Another Blank Check: House Repubs Pass “No Budget, No Pay” and Extends Debt Ceiling for 4 Months

More spending and no spending cuts = more deficits and national debt = Greece!

From The Hill:

The House on Wednesday approved a bill extending the nation’s debt limit, raising pressure on the Senate to pass its first budget in nearly four years. The House approved the No Budget, No Pay Act, which also includes a measure withholding senators’ pay until they complete that work, in a 285-144 vote. Among Republicans, 33 voted against it to protest the absence of specific spending cuts alongside suspending the nation’s borrowing limit. But they were more than offset by the 86 Democrats who voted for the measure. The bill extends the debt ceiling through May 18, and requires each chamber to pass a budget by April 15 or have its members face a suspension of pay. Republicans are hoping the bill gives Congress a few months to find a longer-term debt-ceiling agreement that includes significant spending cuts.

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House Majority Leader Eric Cantor to Democrats: No Budget, No Pay

Wanna bet Democrats all of a sudden will be all over passing a budget after 3 years of not doing so?

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor released the following statement about the need to pass a budget that reduces spending:

“The President’s plan to simply borrow more money without any reform in Washington puts us all at risk.

“The first step to fixing this problem is to pass a budget that reduces spending. The House has done so, and will again. The Democratic Senate has not passed a budget in almost four years, which is unfair to hardworking taxpayers who expect more from their representatives. That ends this year.

“We must pay our bills and responsibly budget for our future. Next week, we will authorize a three month temporary debt limit increase to give the Senate and House time to pass a budget. Furthermore, if the Senate or House fails to pass a budget in that time, Members of Congress will not be paid by the American people for failing to do their job. No budget, no pay.

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The Two Faces Of Obama’s View On Raising The Debt Ceiling

 

H/T to TheLookingSpoon

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WaPo Gives President Obama an Upside-down Pinocchio for His Flip-flopping on Debt Ceiling Increase

Obama is just your typical lying, flip-flopping, say-anything to get elected politician.

From WaPo:

“I think if you look at the history, getting votes for the debt ceiling is always difficult, and budgets in this town are always difficult.”

— President Obama, news conference, Jan. 14, 2013

 “The fact that we are here today to debate raising America’s debt limit is a sign of leadership failure. It is a sign that the U.S. government can’t pay its own bills. … I therefore intend to oppose the effort to increase America’s debt limit.”

— Then-Sen. Barack Obama, floor speech in the Senate, March 16, 2006

 

As the saying goes, “where you stand depends on where you sit.” This is certainly true of the votes to boost the national debt limit, where almost by tradition, the party not holding the presidency refused to support an increase in the debt limit. (One big exception, as we have noted, is in 1953 during the Eisenhower presidency.)

The president has acknowledged that his previous vote against the debt limit was “a political vote.” On Monday, at a news conference, he urged lawmakers to boost the debt limit without conditions: “We’re going to have to make sure that people are looking at this in a responsible way, rather than just through the lens of politics.”  (In other words, don’t do what I did back when I was a lawmaker.)

In making his case, Obama noted: “The debt ceiling is not a question of authorizing more spending. Raising the debt ceiling does not authorize more spending. It simply allows the country to pay for spending that Congress has already committed to.”  He added that he was willing to have a “conversation” about reducing the deficit, but the debt limit was not the right vehicle.

With that in mind, we were curious to look back at Obama’s 2006 speech and examine the case he made at the time for not supporting a boost in the debt limit. Below is the entire speech. At key points, we will offer commentary or further explanation.

Obama’s 2006 speech on the debt limit

 

“Mr. President, I rise today to talk about America’s debt problem. The fact that we are here today to debate raising America’s debt limit is a sign of leadership failure. It is a sign that the U.S. government can’t pay its own bills.” 

Here, Obama is sounding a bit Tea Partyish.

 “It is a sign that we now depend on ongoing financial assistance from foreign countries to finance our government’s reckless fiscal policies. Over the past five years, our federal debt has increased by $3.5 trillion to $8.6 trillion. That is  ‘‘trillion’’ with a ‘‘T.’’ That is money that we have borrowed from the Social Security trust fund, borrowed from China and Japan, borrowed from American taxpayers.”

[...]The Pinocchio Test

 

This is why many Americans hate politics.

The young senator from Illinois presumably did not want to buck the rest of his party establishment in voting for increasing the debt limit — not when there were just enough Republicans willing to support a president from their own party. But Obama would be on much more solid ground today if he had given a speech back in 2006 that sounded more like his news conference in 2013.

For making an argument that the president now decries as politics, he earns the upside-down Pinocchio, signifying a major-league flip-flop. (We have rarely given this ruling, but are eager for other examples from readers.)

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Kirsten Powers Slams Obama’s ‘Petulant’ Presser: If You ‘Don’t Go His Way,’ He Claims You ‘Starve Children’

Even some Democrats know Obama is a lying sack of shit.

From Mediaite:

Fox News contributor Kirsten Powersslammed President Obama‘s press conference earlier today when she told Bret Baier that his tone was “petulant” and he was “acting annoyed that people were asking him questions.”

Regarding the impending debt ceiling debate, Powers said Obama “didn’t do a great job of explaining the situation” because although a default would be “disruptive,” he “didn’t need to exaggerate it.”

Baier noted that “default is really not an option for the country.” Powers agreed and responded that Obama “could have been straightforward about that.”

Obama saying that Social Security and veteran’s benefits may be delayed, Powers continued, is a “scare tactic.” The GOP has a “fair position,” she added, and Obama is setting it up to appear that “if you don’t go his way, you like to starve children.”

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Federal Reserve Chairman: Debt Limit Should be Scrapped

Please, please give politicians who created this mess a blank check

Sure, let’s let Congress have a blank check to spend what they want. That way, Bernanke, can continue to print money to buy the debt and continue to devalue the dollar even more. Welcome to the banana republic America.

From The Hill:

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke on Monday said the debt ceiling has no value to the United States and should be scrapped.

“It would be a good thing if we didn’t have it,” the Fed chairman said at the University of Michigan.

Bernanke acknowledged, however, that that charged politics surrounding the debt likely mean the borrowing limit is here to stay.

The powerful Fed chairman has repeatedly urged Congress to avoid putting the U.S. economy and its financial reputation at risk with long-running fights over the debt limit, which stands at $16.4 trillion.

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Obama on Congress:‘They Order Me to Spend’

Nothing is ever Owebama’s fault.

(CNSNews.com) – Explaining why he has no choice but to demand an increase in the legal limit on the national debt, President Barack Obama said at a Monday press conference that Congress orders him to spend money.

“This is a matter of Congress authorizes spending,” Obama said.

“They order me to spend,” he said. “They tell me: ‘You need to fund our Defense Department at such-and-such a level. You need to send Social Security checks. You need to make sure that you are paying to care for our veterans.’ They lay all this out for me, and–because they have the spending power–and so I am required by law to go ahead and pay these bills.”

Just forget this pathological liar promised to cut the deficit in half and wouldn’t sign any bill with pork barrel spending in it. Did Congress force him to make those promises?

The current debt ceiling is $16.394 trillion, a number that President Obama and House Speaker John Boehner agreed to in August 2011, when they increased the previous limit by $2.4 trillion. The Constitution gives Congress the power to borrow money. So, the president cannot increase the debt of the United States unless Congress enacts legislation authorizing him to do so.

“Separately, they also have to authorize a raising of the debt ceiling in order to make sure that those bills are paid,” said Obama. “And so what Congress can’t do is tell me to spend X and then say, but we’re not going to give you the authority to go ahead and pay the bills.”

Shouldn’t run up $1 trillion deficits each year in office there Owebama.

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Cartoon of the Day

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Sen. Rand Paul: Ban Federal Spending on Anything but Interest Payments, Social Security and Military Pay

No matter what Republicans suggest, Obama is not going to cut his spending

GOLAN HEIGHTS — In a renewed attempt to force President Barack Obama’s hand on the debt limit, Kentucky Republican Sen. Rand Paul is pushing legislation that would ban federal spending on anything but interest payments on the national debt, Social Security checks, and military salaries.

Paul, who is traveling through Israel this week, told Business Insider here Thursday that he believes the GOP should take a more pro-active approach to the coming fight over raising the debt ceiling. Rather than march the country toward a government shutdown — and spook markets with possible default — Paul argued that Republicans should pass a bill that would force the government to prioritize payments to bondholders.

“The only real way to have leverage with the debt ceiling is to convince people that we are not going to default on our debt,” Paul said. “We could actually direct the President to pay our interest, make Social Security payments, pay soldier salaries, the basic functions that could keep government going. That way we take default off the table. They always scare us into raising the debt ceiling by saying that the stock markets will tank, everyone will go crazy if we default. I don’t think we should default — but I don’t think we should raise the debt ceiling either.”

As Paul points out, this would automatically force the federal budget into balance, a position he argues would give Republicans leverage to push through a comparatively gradual balanced budget amendment, similar to the “Cut, Cap and Balance” amendment that House Republicans passed in 2011.

“We have tax receipts to pay for about 70 percent of the government and we’re running deficits of about 30 percent, so what I would say is pay for the 70 percent we would all keep going and stop paying the other 30 percent until we come to an agreement,” Paul said. “That agreement would include an amendment to gradually balance the budget over five years. The only thing the debt ceiling would do is force us immediately to have a balanced budget.” 

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GOP May Force Senate Democrats to Pass a Budget in Debt Ceiling Deal

The number of budgets Senate Democrats have pass over the last 3 years

Byron York reports, via Washington Examiner:

Tuesday marks the 1,350th day since the Senate passed a budget. The law requires Congress to pass a budget every year, on the grounds that Americans deserve to know how the government plans to spend the trillions of taxpayer dollars it collects, along with dollars it borrows at the taxpayers’ expense. But Majority Leader Harry Reid, who last allowed a budget through the Senate in April 2009, has ignored the law since then.

There’s no mystery why. The budget passed by large Democratic majorities in the first months of the Obama administration had hugely elevated levels of spending in it. By not passing a new spending plan since, Reid has in effect made those levels the new budgetary baseline. Congress has kept the government going with continuing resolutions based on the last budget signed into law.

While Reid has forbidden action, the House has passed budgets as required. Senate Democrats have been highly critical of those budgets, designed by House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan. But under Reid’s leadership, Democrats have steadfastly refused to come up with a plan of their own.

The situation is deeply frustrating for many Republicans. Sen. Jeff Sessions, ranking Republican on the Senate Budget Committee, has conducted a virtual crusade on the issue, loudly and consistently and unsuccessfully demanding that Reid obey the law and pass a budget. Now, with a fight over the debt ceiling approaching, Sessions wants to try something new.

“I think it should be a firm principle that we should not raise the debt ceiling until we have a plan on how the new borrowed money will be spent,” Sessions told me Monday in a phone conversation from his home in Alabama. “If the government wants to borrow money so it can spend more, then the government ought to tell the Congress and the American people how they will spend it.”

There are no specific proposals yet, but under this scenario Republicans would insist on a debt ceiling agreement that includes (among other things) a requirement that Congress pass a budget by a specific date. If that doesn’t happen, there would be some sort of enforcement mechanism, perhaps an arrangement whereby the debt ceiling was lowered, or one in which Congress would have to muster a supermajority to raise it again.

One problem, of course, is that the law already requires Congress to pass a budget, and Reid has violated that. Why would he abide by a mere agreement between lawmakers? Sessions did not want to go into many specifics on enforcement, but it seems clear from talking to him, as well as others on Capitol Hill, that the plan would have a better chance of success if it had the united support of Republicans in both Senate and House.

Reid and the Democrats do not want to put there name on a budget that’s why. The same reason why they refused to give Obama’s last 2 budgets a single vote.

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