GRAHAM: This is an opportunity to make sure the government is changing its spending ways. I will not vote for the debt ceiling increase until I see a plan in place that will deal with our long-term debt obligations starting with Social Security, a real bipartisan effort to make sure that Social Security stays solvent, adjusting the age, looking at means-tests for benefits. [...]
GREGORY: That’s a big condition just on Social Security alone.
GRAHAM: Yeah, it is!
GREGORY: You think Republicans are prepared to follow you and two things you said: raise the retirement age and means-test benefits for older Americans?
GRAHAM: I would suggest that if we’re serious about taking America in a new direction and you’re not putting entitlement reform on the table, you’ve missed a great opportunity to change the course of America’s future.
A future where my generation maybe gets to retire at 70, and maybe at 80% of the benefits now. And if the Republicans don't get those changes, they'll destroy the economy and cause another financial crisis with a sovereign debt default.
This is called "compromise". You do what the GOP wants, they won't wreck the country. And this from a supposed "moderate".
Let's review what happens if the GOP fails to raise the debt ceiling in March. Short version: the country is screwed with a chainsaw in the gonads. Long version, we default on our debt. Treasury bonds disintegrate. Interest rates go through the roof. Everything loan-wise tied to those rates also goes through the roof. Hedge funds and other massive institutional investors lose trillions of dollars overnight. We end up in another financial crisis with no real way out and the entire global banking system locks up, catches on fire, and then explodes, taking our economy with it and everyone else's too.
It's like strapping a nuke to an orphanage and pressing the big red button.
Lindsey Graham is warning he will help do this unless he gets massive Social Security cuts for starters. This is why it's so damn important for the Democrats to stand up right now and say "The Republicans are going to destroy the economy in order to get what they want."
Because I swear if the Dems fold on this one, it's over.
How long ago was it that we thought that going after Social Security was essentially political suicide?
ReplyDeleteI miss those days.
Maybe we should take the advice of this Senator who said:
ReplyDelete"The fact that we are here today to debate raising America's debt limit is a sign of leadership failure. It is a sign that the U.S. Government can't pay its own bills. It is a sign that we now depend on ongoing financial
assistance from foreign countries to finance our Government's reckless fiscal policies.
Increasing America's debt weakens us domestically and internationally. Leadership means that ‘the buck stops here'.
Instead, Washington is shifting the burden of bad choices today onto the backs of our children and
grandchildren. America has a debt problem and a failure of leadership. Americans deserve better."
Oh wait, Sen. Barack Obama said that in March 2006 when he voted against the debt ceiling increase when Bush was President.
I wonder what happened to that guy. He would have made a good President and would never of played politics with the debt ceiling.