It's Our Own Default

Some people claim that there's a woman - Marjorie Taylor Greene or Lauren Boebert - to blame.

But Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen isn't playing any blame games.  She's coming right out and saying the not only will the United States reach the debt ceiling this week - Thursday - but she can only keep paying incurred government bills until June - not through September, as previously hoped.

Republicans hope to use this man-made crisis (or woman-made crisis, if you blame Marjorie Taylor Greene or Lauren Boebert for it) to get President Biden to cut domestic spending and zero out funding for hiring IRS employees to allow the debt ceiling to go up and the allow the rich to make out like bandits while the poor and a good chunk of the middle class fall by the wayside.  Or maybe fall into a bottomless pit, so that they keep falling for all eternity.

What can the Democrats do on their own?  Probably nothing.  It's either capitulate to the GOP, or let the economy crumble and start a depression.

People thought the Republicans would be less extreme toward all matters economic when they won only a narrow majority in the House, but a House majority is still a House majority, no matter how big it is.  

The best - no, only - hope is for the Democrats to get at least six Republicans to join them in issuing a discharge petition to have a debt ceiling vote over Kevin McCarthy's objections and try to get a majority to pass it.  As for the possibly of default, the Republicans do have an idea: they're working on a contingency plan to enact if the government does default, which I assume involves blaming the Democrats for everything.  By contrast, a discharge petition \could take awhile, given the nuances of House procedure.

And in case you haven't noticed, Americans can't be bothered with nuance, preferring instead to shoot first and ask questions rarely.

If ever.