When Republicans captured the House of Representatives this past fall, Americans were treated to the happy surprise of their rhetoric, in which they claimed they did not intend to leverage the debt ceiling and risk economic damage as they had done in the past. Unfortunately, that is no longer the case. GOP hardliners are holding the creditworthiness of the country hostage even when they vote for the same increased deficits they pretend to care about.
Full Faith and Credit
Ted Rall
Ted Rall is a syndicated political cartoonist for Andrews McMeel Syndication, WhoWhatWhy.org and Counterpoint. He is a frequent contributor to The Wall Street Journal, a graphic novelist and author of many books of art and prose, and an occasional war correspondent. He is, recently, the author of the graphic novel "The Stringer."
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The issue is: how can the creditworthiness of a country be expected to expand indefinitely … if not for the ultimate, inescapable thermodynamic imperative, then, at least, after 40 years of encouraging its former former industrial base*** to escape to other countries? I expect neither the party of Ronald “my heart tells me that facts and evidence can screw-off“ Reagan nor that of William “I feel the pain I’ve inflicted upon you” Clinton to accept responsibility for this … if they recognize it at all.
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*** industrial production having formerly been the source of wealth production in “classical” capitalism, which has been converted into the realm of effortless manipulation of electronic chits of “financial capitalism” … including, but hardly restricted to, acts of electronic piracy against the foreign exchange surpluses of other countries held in banks of the US/”West.”
In return for allowing the debt ceiling to rise, Republicans demand that spending be limited to the increase due to inflation. Seemingly they think we are oblivious to the fact that since the blessed time of Ronald Reagan (1980), inflation has multiplied the consumer price index by a factor of about 2.8 but the defense budget has multiplied by about 5.4. What’s up with that?