Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Cancel the cowardly WaPo and set up an equivalent monthly donation to ProPublica.

But frankly mr. cole, I’ll be happier when you get back to telling us to go fuck ourselves.

Whatever happens next week, the fight doesn’t end.

“Just close your eyes and kiss the girl and go where the tilt-a-whirl takes you.” ~OzarkHillbilly

Trump should be leading, not lying.

The media handbook says “controversial” is the most negative description that can be used for a Republican.

Republicans do not pay their debts.

Balloon Juice, where there is always someone who will say you’re doing it wrong.

The low info voters probably won’t even notice or remember by their next lap around the goldfish bowl.

American History and Black History can not be separated.

Following reporting rules is only for the little people, apparently.

They punch you in the face and then start crying because their fist hurts.

Jesus, Mary, & Joseph how is that election even close?

Do not shrug your shoulders and accept the normalization of untruths.

If you voted for Trump, you don’t get to speak about ethics, morals, or rule of law.

The lights are all blinking red.

People are complicated. Love is not.

“Everybody’s entitled to be an idiot.”

I’m starting to think Jesus may have made a mistake saving people with no questions asked.

Hot air and ill-informed banter

The line between political reporting and fan fiction continues to blur.

They’re not red states to be hated; they are voter suppression states to be fixed.

If you can’t control your emotions, someone else will.

You are so fucked. Still, I wish you the best of luck.

You are here: Home / Open Threads / Morning RoundUp

Morning RoundUp

by | 89 Comments

This post is in: 

There’s a good interview of Brian Schatz in the New Yorker.  This is spot-on:

Various people in the Democratic caucuses within the House and the Senate have said some version of “We can’t respond with full panic to every single thing Trump does. You have to pick and choose.” I know everyone’s got different political incentives, but how are you figuring out what to make a big deal about versus what you may oppose but not freak out over?

I focus on preventing immediate harm. When the Medicaid portal was shut down, when the Head Start money was shut down, when construction money for highways was shut down, that was relatively straightforward because it was both immediately harmful and illegal. [The White House claimed the Medicaid portal was unavailable owing to a technical outage.] And then I’m also focussed on maintaining our American system of checks and balances. That’s different from me making that my primary talking point. But I did swear an oath to the Constitution, and I’m not going to let some pundit dictate whether or not I exercise my obligations as a member of the Article I branch. I’m not suggesting we put it into a television ad—

Wait, what are you talking about with “some pundit”? Who are you referring to?

Oh, David Axelrod, James Carville. I mean, those guys have not been in the trenches legislatively or electorally in a full generation. And there’s a cottage industry out there of Democratic strategists. But in order to be a Democratic strategist, you actually have to do politics currently and not just podcast about it.

You are referring to them criticizing what you’ve done around U.S.A.I.D. by saying foreign aid is not good territory for Democrats to fight for?

Yeah. And you think I don’t know that foreign aid is not as popular as Medicaid? Of course I know that. But there are going to be mass deaths from malaria and H.I.V./aids and other preventable diseases and conditions because of what the United States is doing. So do I have to be thoughtful and sometimes clever about how we go about communicating that? Yes. Am I going to wait for a more popular program? No, because what they are doing here is ignoring a federal law.

If you haven’t heard what Axelrod (and Rahm Emanuel) said, this Politico piece details it — they said that Democrats shouldn’t fight USAID because foreign aid isn’t popular.

This is on-brand for the pedophile enabling party:

New — The National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC) was told this week by DOJ that they'd lose their funding if the org didn't remove any mentions of LGBTQIA+ issues from their public materials, I've learned. Staff were told they need to deadname trans kids in their reports to comply.

— Marisa Kabas (@marisakabas.bsky.social) February 6, 2025 at 8:30 PM


Here are just a couple of recent instances of Republicans enabling pedophiles: Pardoned J6 Rioter Arrested in Texas for Soliciting Sex from a Minor and Conservative Writer who accused drag queens of “grooming” kids arrested for child molestation. It’s always the ones you most expect.

Here’s a little Elon tidbit: The reason that Tesla charging ports are in an inconvenient location (left rear corner) instead of the front fender or left-hand side is because that was a good placement for Elon’s rental in Beverly Hills. That’s certainly not the biggest Elon story of the moment, but I thought it was interesting that it broke a couple of days ago, because much (not all) of the tech press has been fluffing this guy for years. (Walter Isaacson’s Musk bio was especially full of shit.) Now they’ve finally decided to pull their version of a Maggie Haberman and actually report all the dumb shit he’s done over the years. Great work, guys!

Reader Interactions

89Comments

  2. 2.

    FDRLincoln

    I heard about the NCMEC thing this morning.

    We are in the grip of radical evil.

    They are now floating 50% cuts for NOAA, National Weather Service, and all science funding.

    People seem to think that the debt limit will be a pressure point the Dems can use to stop the bleeding. However, I think that the GOP plan is to NOT pass a debt limit increase, and use that as an
    excuse to shut down all Federal programs they don’t like under the cover of “fiscal restraint” and paying the debt.

    We either accept white Christian Nationalist patriarchy, break up the Union, or be willing to fight a civil war. Either way, the nation and system we’ve known since 1945 and especially 1965 is dead.

  3. 3.

    comrade scotts agenda of rage

    There’s a cottage discussion industry among the Bolt community about “best practices” when charging at a Sooooper Charger station so as to avoid taking up 2 spots.

    There’s differing experiences about when you have no choice (meaning the far right spot is either taken or butts up against a garbage bin or something) but to take 2 spots and whether or not Tesla owners get pissy about it.

    There’s been talk of extending the charging cable but nobody sees Tesla dropping money into that because there’s a ton of debate as to just how interested (now at least) Tesla is in furthering is charging network as it’s opened it up to some other manufacturers.

    We’ve got a thread on the Bolt forum that’s now 2,283 entries long.

  4. 4.

    UncleEbeneezer

    Congrats to all the Garland-haters!  You finally got the aggressive, partisan, ignore all rules/norms/laws, cut-every-corner DOJ that you wished for…

  5. 5.

    Betty Cracker

    @FDRLincoln: I’ve wondered about that too — whether Repubs will use the debt ceiling to shut down programs willy nilly. It would be irresponsible, but then so is letting a weirdo billionaire illegally starve programs he doesn’t like of funds and order his incel flying monkeys to exfiltrate everyone’s personal data. We passed irresponsible and illegal a couple of weeks ago.

  6. 6.

    Kay

    Fetterman says the Democratic brand is “toxic” because of “scolding and shaming”

    Another incredibly privileged middle aged white guy who whines incessantly about how black people and women hurt his feelings.

    Giant man-babies who refuse to grow up

  8. 8.

    Professor Bigfoot

    Where Rahm Emanuel and David Axlerod and James Carville show how much they’re like Jon Stewart and Bill Maher and countless other straight white dudes who will negotiate away the rights of people who are not straight white dudes.

    (*obligatory not all )

  12. 12.

    Chief Oshkosh

    Is there a truthful biography of The Muskrat available online? One that includes all the bits about how he abused his original visa (and thus shouldn’t even be here), how he bought into nascent projects and then fired all the original thinkers (like at Tesla) or himself got canned (like at PayPal)? Is there a similar story about SpaceX? Or is he really the originator on that?

  13. 13.

    Kay

    Frost is confronting armed officers and telling them they can’t bar a member of Congress from the US Dept of Ed

  15. 15.

    Leto

    @Kay: so security will let Dipshit members waltz right on past, but MoC they stop. Just another normal day in the good ole US of A.

  16. 16.

    Kay

    @prufrock:

    Does he ever work? He seems to be a full time MAGA adjacent pundit.

    At least 50% of rural Pennsylvania is on Medicaid. Shouldn’t he be concerned about 2 trillion in cuts?

  20. 20.

    Kay

    @Leto:

    The first security guards were not in uniform or identified as security, yet they refused Frost access.  Then someone called uniformed federal police.

  21. 21.

    ExPatExDem

    @Kay:  What a phony he turned out to be.  But Dem leadership will say it’s wrong to primary him when the time comes, despite his numerous betrayals.

  22. 22.

    Barry

    “Where Rahm Emanuel and David Axlerod and James Carville show how much they’re like Jon Stewart and Bill Maher and countless other straight white dudes who will negotiate away the rights of people who are not straight white dudes.”

    And who have not been relevant for decades.

     

    @Kay:

  23. 23.

    ExPatExDem

    @Chief Oshkosh:  Musk is like the modern day Thomas Edison, in the sense that he likes to put his name on the work of others and have people call him a genius for it.

  25. 25.

    Kay

    @ExPatExDem:

    Oh, I don’t know. Shapiro, the PA governor, seems to loathe him.
    Do you think he’s making a lot of friends in Congress lecturing them about how he’s an authentic warrior for rural white people while they are all hacks? I bet he’s disliked.

  26. 26.

    Kristine

    I just phoned my Rep’s (Brad Schneider) DC office and had no trouble getting through. Let them know that I hoped he will refuse to negotiate or vote for any spending bills/debt ceiling increases until Musk etc are stopped/removed. I asked if they were getting a lot of calls—the staffer I spoke with said yes.

  28. 28.

    MomSense

    @Kay:

    Exactly and it will hit Maine’s CD2 really hard because there are already not enough people to support the rural hospitals we have. It is one of the oldest and whitest parts of the country. They FA by voting for Trump and they are about to FO.

    ETA we are already dealing with clinics closing because of the funding freeze – and this will only get worse.

  29. 29.

    FDRLincoln

    @Betty Cracker:  You’d think the business community would pull them back due to the financial chaos this will cause.

    But so far there’s no sign of that. Thousands of businesses are losing/will lose Federal contracts; I’ve heard that some of them are screaming at their Reps and Senators, but so far with no result.

    The business community won’t save us.

    This will end with fights in the streets. Either that or we lie down and let the Republic die.

  31. 31.

    Jackie

    @Chief Oshkosh:

    Is there a truthful biography of The Muskrat available online? One that includes all the bits about how he abused his original visa (and thus shouldn’t even be here), how he bought into nascent projects and then fired all the original thinkers (like at Tesla) or himself got canned (like at PayPal)?

    There was an almost exact in-depth article published sometime after Jan 1 and before? FFOTUS’s inauguration. Unless it was in the WaPo, it wasn’t firewalled…

    I seem to recall the headline suggesting Musk was an undocumented immigrant…

  32. 32.

    The Audacity of Krope

    @Kay: Fetterman says the Democratic brand is “toxic” because of “scolding and shaming”

    No one gets scolded and shamed more than the activists Fetterman scolds and shames with this remark

  33. 33.

    Kay

    NY and 12 other states filing for an injunction to stop Musk from going into payment systems

    Good. Sue, sue, sue

  34. 34.

    Ohio Mom

    @Kay: If the cut to Medicaid wasn’t going to decimate Ohio Son’s disability supports, I’d be chuckling. I know there are good people like you living in Red rural America but I’m running out of sympathy for the boondocks.

    There’s a lot of talk here and elsewhere on my usual routes through the internet about being kind, and I like to think I am judiciously kind, because I believe some acts of kindness are indeed wasted.

  36. 36.

    Leto

    @Kay: that’s what I’m saying; when the Doge dipshits first went into DoE, they said, “Get of the way” and security complied. But when a member of Congress arrives, suddenly they remember their job. Just watching the coup continue to roll along.

  39. 39.

    Steve LaBonne

    @FDRLincoln: Nondefense discretionary spending is something like 13% of the budget. I’m not sure even zeroing it out would keep us under the debt ceiling for long. And debt default would trigger a global economic meltdown.

  40. 40.

    Suzanne

    @prufrock:

    I am so over nominal Democratic politicians who are “eccentric”. 

    I feel similarly when we talk about “talented” Democrats whose talent appears to be “being an asshole with power”.

  41. 41.

    Ohio Mom

    @MomSense: Yup, lots of people who work at rural hospitals and nursing homes all over, plus agencies and nonprofits serving the disabled, are going to be out of jobs. Woo whee, here comes a financial crisis, that’s a lot of money taken out of the economy.

  45. 45.

    Ohio Mom

    @Professor Bigfoot: I have told some Republicans that I was cutting them out of my life; others, I just slipped away from.

    That was during the GW years. I thought things were bad then, was I naive. Those are by now the good old days.

  46. 46.

    Geminid

    @Kay: I don’t assume Fetterman will even run again. He may end up like Virginia Democratic Senator Jim Webb, one and done.

    And unlike Fetterman, Webb was in good physical health. Fetterman is not, and if he retires his father can take care of him like he did when the son was Mayor of Braddock with a nominal salary.

  47. 47.

    The Audacity of Krope

    @Professor Bigfoot: Yeah, it has nothing to do with race.

    We have long known that individual citizens asking for respect are far more intrusive and disruptive to our daily lives than powerful people demonizing broad swathes of society on TV and government officials banning information.

    Just ask Fox News or Bill Maher if you need confirmation of this principle.

  49. 49.

    The Audacity of Krope

    @PatD: The person I addressed that to has been pushing a line of bigotry, got his way, the whole thing went left, and he persists with similar bigotry to this day.

    Needs attention.

  50. 50.

    Soprano2

    @Kay: In MO it will hit the FFOTUS voting areas extremely hard. Even in the cities it won’t be great, but rural areas would definitely “find out” the consequences of their votes.

  51. 51.

    Miss Bianca

    @Kay: I really, really do wonder whether Fetterman was always like this or whether the stroke changed his personality. Or some combo of the stroke and the election results.

    But yeah – super tired of Democrats with a “schtick”. Or a contrarian streak, but I repeat myself…

  53. 53.

    Another Scott

    @Chief Oshkosh: Wikipedia is usually a good place to start.

    Education

    [ An ornate school building ]

    Musk graduated from Pretoria Boys High School in South Africa.
    Musk attended Waterkloof House Preparatory School, Bryanston High School, and then Pretoria Boys High School, where he graduated.[34] Musk was a good but unexceptional student, earning a 61 in Afrikaans and a B on his senior math certification.[35] Musk applied for a Canadian passport through his Canadian-born mother to avoid South Africa’s mandatory military service,[36][37] which would have forced him to participate in the apartheid regime,[3] as well as to ease his path to immigration to the United States.[38] While waiting for his application to be processed, he attended the University of Pretoria for five months.[39]

    Musk arrived in Canada in June 1989, connected with a second cousin in Saskatchewan,[40] and worked odd jobs including at a farm and a lumber mill.[41] In 1990, he entered Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario.[42][43] Two years later, he transferred to the University of Pennsylvania, where he studied until 1995.[44] Although Musk has said that he earned his degrees in 1995, the University of Pennsylvania did not award them until 1997 – a Bachelor of Arts in physics and a Bachelor of Science in economics from the university’s Wharton School.[45][46][47][48][49] He reportedly hosted large, ticketed house parties to help pay for tuition, and wrote a business plan for an electronic book-scanning service similar to Google Books.[50]

    In 1994, Musk held two internships in Silicon Valley: one at energy storage startup Pinnacle Research Institute, which investigated electrolytic supercapacitors for energy storage, and another at Palo Alto–based startup Rocket Science Games.[51][52] In 1995, he was accepted to a graduate program in materials science at Stanford University, but did not enroll.[47][45][53] Musk decided to join the Internet boom, applying for a job at Netscape, to which he reportedly never received a response.[54][36] The Washington Post reported that Musk lacked legal authorization to remain and work in the United States after failing to enroll at Stanford.[53] In response, Musk said he was allowed to work at that time and that his student visa transitioned to an H1-B. According to numerous former business associates and shareholders, Musk said he was on a student visa at the time.[55]

    FWIW.

    HTH!

    Best wishes,
    Scott.

  54. 54.

    AM in NC

    @Kay:   We have a winner!

    I never realized how much of political life has apparently always been driven by white doodz in midlife crisis.

    just done with their whiny, entitled, infantile bullshit. Across the fucking board.

  55. 55.

    Another Scott

    @Steve LaBonne:

    And debt default would trigger a global economic meltdown.

    It really depends on the details and the alternatives.

    As I’ve said before, if the cost to protect the social safety net is a temporary default to show that Democrats are serious, then I think one should carefully consider that. When the monsters are destroying every norm, we have to be willing to consider things that were inconceivable before.

    Axios – The not-so-secret history of U.S. default (from May 2023).

    Fact check: There have been at least three, admittedly distant, times when the U.S. failed to keep its financial word.

    1814: Amid war with the British, the Treasury couldn’t come up with the scratch to service its debts, with Treasury Secretary Alexander J. Dallas admitting, “the dividend on the funded debt has not been punctually paid; a large amount of treasury notes has already been dishonored.”

    1933-34: President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s refusal to repay Treasury bondholders with gold, as agreed to when the securities were sold, represents an abrogation of the contract that certainly qualifies as a default.

    1979: The Treasury briefly missed payments on roughly $122 million in Treasury bills, according to the Wall Street Journal, citing issues with computer technology. Investors were repaid, with interest.

    FWIW.

    Best wishes,
    Scott.

  56. 56.

    Layer8Problem

    @Betty Cracker:  We certainly need to work together now and in the future, but going forward I also reserve the right to internally question some other commenters’ judgement based on their takes in the past.

  57. 57.

    Betty Cracker

    @Geminid: It wouldn’t surprise me if Fetterman doesn’t run again. Lots of folks interpret his, uh, heel turn as a sign that he’s chasing the electorate to keep the seat, and maybe they’re right. I’m not so sure.

  58. 58.

    ewrunning

    Nothing Democrats do makes my blood boil more than spamming me with fundraising messages from James Carville. I keep trying to block them all.

  61. 61.

    The Audacity of Krope

    @Layer8Problem: Better we work through our differences now instead of of during election time or letting them fester for eternity.

    Or is it like discussing gun control, never being the right time?

  65. 65.

    The Audacity of Krope

    @Kristine: They’re the only ones who have time to appear because no one is employing them.

    Pay me like they get paid and I’ll make the time. Then, I don’t think I’d spread the message the paymasters want…

  66. 66.

    comrade scotts agenda of rage

    @FDRLincoln:

    However, I think that the GOP plan is to NOT pass a debt limit increase, and use that as an
    excuse to shut down all Federal programs they don’t like under the cover of “fiscal restraint” and paying the debt.

    We either accept white Christian Nationalist patriarchy, break up the Union, or be willing to fight a civil war. Either way, the nation and system we’ve known since 1945 and especially 1965 is dead.

    Many people have labeled this as a “cold civil war” and I’ve definitely come around to that way of thinking. Part of our little visit to Bennet and Hick’s offices earlier in the week was to get them nudged in that direction, thinking-wise, without actually calling it that.

    But that’s where we are.

    And yeah, the House is probably looking forward to a default as it’s the classic “drown the gubmint in a bathtub” tactic.

  67. 67.

    Geminid

    @Betty Cracker: Some people are cut out to be politicians. They are generally extroverts. But I remember reading an interview with Giselle Fetterman when she said her husband is an introvert. That’s a view I had not taken of him before, but it made sense and I think she would know.

    Fetterman reminds me of Kyrsten Sinema in this respect. She had plenty of ambition, probably more than Fettrrm. But she never seemed like someone who liked other people or was comfortable meeting them. Just not a natural politician.

  68. 68.

    ewrunning

    @Kristine: Well, there was that story about Carville teaching at a university where he was providing undergrads with his idea of what a (sexually) “satisfied woman” sounds like. Altogether now! Eeewww!

  69. 69.

    Steve LaBonne

    @Another Scott: The first two occurred before the globalized interconnected financial system. In the last case investors knew it was a brief glitch and didn’t panic. Deliberately going over the cliff will look very different.

  70. 70.

    Ohio Mom

    @Another Scott: I have a vague memory that the 1979 missed payment resulted in higher interest rates on the U.S. going forward, and that the rise in interest ended up just adding to the debt. We didn’t exactly prove ourselves a good credit risk with that caper.

    Someone else with a better memory can feel free to correct me.

  73. 73.

    RaflW

    Just circling back to say that this was a delightful glimmer in yet another hard day:
    Schatz’s “In order to be a Democratic strategist, you actually have to do politics currently and not just podcast about it.”

    Boop!

  78. 78.

    Layer8Problem

    @ExPatExDem:  ” . . . Republican Garland . . .”

    Wait, you got a cite that Garland’s Republican?  I mean beyond “everybody knows”, that is.

  79. 79.

    WTFGhost

    Here are just a couple of recent instances of Republicans enabling pedophiles:

    Ahem. A couple *MORE* instances. Trans kids are especially vulnerable to trafficking. (Sorry if I sounded too, too, upset – just, “missing and exploited children” “removal of information” – you *really* miscounted there!)

  80. 80.

    cain

    @FDRLincoln:

    Not going to work. They need a budget to pay for all the ICE deportations, holding the immigrants in tent cities, and guantanamo bay. They also need it for the tax cuts.

  81. 81.

    eldorado

    I’m going to subscribe to Marisa Kabas’s newletter/website the handbasket

    What other independent journalists are publishing work worth supporting? Is the community keeping a list

  82. 82.

    Another Scott

    @Steve LaBonne: @Ohio Mom:

    I recall seeing some list of a few more technical defaults, but didn’t have a chance to find it quickly. Yes, higher interest rates result, yes, it’s bad. My view is that we have to consider everything – even things that were unthinkable in the past – since the monsters have blown up all the norms.

    I also found this 2011 piece by Dean Baker:

    Ron Paul’s Surprisingly Lucid Solution to the Debt Ceiling Impasse

    Representative Ron Paul has hit upon a remarkably creative way to deal with the impasse over the debt ceiling: have the Federal Reserve Board destroy the $1.6 trillion in government bonds it now holds. While at first blush this idea may seem crazy, on more careful thought it is actually a very reasonable way to deal with the crisis. Furthermore, it provides a way to have lasting savings to the budget.

    The basic story is that the Fed has bought roughly $1.6 trillion in government bonds through its various quantitative easing programs over the last two and a half years. This money is part of the $14.3 trillion debt that is subject to the debt ceiling. However, the Fed is an agency of the government. Its assets are in fact assets of the government. Each year, the Fed refunds the interest earned on its assets in excess of the money needed to cover its operating expenses. Last year the Fed refunded almost $80 billion to the Treasury. In this sense, the bonds held by the Fed are literally money that the government owes to itself.

    Unlike the debt held by Social Security, the debt held by the Fed is not tied to any specific obligations. The bonds held by the Fed are assets of the Fed. It has no obligations that it must use these assets to meet. There is no one who loses their retirement income if the Fed doesn’t have its bonds. In fact, there is no direct loss of income to anyone associated with the Fed’s destruction of its bonds. This means that if Congress told the Fed to burn the bonds, it would in effect just be destroying a liability that the government had to itself, but it would still reduce the debt subject to the debt ceiling by $1.6 trillion. This would buy the country considerable breathing room before the debt ceiling had to be raised again. President Obama and the Republican congressional leadership could have close to two years to talk about potential spending cuts or tax increases. Maybe they could even talk a little about jobs.

    In addition, there’s a second reason why Representative Paul’s plan is such a good idea. As it stands now, the Fed plans to sell off its bond holdings over the next few years. This means that the interest paid on these bonds would go to banks, corporations, pension funds, and individual investors who purchase them from the Fed. In this case, the interest payments would be a burden to the Treasury since the Fed would no longer be collecting (and refunding) the interest.

    To be sure, there would be consequences to the Fed destroying these bonds. The Fed had planned to sell off the bonds to absorb reserves that it had pumped into the banking system when it originally purchased the bonds. These reserves can be created by the Fed when it has need to do so, as was the case with the quantitative easing policy. Creating reserves is in effect a way of “printing money.” During a period of high unemployment, this can boost the economy with little fear of inflation, since there are many unemployed workers and excess capacity to keep downward pressure on wages and prices. However, at some point the economy will presumably recover and inflation will be a risk. This is why the Fed intends to sell off its bonds in future years. Doing so would reduce the reserves of the banking system, thereby limiting lending and preventing inflation. If the Fed doesn’t have the bonds, however, then it can’t sell them off to soak up reserves.

    But as it turns out, there are other mechanisms for restricting lending, most obviously raising the reserve requirements for banks. If banks are forced to keep a larger share of their deposits on reserve (rather than lend them out), it has the same effect as reducing the amount of reserves. To take a simple arithmetic example, if the reserve requirement is 10 percent and banks have $1 trillion in reserves, the system will support the same amount of lending as when the reserve requirement is 20 percent and the banks have $2 trillion in reserves. In principle, the Fed can reach any target for lending limits by raising reserve requirements rather than reducing reserves.

    As a practical matter, the Fed has rarely used changes in the reserve requirement as an instrument for adjusting the amount of lending in the system. Its main tool has been changing the amount of reserves in the system. However, these are not ordinary times. The Fed does not typically buy mortgage backed securities or long-term government bonds either. It has been doing both over the last two years precisely because this downturn is so extraordinary. And in extraordinary times, it is appropriate to take extraordinary measures—like the Fed destroying its $1.6 trillion in government bonds and using increases in reserve requirements to limit lending and prevent inflation.

    In short, Representative Paul has produced a very creative plan that has two enormously helpful outcomes. The first one is that the destruction of the Fed’s $1.6 trillion in bond holdings immediately gives us plenty of borrowing capacity under the current debt ceiling. The second benefit is that it will substantially reduce the government’s interest burden over the coming decades. This is a proposal that deserves serious consideration, even from people who may not like its source.

    It didn’t happen, and we muddled through.

    Again, we have to be thinking about every avenue to protect the US Government and our way of life. If a temporary default is part of that, then it needs to be considered.

    I think we’ll muddle through this time as well, but we have to be prepared for all kinds of crazy proposals and demands and game them out.

    FWIW.

    Thanks.

    Best wishes,
    Scott.

  83. 83.

    Ohio Mom

    @Another Scott: What cognitive dissonance I am experiencing — Dean Baker, who I recognize as a smart fellow traveler, giving credit to Rand Paul, that piece of crap?

    This sort of economics is way above me, I am in no position to have an opinion. I am reminded of Atrois’s urging that we Mint the Coin. Never knew what to make of that, either.

  84. 84.

    pajaro

    @ExPatExDem:

    Democratic leadership, whatever that is, will not decide whether someone challenges Fetterman.  If there is an ambitious politician who believes he or she has a chance in the primary, there will be a challenge.  Fetterman’s mavericky actions actually aren’t going to help him.

  85. 85.

    There go two miscreants

    @Ohio Mom: Ron Paul, not Rand Paul. Yes, that’s Rand’s father, and he had some wacky ideas, but doesn’t seem to be quite as much of a jerk. (I’m with you on the cognitive dissonance tho, just for slightly different reasons.)

  87. 87.

    Kayla Rudbek

    @MomSense: Hell, I’m worried that if my sibling and spouse lose their jobs,  I will have all of their family moving in with me (I love them, we would not have nearly enough room, we would drive them insane and vice versa). (I say they for privacy purposes, sibling and spouse fit the norm). And in a really bad case scenario, we are all unemployed and living with Mr. Rudbek’s parents.

  89. 89.

    Kayla Rudbek

    @Geminid: yeah, I am an introvert and I have no bedside manner (which is why I didn’t go to medical school) and you know what I did with that? I stayed out of running for political office, that’s what I did with that. It’s not the introversion, it’s the lack of principles. Fetterman and Sinema both took lessons from the Vicar of Bray.

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