If this would have been a Democrat the Repiglican/Corporate Media would have 24/7 coverage leading to demanding his resignation as a 'traitor' to the country. But, of course, this won't happen because he is a Repiglican. The 'memory hole' awaits ...

WTF? On what planet is that not treason?

He is a traitor. He is also unbelievably stupid and hypocritical. He lead the fight against Sean Penn several years ago. He is probably one of 'those' that believe only congress can say totally inane things on the world stage.

"One of the messages I had -- because we need to build trust and confidence in our number one creditor," said Kirk, "is that the budget numbers that the US government had put forward should not be believed.

And that builds trust and confidence, how?

I seem to remember a time, not too long ago (2001-2008) when that kind of talk would produce howls of treason on FoxNews and accusations of being a traitor.

I've been getting the feeling that people in Congress on both sides just don't want this country to succeed. Whether it's Repubs just obstructing everything this administration tries to do or Dems trying to water down the administration's agenda forgetting that they won the election in a landslide.

Remember how Republicans nearly blew a gasket about Nancy Pelosi's trip to Syria, claiming that she was committing lese majeste against the government of King George? But she didn't do anything remotely like this.

"traitor" says storskies.

"Treason" says Dave Munger.
I'll add Giving Comfort to the Enemy in a Time of War.

And the Justice Department will take action in Three-Two-One. . .

Our country is fucked. These people are determined to do everything possible to make Obama's agenda fail.

The republicans are great at attacking, great sticking to the message, but we've all witnessed their inability to actually govern when they had their chance. And they want people to vote them back into power for what reason???

We are going to be a third world country very soon. Very similar to Mexico; the rich elite living in gated communities while the rest of the population (the vast majority) works in squalor.

Fucking feudalism is what they want.

I see no other way to stop this than another civil war and I am being dead fucking serious.

Are we to ass

The Chinese are well aware that the government is spending too much money. That is why Beijing is diversifying their foreign currency reserves.

Oil prices are rising as well. This is another indicator that the world is not high on the dollar. There is only so much deficit spending that Obama and Congress can do without the world noticing and taking action as appropriate.

Additionally, I for one am not worried about China owning so much of our debt.

Now, I'm no economist, but it could be argued that it is the American market that has allowed China to become the economic super power it has become. Now, if they actually were to call in their debt, could we not just say fine, but guess what - we're gonna slap some serious trade tariffs on all the cheap, poisoned plastic bullshit you sell by the billions here in the US. You think any other country would spend so much on Chinese goods? Hell no.

The next step of course would be war.

"ACTIVE ATTEMPTS TO UNDERMINE THE COUNTRY"

Personally, I think the whole premise that we owe something to our country is garbage. We owe it what is set out in the laws, it owes us what is set out in the laws - that's the agreement. None of us had a choice over where we were born. "Patriotism" is almost always an attempt at manipulation, like requests of loyalty at a job - a play on emotion to get more out of you than the contract sets out.

People, companies and countries abandon you when it suits them, and when they "can" legally, and you do the same.

I don't care more about this country than I do Canada or France or Japan. Is that wrong? I want this country to fail in some endeavor when I believe the most *good* will come of such failure.

U.S. Constitution, 14th Amendment, Section 4 states:

“The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned.

I hope he spends a lot of money losing the Senate election in Illinois.

Why is this son of a bitch not being arrested and charged with treason?

Is anyone really surprised to see the anti-American right showing their true colors again? From Sarah Palin's cozying up to the Alaskan secessionists to Limbaugh's campaign to get GM to fail, it's been clear for ages that a substantial part of the conservative base simply doesn't like the USA as it actually exists-- they like a fantasy version of it where Goldwater wrote the Constitution, and 90% of the population is white folks without all their teeth.

"I don't care more about this country than I do Canada or France or Japan. Is that wrong?"

Yes. If you don't appreciate what the US is, in comparison to those other countries, then you've got your head up your ass.

Sooner or later, one of these impetuous GOP connivers is going to find himself/herself/itself openly branded for committing an act of war against the Republic, at which point they're going to be forcibly removed from the floor of their respective chamber by armed federal officers---and, if need be, by armed federal officers who are backed up by troops.

Will that incite the uprising so oft-times predicted by the Right?

Yep---followed by a quick emaciation of the Right's population numbers, if we possess the courage to recall humankind's historical interactions with armed thuggery. In the end, ther can be no other alternative to acknowledging the fact that these are people who will not be reasoned with; who will not accept anything other than their wholly-reclaimed superiority over all else, and all others.

As Joe Biden said, "Our enemies will test us."

"How much easier it is to be critical than correct."
- Benjamin Disraeli

and YES! The GOP spent 8 years in power tearing this country down and NOW they are trying to do it from the sidelines.

"I realize Mark Kirk is poised to launch a Senate campaign, so he'll make ridiculous attacks as often as possible to boost his fundraising prospects."

I thought also that he probably didn't say that to the Chinese officials - that this was some generic Cato-bitch about government spending. But if so, it's ill-conceived, since the type of voters that are susceptible to rhetoric about out-of-control spending are also the type of voters that would freak out about "leaking" info to the scary Chinese.

It's not a matter of "If a Dem did this..."; it happened about 2 years ago when Pelosi went to Syria,and Bush et al publically made a stink about it sending "mixed signals".

I doubt the Chinese government will make any economic decisions based on the rantings of a lone third-tier politico. Indeed, I'd wager most of the people in the room have a better understanding of the situation than does Kirk.

But still, what an insanely stupid thing to do.

It's treason, pure and simple. I'm sure Ann Coulter will discuss this at length in this week's column.

Our role in international finance is predicated on the full faith and credit of the United States government, and Mark Kirk wants China to think this isn't worth much.

What if Kirk's prediction turns out to be more accurate than the prediction of the Obama administration?

Even without Kirk, does anybody believe the budget numbers of the Obama administration.

Shouldn't you make at least a small attempt to provide the evidence that Kirk is wrong?

Lastly, Kirk is not undercutting the full faith and credit of the US, but the full faith and credit of the Obama administration. Congressfolks undercutting the administration is a long-standing tradition in the U.S. It began under Washington, and motivated the Adams administration to pass the Alien and Sedition acts, that they used to prosecute their political opponents. Since they were repealed by the Jefferson administration and Democratic-Republican Congress, Congressfolks have always undermined the administration of the opposing party. Right before the US invaded Iraq, Democratic Congressment visited Baghdad to show what a nice country Iraq was under Hussein.

Kirk is now probably on a list in some Beijing office of "guys we can bribe or hoodwink when the time comes."

Kirk has no chance of gaining a senate seat from Illinois.

And the Republicans wonder why they are losing membership...this kind of idiocy is one reason. In difficult times, you don't undercut a standing president and his policy when you are also an elected leader. Most people do recognize hypocrisy. And most recognize skating on the thin ice of treason. The exemption is, of course, FOX and their constituents.

Kirk is too shortsighted to realize that his words would/could have the same impact in the future when the next republican president occupies 1600 Pennsylvania Ave as it could/would have on the current democratic president. His words indicate a focus on short-term goals over long-term goals.

If China wants to become the dominant power in the world this century, then making sure fools like Mark Kirk are elected into leadership positions would be a wise move on China's part.

If China's leadership is wise, they'll just let Obama prove he is untrustworthy, just like Bush did.

It's called treason, and he should be prosecuted like the traitor he is. This tool belongs to what the GOP is morphing into: the Hate America party.

It was obvious that Kirk was running for senate when he signed on to cosponsor Michelle Bachmann's crazy anti-Amero bill.

Either he's clueless about economics, or pandering to the nativist right wing, or more likely both.

Of course it's not treason or anything even close. It's the act of a true patriot. The treasonous act was the American people's electing of Obama. Don't you guys get it?

More seriously, in a day and age where those outside countries are pretty much privy to all the information of those inside, this act of Rep. Kirk has nowhere near the potential to damage as it might once have had and has to be seen in this light. Mr. Kirk has zero ability to shift Chinese action one way or the other. Decisions will be based on more relevant information. The question is to what extent people like Mr. Kirk can be used to advance Chinese interests.

If I remember correctly, it's Congress that sets the budget and holds the power of the purse. The President can only approve or veto it.
Did Kirk flunk high school civics?

"We owe [our country] what is set out in the laws, it owes us what is set out in the laws - that's the agreement." -- flubber

That is the agreement that has been broken. It cannot be de-broken, it has to be replaced by a new agreement. But there will be no new agreement, because none is possible while the country is divided into two equal camps, each of which hates the other more than it loves or hates any other thing.

Thank you, Mr. Reagan.

It's dumb, and it's wrong, and it's spiteful and petty, but it's not treason. Treason against the United States consists only in levying war against them, or in adhering to their enemies, giving them aid or comfort.

The PRC isn't an enemy and this asshat isn't levying war against us.

Tossing 'treason' around lightly is just going to make it a fnord, like 'fascism', thus robbing the language of a useful word without leaving anything in its place.

Unlikely the Chinese are placing much stock in the utterances of this asshat, also.

hmm .. it's not treason, I wouldn't say (though who knows what went on when the mics were off). But it is sedition.

The founders of America envisioned a system by which the people would have representation, thanks to office holders specifically elected for that purpose, to give the average man (thankfully now the average woman as well) a voice. What has happened over the last 40 years or so has so far stretched Democracy from its original shape & intent that it bears no resemblance to the original idea whatever. There are several things going on -- people don't care about politics, and think that all elected officials are equally crooked & venal & awful. Democracy cannot survive unless the people nurture & protect it. We -- collectively -- have failed to do this. But our elected officials are arguably as culpable or more so, chiefly because a vast number of them are simply too stupid to pass a basic competency civics exam. They're in it for the power or the money or the glory. They are NOT in it to represent the regular Joes & Judys of America.

One thing that depresses & upsets me about pundits who lean left is that they generally fail to adequately assess the chasm between what it meant to be a Democrat in, say, 1965, and what it means today. Obama, so far, reminds me a whole lot of Richard Nixon (only without the paranoia). Our elected officials have been tracking rightward (& let's face it, we've known that far-right-land is cuckoo-crazy-land ever since, you know, the 1930s) for decades. We do certainly have a far-right portion of our population. A large percentage of them are mentally ill on any sort of clinical scale of measure. But for the most part, the sane people of America have not tracked rightward, and thus the gulf between the desires & will of the people and the government which exists to represent them is widening at an alarming rate. I had hoped restoration of grown-ups being in charge would make a difference, but it has not. "Democrats" these days are decidedly weak tea & mostly are Republicans-circa-1972 in their attitudes, platform, and governing habits.

What does it take to change this? Because however good a thing Democracy is, eventually, it cannot sustain the abuse its endured the last several decades.

Hang the dirt-bag for his treasonous international subversive activities.

Gee, this is almost like wanting to release damning photos knowing that not only your President and your military leaders are against it, but that it would most certainly put your own troops into harm's way. What members of a political party, along with many of their supporters would ever want to do such a thing, knowing it would undermine an ongoing war effort?:

http://www.govexec.com/story_page.cfm?articleid=42886&dcn=todaysnews

End of discussion.

I second those who point out that Kirk's rhetoric, while misguided (and far worse than the usual suspects yapped about when Pelosi traveled overseas), is not treason. Not even close.

His words indicate a focus on short-term goals over long-term goals.

And here we have a remarkably eloquent summary of the GOP's political strategy over the past 40 years.

As for the notion that Kirk's statements are not treason b/c we are not at war w/China, I would suggest that we most definitely *are* at war w/China in an economic sense. Surely, the damage wrought to our economy by a flood of cheap, often slave-made, Chinese goods is equal to or greater than that done physically to the US mainland during any war.

-Z

Traitorous bastard

There is some statute against interfering with or trying to subvert foreign policy positions of the US.

Can't remember the name of it.