nothing short of a constitutional amendment will do:

[unblock]

the president shall have the authority to borrow funds to the extent reasonable and necessary to pay expenses duly authorized by congress.


any deal that signs us up for a repeat performance of this charade is a joke in my book.

[PoliticAverse]

1. Or just repeal the debt limit. n/t

[unblock]

2. frankly i don't want any future congress putting this crap back in.

[YarnAddict]

3. And what happens when there is a Republican president again? n/t

[unblock]

4. then... that president can borrow and pay as well. no debt crisis.

what's the problem?


if either party want to argue about the budget, well, that's what the budget debate is for. once authorizations pass, the government pays, period. i don't want either party playing games about paying authorized expenses.

[Seeking Serenity]

5. Oh, no worries. There won't ever be another

Republican president. Never ever.

[YarnAddict]

6. I was about to warn you

and then I noticed that the sarcasm thingy.

[TheKentuckian]

8. Are you saying this is a legitimate tactic?

Why would we be pushing for a default because the opposition is elected?

[cascadiance]

7. The difference is that Democrats don't usually want to destroy government like the Republicans do...

The problem is that part of many extremist Republicans' missions is that they want to just destroy the government and just live in a fascist state controlled by the 1% fascists they love so much. They don't care if safety net programs are functional or not.

So, I would argue that the kind of crap that Cruzin' for a Bruzin' and others are pulling is something that just won't be useful in our hands, when we wouldn't want the outcome that many of them DO want in terms of destroying an economy as an alternative to what we might try to force a Republican government put in place. A Republican president might just say "Go ahead, shut down the government. See if I care. You are only destroying yourselves and your base support." and he'd be right.

Now the filibuster battle is arguably more a measure of strategic importance that each party can use as a minority and would want to use. I think we'd be better off putting in some constitutional protections against this sort of problem happening again that rule futzing would bring on again if Republicans get the power to do so. We need to fix things that would protect the government from minority takeover and shutdown in the future. If we need means to do something against a rogue Republican administration, we should have some form of citizen initiated means to do so instead of gerry mandered congressional bodies to do so. Something like a "no confidencez" vote that might force an interim election or something like that.

[Nuclear Unicorn]

9. If there's no budget what's there to borrow?

[unblock]

10. congress has the authority not to authorize spending.

but then there's no default concern. if they want to play brinksmanship and games, that's the way to do it. you fight over the budget. but once you authorize spending, the president should have his hands free to pay those bills.

i'm not a fan of such brinksmanship and games either, but at least then it wouldn't be a matter of a government default.

[Nuclear Unicorn]

11. "congress has the authority not to authorize spending."

Forgive me if I'm misreading this but the construction of your statement suggests that the president gets to spend what the president wants unless congress blocks it. The exact opposite is true. A president can only make requests; if approval from congress is not forthcoming -- either by a "No" vote or simple refusal to act -- then the president has no authority to spend.

And until that authority comes there is no accumulation of debt, assuming there is a deficit between expenditures and tax receipts. If, miraculously, congress suddenly started submitting balanced budgets that were signed by the president then the debt ceiling would be a moot issue as deficits would no longer add to the national debt.

[unblock]

12. we agree on the mechanics.

only congress has the power of the purse, it authorizes spending or it doesn't.
the president can only spend what has been authorized, which may or may not have much to do with what the president may have previously asked for.

borrowing only somewhat relates to a balanced budget, given timing problems. if all government spending happens throughout the year, but government revenue only came in at the very end, then the government would need to borrow in the meanwhile to make the cash flows work. revenue might equal spending over the course of the entire year, but not necessarily through any particular date. moreover, a "balanced budget" is at best based on estimates; a recession will always lower tax receipts and increase spending, so even if it were intended to be "balanced", it might still in fact lead to more spending than revenue (or vice versa) depending on how the year actually plays out.

my point is that i want congress to have their battles over the budget and the authorizations themselves. once passed into law, the president should be able to borrow as needed to carry out those authorizations.

[Nuclear Unicorn]

13. "once passed into law, the president should be able to borrow ... to carry out those authorizations"

One of the principles of the Constitution is that Congress can withhold funding even for things it previously authorized, i.e. wars.

[unblock]

14. again, i'm only talking about open, valid, outstanding authorizations.

yes, congress can at any point shut down medicare or a branch of the military or whatever (assuming they can get the votes and the president's signature, or override a veto).

the sequester is an example of this, where they cut back on the actual authorizations. no problem here. well, stupid and painful, but constitutionally kosher and doesn't cause any default issues.


the issue here is that congress now has a mechanism by which it has authorized something, and continues to authorize it, but has tied the president's hands in terms of the borrowing necessary to carry out what congress itself has authorized and is continuing to authorize.

"here, order those tanks, in fact order some more, but don't you dare pay that bill when they invoice you!" i mean that's just plain nuts.

[econoclast]

15. Surefire way to turn into Greece

(1). Congress loves "authorizing" programs. Gives then ooodles of goodies to hand out to their constituents....makes for easy re-election. This is axiomatic regardless of which party controls Congress.

(2). Congress hates voting for tax increases. (On most people most of the time). This is axiomatic regardless of which party controls Congress.

(1) + (2) =

(3). Shirking the responsibility for the resultant fiscal imbalance by Mandating that the chief executive borrow the difference ..... It'll be "Katie bar the door!"

And when the debt is suddenly 50 trillion dollars they'll look you in the eye and say "We NEVER authorized accumulation of this mess!!!! The President did it!!!

You are right that these fights SHOULD occur in the budget process. BUT Congress has apparently abdicated that responsibility. For probably the last 100 years these fights have in fact taken place during the Appropriations process. Used to 10 or 15 separate Appropriations bills hashed out each year. One Bill for each grouping of Govt departments. Defense. Education etc. Back a few years ago it was a sign of Congressional failure if a Continuing Resolution was needed. Meant they failed to get the appropriations done timely.

Now they don't even pretend to try. This year the House only passed 4 or so of the 13 appropriations Bills needed and of those four the Senate passed ZERO! For whatever reason they seem to LIKE the CR now .... Everything rolled up into a fur ball.

They are already shirking their Constitutional responsibilities. The amendment you propose lets them wash their hands of it entirely.

[unblock]

16. uh, right, this is why every other country in the world is greece.

afaik, no other country in the world has this crazy mechanism that lets them order up a lot of stuff and then not legally pay for it.

the debt ceiling has never been more than an opportunity to grandstand against excessive debt while putting the country perilously close to a pointless, massive, self-inflicted wound.

moreover, the debt ceiling has ZERO effect on restraining spending or increasing revenues. no one talks about the actual debt ceiling level when they talk about budget items or tax proposals. they only talk about overall deficits, balanced budgets, debt as a percent of gdp, etc.

without this debt ceiling nonsense we'll be no more or less prone to overspending than any other country because the debt ceiling crap has nothing to do with it.

*all* it is is an opportunity to default when we don't have to. it makes NO sense whatsoever and serve NO purpose beyond grandstanding theatrics. once upon a time, these were harmless, but no longer. we the people can't let them continue to toy with the validity of federal debt like this.