Political Animal
Blog
About two weeks ago, Diane Swonk, chief economist for Mesirow Financial and an economic advisor to the Congressional Budget Office and the Federal Reserve Board, talked to MSNBC about the state of the debt-ceiling crisis. She noted, among other things, recently having returned from Europe.
“Coming back from Europe, the Europeans just can’t believe we’d be so foolish as to decidedly squander away our debt rating in such a frivolous manner,” she said. “This just doesn’t make any sense whatsoever.”
Some observers on the other side of the Atlantic are becoming increasingly blunt in their assessment.
Right-wing “nutters” in the United States Congress holding up a deal to prevent a catastrophic debt default are a greater risk to the global financial system than problems in the euro zone, a British minister said Sunday. […]
“The irony of the situation at the moment, with markets opening tomorrow morning, is that the biggest threat to the world financial system comes from a few right-wing nutters in the American congress rather than the euro zone,” he told BBC television.
This also comes the same month as a powerful editorial in The Economist, a conservative British publication, explaining that Republicans are creating a crisis, on purpose, for no reason: “It is because the vast majority of Republicans, driven on by the wilder-eyed members of their party and the cacophony of conservative media, are clinging to the position that not a single cent of deficit reduction must come from a higher tax take. This is economically illiterate and disgracefully cynical.”
The Financial Times’ James Crabtree added this morning that Asian central bankers, watching the American fiasco, have been reduced to “resigned incredulity.”
I do wonder, from time to time, how I might explain this crisis to someone from outside the United States. Why would American officials, on purpose, choose to stop paying America’s bills? Why would these officials want to deliberately undermine the country’s credit rating? Why would elected lawmakers, who presumably like their country, risk an economic crash on purpose? Why would American voters elect such lunatics?
Alas, I’m not sure how I’d answer any of these questions from an outsider looking in. The best I can do is try to explain that there’s a deep strain of madness that’s overcome one of our major political parties, and it’s an illness that puts us all at risk.
Facebook
Twitter
K in VA on July 25, 2011 9:26 AM:
So which is worse for us all (and by "all," I mean the entire world)? Crazy Republicans or Cowering Democrats?
c u n d gulag on July 25, 2011 9:27 AM:
"Alas, I’m not sure how I’d answer any of these questions from an outsider looking in."
How about the fact that we are a country with a large enough group of scared xenophobic morons, that they elect politicians who are, in the words of the great Barney Frank - "invinsibly ignorant."
I would also add, supremely stupid!
Generations from now, if there are any, with the ever warming globe, people will look back at us and laugh
Stupid, stupid, stupid...
gelfling545 on July 25, 2011 9:28 AM:
Well, first you'd have to explain that these are anti-government types who spent millions to get INTO the government. Logic would be your weakest tool here.
Josef K on July 25, 2011 9:32 AM:
I do wonder, from time to time, how I might explain this crisis to someone from outside the United States.
This is simply a vivid illustration of Winston Churchill's observation "democracy is the worst form of government...except for all the others".
As for explaining this? Its simple enough: low-information voters elected candidates who claimed they would focus on jobs and the economy, but who have turned out to be both liars and fools who really don't understand what they're doing.
That's what can happen in a democratic republic. Sadly, it happened last year and now we're paying for it.
steve duncan on July 25, 2011 9:35 AM:
Perception is reality:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/ezra-klein/post/wonkbook-republicans-have-won-but-can-they-stop-there/2011/07/25/gIQAFHVIYI_blog.html#pagebreak
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The MSM will soon be stampeding to declare Republicans the winners in the debt ceiling showdown. As seen with Ezra Klein of WaPo, the trend is off to a good start. If there is a winner in a contest there is a loser too. Obama lost. Democrats lost. Sure, it's most important to prevent all the carnage a default would cause. In doing that Obama made "winners" of us all. But there is no doubt he's stamped himself and his party political losers. The press, talk radio, word on the street and all the opposition candidates blaring forth their 2012 campaign spots will cement the image.
J on July 25, 2011 9:35 AM:
c. gulag, Agreed! but I think you meant to write 'invincibly'
Reality Bites on July 25, 2011 9:37 AM:
Steve, you fail to note that a handful of Western European nations have adopted auterity measures in order to curb spending and improve their debt situation.
Danp on July 25, 2011 9:39 AM:
The Republicans are not crazy. They are evil. They don't care how many Breiviks and Bin Ladens they create, or how many Katrinas or bank disasters. These are merely collateral casualties in their efforts to gain power and funds.
But the worst culprits are the morons who refuse to understand - those who think of themselves as average and independent, but vote cynically for Republicans, because they're too lazy to pay attention.
Kane on July 25, 2011 9:39 AM:
The problem is not that the Republican philosophy isn’t working the way it’s supposed to work, the problem is that it is working the way it’s supposed to work. They don’t believe that government has a role in solving national problems because they believe that government is the problem. They think we’re better off if we just dismantle government.
For decades now, Republicans have argued that government doesn’t work. And with their many failures over the years, they have been quite successful in making that argument. The entire right-wing ideology is predicated on the notion that government can’t work. They don’t want government to succeed at any level, local or national. They actually encourage public distrust of government, having no problem with spreading conspiracy theories about government. They highlight the
inefficiencies of government not so that government might be improved, but rather as a reason to oppose government altogether. All the better to make the argument that government needs to be shrunk down to size and drowned in a bathtub so that corporations can rule openly.
Perhaps this is one reason why Republicans so vehemently opposed President Obama and the Democratic Congress. It wasn’t so much that Republicans disagreed with the logic of the policies, rather they were affraid that the policies would be successful. They feared that President Obama and Democrats would prove that government can indeed work for the American people and that it can be effective, just not in the hands of Republicans.
Anonymous on July 25, 2011 9:42 AM:
"This is economically illiterate and disgracefully cynical.”
Kind of sums it up the current republican party very succinctly.
America : Too stupid for democracy.
c u n d gulag on July 25, 2011 9:42 AM:
J,
Yes, I did.
How embarassing...
Mimikatz on July 25, 2011 9:43 AM:
I think the GOP has so demonized Obama and believes so little in his legitimacy that they psychologically just can't imagine reaching a deal, any deal, with him, even if refusing sends us over the cliff. Whatever he proposes, they have to reject. McConnell and Reid are the key to a deal, as McConnell's Chinese connections must be really pressuring him at this point. But can Boehner reach a deal with Reid? What a mess.
T2 on July 25, 2011 9:44 AM:
yes, and to think all this happened in less than three years.....Republican Party taken over by hard-right conservative white people who apparently failed to see, in 8 years of George W. Bush, the same horrors they now see in Obama. Basically, a black president was the final push off the bridge for these crazies. The country taken over by black people is their great fear along with the country taken over by hispanics. Now the want to stop that at all costs.
bob h on July 25, 2011 9:45 AM:
Here is how I would explain it: Hatred of government combined with hatred of a black President combined with hatred of powerlessness has combined to produce a state of destructive insanity.
Cantank on July 25, 2011 9:47 AM:
I also think that Republican politics are so insular, so unconcerned with anyone or any thought not wholly within their ownership, that they have lost any concept of living in a cooperative or interrelated world. Because the debt ceiling doesn't infiltrate their caucus or tea party, it is irrelevant
jjm on July 25, 2011 9:54 AM:
What is happening here merely reflects the wishes of the corporate class, imposed over the rest of us.
But we do see how ugly that really is. Despite all the efforts made over the past 30+ years to 'glamorize' business, fetishize CEOs, etc. no one can hide the fact that corporations are exceptionally inept at running a whole society.
Their answer? Destroy society itself, which after all, as Thatcher and Reagan told us 'doesn't exist.' Only individuals and perhaps the family...
The MSM is declaring the GOP won, but I don't see how, if Pelosi's plan works, that ending two wars saving a trillion and another $500 billion on the interest for that trillion is a loss? It's simply allowing the GOP to declare they won...
pj in jesusland on July 25, 2011 9:55 AM:
Republicans don�t care about the consequences of default. If they can pin it on Obama and get him ousted next year, that is their only care. If they compromise now they fear it will make Obama look more like a leader and he will be reelected.
They would also accept a piecemeal solution that dragged out until the 2012 election season so they could keep bashing Democrats over the consequences of their own fiscal irresponsibility under George Bush.
That they would bring America to the brink of financial disaster shows the GOP�s utter cynicism and fanaticism.
chi res on July 25, 2011 9:56 AM:
Why would American officials, on purpose, choose to stop paying America’s bills? Why would these officials want to deliberately undermine the country’s credit rating? Why would elected lawmakers, who presumably like their country, risk an economic crash on purpose?
None Dare Call It Treason
Oh, what the hell: IT'S TREASON!!!
Ronald on July 25, 2011 9:58 AM:
Republicans DON'T like Americans. They especially hate the middle class.
Ron Byers on July 25, 2011 10:00 AM:
The failure in all of this is that the Democratic party allowed the tea party to develop. Populism is the natural friend of the Democrats and has been back to Andy Jackson. In 2008-2010 the conditions were right for a new wave of populism. The Democrats were too busy being the party in power to notice. I guess they thought that the people had no where to turn. Dicl Army, seeing an opportunity, ginned up the astro populist Tea Party. The media ran with it. Republican wack jobs from Scott Walker to the looniest nutter in the Republican house caucus were elected.
Had the Democratic party been lead by someone truly politically aware, it would have been rousing the "rabble" across the nation in favor of more jobs, in favor of sending "banksters" to prison, in favor of restoring America. The result might have been messy for the boys on Wall Street, so Democrats didn't rise to the occasion. If anybody is to blame for this mess it is all of us who claim to be progressives. We abandoned our traditional function of rallying the population to advance their legtimate interests.
Trollop on July 25, 2011 10:04 AM:
Yeah, my friends in Ettlingen were amazed at Boosh when he started us down teh stupit.. I haven't consulted them on the debt crisis, I don't think I have to..
I think I blame the cowering democrats for this one; this stupid posturing is crazier than suicide bombing in the name of a man-made deity.
delNorte on July 25, 2011 10:04 AM:
Here is how I would explain it: Hatred of government combined with hatred of a black President combined with hatred of powerlessness has combined to produce a state of destructive insanity.
Add to that the fact that these people, as Conservatives, are, as defined: "averse to change and hold to traditional values and attitudes, typically in politics" in a world that is changing rapidly. The question is: do they fear change so much (and the fact that such change will probably take power away from them and give it to the people they've oppressed for years) that they would rather destroy our country than accept the change that they know is inevitable?
The last desperate attempts of Conservatives to retain power can get ugly, and more absurd as time goes by - and maybe Obama knows this (remember this comment he once made: "They get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.") Maybe that explains his caution and perceived conservatism: baby steps is the best way to lead people into the future.
Daniel Kim on July 25, 2011 10:14 AM:
If I may, I would like to refer to my comment to "The Ceiling and the Damage Done", made on July 16, 2011 1:24 PM.
Please see the whole thing there, but basically I pointed out that our allies may make the connection between our insane government leaders and the bases, troops and nuclear weapons that we have on their soil.
square1 on July 25, 2011 10:16 AM:
Imagine, if you will, that Democrats had chosen to ignore this "opportunity" and had insisted on a clean bill. In that case, we would now be facing the following options:
Option A: Pass a clean bill.
Option B: Don't raise the debt ceiling.
The beauty of this is that there would be a clear, default piece of legislation. And as the markets destabilized, passage of a clean bill would be increasingly inevitable. The clean bill would function as an "emergency exit"; if a fire breaks out, the partipants could calmy head for a safe (and well marked) exit.
Instead, thanks in part to Democrats who chose to join the "opportunity" madness, we now face the following:
Option A: Pass a Democratic Bill
Option B: Pass a Republican Bill
Option C: Don't pass a bill.
Actually, it is worse. There are dozens of iterations of proposals. Option A through Y. Now a clean bill is a forgotten Option Z.
The danger is that there is no longer a default "emergency exit". If panic erupts in the markets, Congress and the WH will be trampling each other and screaming at each other to head for their preferred exit. But there will be no consensus as to the proper exit. The pressure that would have been placed on sane Republicans to pass a clean bill will no longer exist as Republicans can point to Options F, K, O, & U as acceptable alternatives.
This isn't about blame. If no bill is passed Republicans might get most of the blame. But so what? I'm not interested in pointing fingers. I'm interested in raising the debt ceiling. Democrats made that less likely by confusing the issue.
Zorro on July 25, 2011 10:18 AM:
Why would American voters elect such lunatics?
Because American voters are idiots.
Next question.
-Z
Anonymous on July 25, 2011 10:43 AM:
I'm with chi res. It's treason. The Republicans are so intent on ruining Obama for partisan gain that they really don't care if they throw millions more out of work in order to do it. Everything is about them.
Of course, it might help if we didn't have such a compulsive capitulator in the White House.
PTate in MN on July 25, 2011 10:45 AM:
Why? Why would they do this? The answer I would give my international contact is that the United States is infected with a kind of fundamentalist Christian virus that nurtures bad thinking in the personal (eg, creationism, biblical literalism, "every sperm is sacred," Christ is a capitalist and their personal buddy, "spare the rod and spoil the child," homosexuality is a choice) which leads to craziness and denial of reality in matters requiring public judgment (eg, human population growth is not a problem, unions are evil, global climate change is a fraud, cutting taxes and spending less will create jobs, the debt ceiling doesn't matter.) So we have a substantial minority of the US population characterized by topsy-turvey thinking.
But the virus also cements strong group cohesiveness. It doesn't really matter what they think because they are addicted to the group solidarity high. They don't question their nutty ideas; the threats they perceive everywhere (such as Democrats and moderate Republicans saying "you guys are nuts") just makes them a stronger group. So why would they create this debt ceiling crisis? Because they deny reality AND they get a thrill from the group solidarity of making the Democrats squirm.
The really unanswerable question, to me, is "Why would American voters elect such lunatics?"
KSR on July 25, 2011 10:50 AM:
Why are they doing this?
They answered this question, in its many forms, during the past 3 years:
They want Obama to fail. Period.
If they have to take the country down to do it, they will.
TCinLA on July 25, 2011 10:59 AM:
Why would American officials, on purpose, choose to stop paying America’s bills?
Because it would destroy the country, and the confederate traitors running the operation have been dedicated to that for 150 years.
TrollOped on July 25, 2011 11:14 AM:
That's a treasonous statement Anonymous!
(Channeling (baiting) Elie.. .. ..)
TCinLA on July 25, 2011 11:19 AM:
Ron Byers on July 25, 2011 10:00 AM: The failure in all of this is that the Democratic party allowed the tea party to develop.
No. The failure in all this is that "President Community Organizer" (whose "community organizing" experience was limited to sitting at card tables on street corners registering voters for a few months as a college student - the lowest level of "community organizing" there is) failed to learn Rule Number One of Community Organizing: you do not destroy your community organization once you have "won," since it is the only thing that keeps the other side respectful of you. The truth is, Obama did all this. The first major political act of the Obama Administration was to shut down Obama For America after the inauguration, at just the time the enemy was organizing what became "the tea party," their community organization.
OFA people across the country were pleading with the "political geniuses" running the Obama political operation to get things going again in the spring and summer of 2009 as the tea party was taking over the congressional "town halls," to get some organized opposition to these brownshirted street thugs, and that amazing "genius", David Axelrod answered by sticking his head further up his ass. For someone who is supposed to know "the Chicago way," Axelrod is amazingly ignorant, and too arrogant to ever know how ignorant he is. People who understood what was at stake begged for a word of guidance and leadership in the situation and got silence.
If Obama wants to fix the blame for who it was who allowed a defeated, discredited, morally and politically-bankrupt political party that was on the ropes in November 2008, to turn itself into a major political power a mere two years later, one that now has the ability to destroy the country and put the world into the worst economic crisis since 1929-31, all he needs to do is step into the executive washroom at the White House and look in the mirror.
And of course, worthless pieces of shit like Joe Lieberman and Ben Nelson bear their fair share of the blame for their spineless treason. Legends in their own minds indeed!
bdop4 on July 25, 2011 11:32 AM:
I don't know about the rest of you here, but my two greatest fears are:
1. That the nation defaults without any preemptive action by Obama; and
2. The GOP comes to its senses and accepts Obama's "grand bargain."
I'm really not sure how much worse option 1 is from Option 2. From the looks of it, the "grand bargain" really, really, REALLY sucks!
Anonymous on July 25, 2011 1:32 PM:
SB wrote: I do wonder, from time to time, how I might explain this crisis to someone from outside the United States.
Two words: douchebag republicans
Ron Byers on July 25, 2011 1:56 PM:
TCinLA
It is easy to blame Obama, but it is hard to accept our own responsiblity.
There was a Democratic party before Obama. There will be one after Obama.
Joe Finch on July 25, 2011 2:05 PM:
The answers to all of your questions is that he is a BLACK PRESIDENT and Republicans cannot stomach that.
chi res on July 25, 2011 4:41 PM:
TCinLA: "President Community Organizer" (whose "community organizing" experience was limited to sitting at card tables on street corners registering voters for a few months as a college student
This is blatantly wrong, showing your ignorance of the basic facts of Obama's pre-presidential biography. Not surprisingly, you're wrong about everything since he became president as well.