not incurring new debts. Obama is stuck with wacko extremist created disaster including Afghanistan, a completely screwed up space program, a military that is sucking the life out of America, and the 'enrich the drug companies' prescription drug plan that by itself is another $1trillion. Add to it so many wacko extremists in Congress that we cannot even do the simplest things - eliminate the paper dollar bill – an immediate $1billion saved annually.

So you want to print more paper money? That was already done by George Jr when we flew three 747s with pallets of hundred dollar bills into Iraqi (with no accounting) to ‘save’ that country. Time to pay for all that printed money is now.

Now is when all those debts start coming due. It is rather amazing that our unemployment did not exceed 20%. Maybe because this time we did not print more money.

[Spexxvet]

We could sell Minnesota, if anyone would buy it.

[piercehawkeye45]

I resent that. Wisconsin is a much better choice.

[infinite monkey]

Well, how about if we tack on North and South Dakota?