The Outer Limits

Back when the TV series The Twilight Zone was a huge it on TV, another creepy show was created in 1963 to compete, a bit more horror-based, called The Outer Limits.  Who knew that fiction is encroaching on reality.

I’ve never been able to figure out if most Republicans in Congress actually know that raising the debt limit only means approving the funds to pay for what we’ve already spent and are just trying to flim-flam the public – or if some (or many or most) Republicans in Congress actually don’t know that’s what it is.
 
While it seems the former, I honestly have no idea.  Because if they do know, then that means every time it comes up they are willing to risk destroying the world economy, rather than just flim-flam for votes.  But if many truly don’t know, it’s almost inexplicable that they have to be told again – and again and again – every single time it comes up.
 
Sorry, I mean, “every single time it comes up when Democrats are in the White House, but not when a Republican is.”
 
(As has been said often, Republicans voted to raise the debt ceiling all three times it came up during Trump’s time in office.)
 
To be clear, just because Republicans in Congress only set their hair on fire about raising the debt limit when Democrats are in the White House, but happily raise it without a “harrumph” when a Republican is president does not mean they understand and are just playing politics, willing to risk destroying the world economy if it means it happening under a Democratic Administration.  For all I know, many/most Republicans in Congress don’t know in the slightest what raising the debt limit means, but just don’t care about it as an issue if a Republican is in control.
 
One thing I do believe strongly is that a great many or most Republican voters don’t know what raising the debt limit means.  I feel comfortable saying that because if they did know then Republicans in Congress would not keep trying to make an “outraged" issue about it.
 
The weird thing about raising the debt limit is that it’s one of the easiest concepts in politics to explain and understand.  It’s just transferring money from your savings account to your checking account so that you can pay your bills for what you’ve already bought. 

​That’s it. 
 
The problem is that “raising the debt limit” has a terrible name that sounds like it’s something totally different from what it is.  It sounds like it means raising how much you can go into debt.  But it’s not.  Far better would be if they changed to the name to “Approval of the transfer of enough money in the Treasury to pay the bills we owe.”
 
If people are concerned about spending more money than we have, the time to debate that is when a new budget comes up.  You can cut spending or raise taxes.  Or just go into deficit financing – which is not inherently a bad thing.
 
(The best, remarkably easy explanation I ever heard about why deficit financing can be a very good thing came from the great, Pulitzer Prize-winning David Cay Johnson.  To simplify what he said – Imagine if your have no money and are out of work.  You’re offered a good job, but it’s so far away you can’t get there and have to turn the job down.  But if you went into debt by buying a car, you could take the job and earn enough money to pay back your debt.)
 
There’s one other weird thing about Republicans regularly threatening not to raise the debt limit when a Democrat is in the White House.  It’s that they seem to think that the blame will go to the Democrat when the world economy crashes.  But that won’t be the case – if Republicans are the ones who refused to pay the bills, and people’s lives are pummeled, it’s Republicans who will get the blame.
 
Raising the debt limit is so essential that merely insisting to negotiate about raising the debt ceiling has caused interests rates to rise when the deadline looms close.
 
And yet time and time again – when Democrats are in the White House – Republicans have pushed this issue.  Risking the world economy.  And their own ruin.
 
And each time, I truly, honestly don’t know if most Republicans in Congress really do understand what raising the debt limit means and are just trying to flim-flam the public – or if some (or many or most) Republicans in Congress actually don’t know what it is.
 
Because that’s today’s Republican Party. 

And both options are horrific.  Because that’s today’s Republican Party.