Wednesday, January 23, 2013

Ahh Congress...

Did I happen to mention our system of government is SNAFU / broke.
.
Picture will make sense after post

So we have a "debt ceiling".  This is the limit to the amount of money we can borrow and spend.  Congress sets this limit  on the amount of money the Treasury can borrow(through an arcane, World War II era process - it's not sure that we actually have to do this, it isn't in the Constitution).  Congress also sets the budgets (that process IS in the Constitution) so they can decide how much to spend, and then approve it.  Well, now Congress doesn't want to raise the limit to borrow to cover everything, yes that is everything that they already approved to spend.  So, even though they approved a budget last year, they don't want to spend it this year.
.
The House of Representatives want the President to cut the budget ("but wait Scott, doesn't the budget get created in the House of Representatives?" - Yes Constitution Article 1, Section 8 - but it is so much more fun to blame the President).  In order to get the Presiden to agree to cuts - and honestly he does have the power of veto, they want to hold their breath until we all turn blue (this is called shutting down the government) - they can do this by not raising the debt ceiling - so the Treasury cannot borrow to pay the bills which Congress has already approved.  Which is EXACTLY like signing up for a car loan, then not making payments because you don't like the preset radio stations.
.
Anyway, the Republicans have decided that it is bad optics to shut down the government over this one thing - so in 3 months they get to shut down the government over 2 things (longer story).  But, how to do this?  You see they promised their voters they wouldn't raise the debt ceiling without cutting something.  And they can't go back on their word.
.
What to do?
.
What to do?
.
They have a unique solution.  They are trying to pass a law today that will be reported as "raising the debt ceiling" - but it isn't.  What they are really doing is "not enforcing the debt ceiling."  Honest to God.  They are passing a law that allows them to break the law, rather than pass the law to do what they want to do.  This way they can tell their voters - they didn't vote to raise the debt ceiling!  Ta Da! (Really - here is the Washington Post LINK)
.
What did Suzanne call it, a clusterf*ck?