[BwayDems] The debt ceiling must go

[Paula Diamond Roman]

The debt ceiling must go
Rep. Jerrold Nadler


Here is a stubbornly well-kept 
secret: the debt ceiling is arbitrary, doesn’t affect the deficit, and 
serves no real function in keeping spending down. In addition, it has 
recently become a cudgel which extremist Republican legislators use to 
beat the rest of us into submitting to political blackmail. They say to 
us: If you do not agree to massive cuts to Social Security, Medicare, 
Medicaid, and other social programs, we will refuse to raise the debt 
ceiling and, thereby, cause an economic catastrophe by making the 
country default on its debts.

The debt ceiling was raised seven times during the George W. Bush 
administration, with no great battles and no threats of economic chaos. 
But now that we have a Democratic president, the Republicans have chosen to exploit the debt ceiling as a means of blackmailing the American 
people in order to impose their extreme and regressive agenda. The 
result of this extortion, in 2011, was a downgrading of the U.S. credit 
rating for the first time in history and a terrible compromise that 
punishes middle and working class people, retracts social safety nets, 
and inhibits economic progress just when we most need federal leadership toward economic recovery.

There is certainly a time and a place for discussion of the proper 
levels of taxation and spending, and I am ready to have that discussion.
 But such discussions need not – must not – be tied to the routine 
raising of the debt ceiling to pay for debts already incurred. It’s time
 to repeal the debt ceiling, and I will soon re-introduce legislation to
 do so.

The facts are plain: eliminating the debt ceiling would not create new 
deficit spending. That occurs when Congress decides to authorize more 
spending than revenue. The debt ceiling simply prevents the President 
from borrowing money to pay the debts when they come due. 

Repealing the debt ceiling would ensure that Republican radicals can no 
longer play a dangerous game of chicken with the full faith and credit 
of the United States. We cannot risk allowing this artifact of World War
 I to threaten our nation’s creditworthiness. 

Instead, we need to finally focus on the real work at hand: creating 
jobs and economic development, providing aid to states, building 
infrastructure, and injecting aggregate demand back into the economy. 
Then, when the economy has recovered, we can undertake to pay down the 
national debt.

If we are to prevent years of underemployment and the attrition of 
America’s great middle class, we must act now. We must not permit an 
artificial debt ceiling to throw the country into default, and our 
economy into chaos. It’s time to abolish the debt ceiling.


Nadler is a member of the House Judiciary Committee and the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee.
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