The Debt Ceiling: Two Options

We have 11 days remaining before the debt ceiling deadline, and as we inch closer and closer to the end, I am ever more convinced that the United States is going to default.

This stems from the simple fact that the House leadership does not at all care about good governance; they care more about "drowning [government] in a bathtub" (Starve the Beast) than they do about federal debt. It would be in their interest, from this point of view, for the government to default insofar as it would greatly restrict its borrowing power. Their adamant resistance to tax increases in this case would only serve to finally kill the government they so hate (which, ironically, governs the country they say they love). I would further say that they would gladly have private businesses--and ordinary Americans--take the credit hit if it would serve the greater cause of bringing down the federal government.

As the clock ticks, the GOP only grows in power, as their negotiating in bad faith and interest in seeing the government collapse would force the President to take their unilateral proposition just to prevent a default, as it is unlikely that the GOP would accept anything that isn't on their terms. Now we see how dangerous it is to see our government negotiate in bad faith, and why we can't afford to elect people into government who believe that government 1) cannot work, and 2) is itself the problem.