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Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: TideGlider who wrote (745008)	10/8/2013 2:04:28 PM
From: bentway	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1575781

Debt Ceiling Brinkmanship Puts Social Security Checks At Risk By Alan Pyke on October 8, 2013 at 8:43 am ( I'll bet YOU get one, don't you Tidy? ) The government is warning Social Security recipients not to count on timely or full checks in the event of a debt ceiling breach next week. The Social Security Administration is directing its workers to tell concerned beneficiaries who call the agency that “failure to raise the debt ceiling puts Social Security benefits at risk,” according to the Wall Street Journal. On October 17, the Treasury Department will exhaust the “extraordinary measures” that it’s used to avoid a default since May and be forced to cease some legally required payments unless Congress agrees to increase the government’s borrowing limit, allowing the country to continue to pay bills already incurred by previous acts of Congress. That means choosing between retirees and things like the servicing costs of federal borrowing. Prior to the Tea Party wave that made Rep. John Boehner (R-OH) the Speaker of the House, Congress had raised the debt ceiling with minimal fuss for 50 years. But Republicans decided the debt limit was “ a hostage that’s worth ransoming,” succeeding in extracting spending cuts from Democrats during a 2011 debt ceiling fight that damaged the nation’s credit rating, cost taxpayers $19 billion, and cost the economy about a million jobs. Now they are rolling the debt ceiling fight together with the ongoing government shutdown fight, leading banks to enact emergency plans that include stuffing their ATMs with extra cash in case depositors panic and set off a run on the banks. Boehner is refusing to back down from the party’s demands in exchange for a debt ceiling hike, despite having acknowledged that cracking the debt limit would mean economic catastrophe. Many in his own caucus, as well as several Republicans in the Senate, seem to believe that dire warnings about a new recession resulting from the debt ceiling are a hoax. The rise of such “debt ceiling truthers” leaves Boehner to choose between relying on Democratic votes to raise the debt ceiling or pushing the country and the world into an economic disaster. thinkprogress.org

To: TideGlider who wrote (745008)	10/8/2013 2:59:18 PM
From: tejek	Respond to of 1575781

The Washington Post joins in: In a revealing moment Sunday on ABC’s “This Week,” host George Stephanopoulos replayed a clip from last year in whichHouse Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) explained the foolishness of the tactic that he is now, a year later, pursuing. “It’s pretty clear that the president was reelected,” Mr. Boehner said then. “Obamacare is the law of the land. If we were to put Obamacare into the CR [continuing resolution] and send it over to the Senate, we were risking shutting down the government. That is not our goal.” Cowed by Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) and bullied by the most conservative members of his caucus, Mr.?Boehner has done exactly what he said made no sense. Now he doesn’t know how to get out of the predicament. A shutdown is bad; a default on the debt, which looms 10 days from now, could be catastrophic. The speaker is demanding that President Obama negotiate, while setting “red lines” for those hypothetical talks (“Very simple. We’re not raising taxes.”). It’s not an impressive strategy.