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Global Warming on 15-Year Hold
April 2, 2012 | 12 comments
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Suddenly This Summer
March 31, 2012 | 8 comments
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FakeGate: Just Another Day at Team Green
February 22, 2012 | 7 comments
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“Climate” and the Campaign
January 12, 2012 | 8 comments
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Germany’s Green Bubble Follows Spain’s; Will Congress Waste More Billions on Ours?
December 15, 2011 | 3 comments
The Spectacle Blog
So, reading Sen. Pat Toomey’s discourse on what a threatened refusal to raise the debt ceiling would really mean, in practice - a clumsier, more painful way to force necessary spending cuts than if the spenders would just agree to legislate them - I fail to see how such a threat differs from the administration and e.g. Sen. Barbara Boxer threatening the economy (and specifically and regulated entities with Washington representatives) with EPA cramming down the ‘global warming’ agenda in a more clumsy, more painful way if these lobbies and Republicans (and a few dozen elected Democrats) refused to negotiate surrender on cap-and-trade legislation.
Other than that one carried lurid threats of not only financial ruin but the end of the world, while the other just warned of economic consequences.
These people do not come to this debate with clean hands.
View all comments (20) | Leave a comment
More Blog Posts by Chris Horner
http://spectator.org/blog/2011/04/22/more-administration-hypocrisy
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Clint| 4.22.11 @ 4:14PM
Pat Toomey,
"In fact, Secretary Geithner implicitly acknowledges that failure to increase the debt limit need not lead to a default on our debt. But he dismisses this fact by arguing that failure to make any obligated federal payments would be seen by the markets as though it were a debt default. Thus, he equates furloughing federal workers; postponing welfare payments; and delaying implementations of federal contracts, for instance, with failing to make interest payments on our national debt. This assertion is absurd, and the market demonstrated as much last week when it ignored the federal government's near shutdown, which would have resulted in a host of delayed payments.
The markets do not equate failure to make any and all federal payments with default, nor do they believe - at least for now - that the Treasury secretary will willingly choose default. I don't believe he will either. But Secretary Geithner is implicitly threatening to do just that with his doomsday predictions that could only materialize at his own hand. These threats are dangerous, and they should stop.
If the secretary truly wanted to eliminate any specter of default, then he would have supported my legislation, the Full Faith and Credit Act. This bill would require the Treasury to prioritize payments on our debt in the event the debt ceiling is not raised, thus ensuring the U.S. government does not default."
SpiralArchitect| 4.22.11 @ 10:07PM
Global warming...?
I wonder if fossil fuels were responsible for the previous round of loss of ice melt.
Greenland is so named not because of all the ice but because the region was...green!
Ken (Old Texican)| 4.23.11 @ 6:58AM
Architect,
I just wish every American understood what we here at TAS understand.
Tevi| 4.23.11 @ 10:47AM
Er... no.....
"He named the land Greenland, saying that people would be eager to go there if it had a good name."
Eric The Red, Real Estate Agent of the 10th century.
axbucxdu| 4.23.11 @ 12:04PM
Whatever. The question remains: What automobiles were being used 800,000 years ago when the ice receded in Greenland?
Tevi| 4.24.11 @ 7:09PM
800,000 years ago? Are literally unfamiliar with facts? That's almost 8 times longer than the human race has been outside of Africa.
Antarctica used to have temperate jungles. What's your point? That it would be neat to look at the climate in other periods when humans didnt exist as opposed to the one we have now when they do? Well go do that. Take a night school class in your local area.
axbucxdu| 4.25.11 @ 12:53PM
Perhaps you could save me the time? If not, take your own advice.
Tevi| 4.23.11 @ 10:59AM
"Thus, he equates furloughing federal workers; postponing welfare payments; and delaying implementations of federal contracts, for instance, with failing to make interest payments on our national debt. This assertion is absurd, and the market demonstrated as much last week when it ignored the federal government's near shutdown, which would have resulted in a host of delayed payments."
Except that's referring to temporary delays in relation to the passing of an annual budget.
An accurate comparison would be to say "That assertion is absurd, look at severe austerity measures taken in Europe to address long term debt crisis as opposed to an annual-freaking-budget, which markets totally ignored and hasn't adversely impacted the standing of their economies."
Or just write "I have no credibility on economic matters and/or have no interest in financial stability of the US economy".
The second being more concise.
axbucxdu| 4.23.11 @ 12:25PM
Beware: The markets may have ignored European austerity measures up to this point because they recognized that the Bank of Bernanke down the street was still partying like it was 1999.
Let's see how blase the response will be in June, when QEII is ended and our monetary policy becomes more or less synchronized with Europe's. Methinks the music stops. Bill Gross at PIMCO does too. Monetisation ending at the same time the debt limit is reached. It should be a hoot.
Clint| 4.23.11 @ 1:16PM
Text of Senator Pat Toomey's Full Faith And Credit Act Legislation.
A BILL
To require that the Government prioritize all obligations on the debt held by the public in the event that the debt limit is reached.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Full Faith and Credit Act’’.
SEC. 2. PRIORITIZE OBLIGATIONS ON THE DEBT HELD BY THE PUBLIC.
In the event that the debt of the United States Government, as defined in section 3101 of title 31, United States Code, reaches the statutory limit, the authority of the Department of the Treasury provided in section 3123 of title 31, United States Code, to pay with legal tender the principal and interest on debt held by the public shall take priority over all other obligations incurred by the Government of the United States."
Oldefarte| 4.23.11 @ 3:41PM
I'm not totally familiar with the EPA argument relative to the debt ceiling, but I have a pretty good ideas of same's possibilities. Liberals in particular and Democrats in general are nothing but lunatics and radically deranged domestic terrorists [and have been so for decades]. If up to some of us, same would be legally tried, convicted and locked away in jail cells. It's one thing to be concerning about the well being of our earth/environment [which most sane people are, since we all have to live in same] but quite another to become so radicalized [as some/most of these liberal Democrats are] that they forsake general common sense and prudence in the pursuit of their ideological nut-job ideas. The world will virtually come to an end is this country's current defecit/debt is not seriously contained, and if the GD environment has to take a hit in the process, then so the hades be it!!!!!!!
Quartermaster| 4.25.11 @ 7:22PM
Olde, you must be going softshell on us. I wouldn't jail the little darlings, I'd hang 'em in public as a horrible example to the youth. A bunch College Profs could join them with Ayers at the head of the line.
Conservative View| 4.23.11 @ 4:19PM
I am almost at the boiling point. It now seems that we are being threatened with a delay in Social Security, but also a delay in military retirement checks. This administration has put it's social agenda ahead of those that have served the country. Enough is enough.
I believe that the military past and present is worth more than the; EPA, HUD, NEA, NPR, etc. Should not those institutions be shut down before we cut military retirement (a contractual obligation of the Government) and Social Security? I would like to think so. But to date not one word anywhere has been said by Obama and company about shuting off their funds.
I would like to see a bill passed that says: Congress shall receive no pay or perks before all obligations to US military personel have been satisfied. No more free haircuts, private plane rides, or money to pay for a condo in DC. A private parking spot at the capital building is a perk.
Bill Hussein O'Stalin| 4.23.11 @ 4:34PM
Close the EPA and the Department of Labor and create 10 million jobs!
RWinks| 4.24.11 @ 1:51PM
If I read this right, this is the first time I have disagreed with Chris Horner on anything. The Administration Eco-nazis in the EPA and their Congressional enablers are attempting to subvert the legislative process (and thus, the Constitution) by writing law not even contemplated by the Congress. To equate these actions to a refusal by legislators to raise the Debt ceiling is perverse.
Most, if not the majority, of today's House were elected promising to stop the obscene overspending. For them to vote for an increase in borrowing authority is not only to acquiesce in what they promised to stop but to betray their supporters.
The debt will destroy this country. It is not enough to vote for the overspending and say, "It's the best deal we could get". When a Republican votes to raise the debt ceiling and votes for a wildly out of balance budget they are complicit in the destruction of the country.
The Founders did not envision "cooperation" between the branches. They expected tension, with each branch jealously guarding their powers. When the House surrenders the Power of the Purse to the Senate and the White House because "It's the best deal we could get", they become even worse than the Democrats. At least the Dems do not claim they know it's wrong but they voted for it anyway.
Tevi| 4.24.11 @ 7:16PM
"The debt will destroy this country...When a Republican votes to raise the debt ceiling and votes for a wildly out of balance budget they are complicit in the destruction of the country."
This is correct. There's no other outcome if this party both allows the debt to be run up and continuously opposes raising taxes.
But what we are talking about here is defaulting on your debt payments.
You're in a bad situation if you continue to max out your credit cards, apply for more credit while refusing to earn more money and trying to earn less. But not as much as when you threaten to stop making debt payments.
Jeff| 4.28.11 @ 5:16AM
not raising the debt ceiling is not a threat to stop payments on our debt ... that is Obama childish threat if he doesn't get his way ...
axbucxdu| 4.25.11 @ 1:13PM
"...if this party both allows the debt to be run up and continuously opposes raising taxes...
...But not as much as when you threaten to stop making debt payments."
Toomey: "But Secretary Geithner is implicitly threatening to do just that with his doomsday predictions that could only materialize at his own hand. These threats are dangerous, and they should stop...
...This bill would require the Treasury to prioritize payments on our debt in the event the debt ceiling is not raised, thus ensuring the U.S. government does not default."
On the one hand, the Rs are threatening default. On the other, those nasty Rethugs are running up the debt. Claiming both sides of an argument is such a convenience.
Quartermaster| 4.25.11 @ 7:26PM
I would agree that both sides are at fault. The Demonrats and their Repulithug partners are just running the balance up with no intention of really doing anything about it. Both parties bought into FDR's Tax, Spend, Elect routine. Both parties are trying to own both sides of the argument.
The difference is that a substantial part of the Republican side was elected to stop the FDR Demonrat cycle. The Pubbie leadership is having a hard time with them, and it's about time they had a hard time with party members that actually remember what their duties are, rather than lining their own nest.
axbucxdu| 4.25.11 @ 8:36PM
I'm not a member of either party, but trying to pass off both a thesis and its anti as criticism of Republicans' opposition to more debt is no argument, and therefore amounts to no criticism at all. Of course, those enamored of Hegel think differently...;)