I noted some lack of understanding of my position on Trump’s call to eliminate the debt ceiling. I was not engaging in some “Hey, look! Agreement!” post. I was not congratulating Trump for holding the position. The only noteworthy aspect of Trump’s position is that he is the first, in my recollection, Republican president/president-elect to call for the debt ceiling to be abolished I would be more than happy for his broken-clockedness to be exploited.
I also think that some readers may be conflating normal shutdowns over lack of money to run the government and the debt ceiling issue. While these two sometimes converge, they are not the same issue.
I simply think that the debt ceiling itself is a tremendously stupid (and dangerous) feature of American policy and any way we can get rid of it, we should do so. Moreover, I think it is so terrible that even a two-year hiatus would be welcome, even if it, at least in theory, was to Trump’s political advantage.
Keep in mind that to seriously threaten not to raise the debt ceiling is to threaten the full faith and credit of the United States and to threaten both a domestic and international economic crisis in a way that could have truly long-term and possibly irreversible consequences.
To truly threaten to not raise the debt ceiling is to threaten to burn it all down. No serious political party should threaten such a thing and I would note that it has been the Republicans and their more extreme wing that have been willing to do this (see the 2023 debt ceiling crisis). To want to keep the debt ceiling as a leverage point is to behave like an arsonist willing to burn down their own house.
Some tit-for-tat is not worth it.
As a practical political matter, I am not sure that the Democrats could even credibly threaten the debt ceiling, so what’s the point of preserving the option?
The brinksmanship alone in recent years has lead to the US’ bond rating being degraded, which, ironically enough, makes borrowing for the US more expensive.
Note that the debt ceiling is not the main reason for government shutdowns. That is simply because of the inability of congress to pass annual budgets. Those negotiations, with their chances for leverage, would continue to exist even if the debt ceiling issue was taken off the table.
I would hasten to add that the party that is seen as responsible for government shutdowns tends to lose politically with the public. As such, as much as Democratic partisans might want to stick to the Reps, the entire scenario is a loser, ultimately.
Not to mention that all these threats do is leverage hurting people.
At any rate, when you have the chance to take the matches out of the hands of arsonists, you should take it and hence my post.
