Debt Limit Increase Danger

Brian Darling / May 31, 2011

The House is expected to vote down a clean increase of the debt limit today.  This vote is merely political theater and a way for Members of Congress to go on record as being against an increase in the debt limit without any cuts to spending or reforms to the budget process.  Many worry that the eventual debt limit increase plan will dodge entitlement reform and may include an idea to increase taxes.

The New York Times reports today that there is no will on the part of House members to pass a clean increase of the debt limit, and they classify as the bill as “doomed to fail.”

In a bit of political stagecraft, House Republicans plan to bring to a vote on Tuesday evening a measure that President Obama and the Democrats were demanding not so long ago: a clean increase in the national debt ceiling, unencumbered by any requirement that spending be cut.

The American people want cuts to spending programs, and they fear the consequences of more debt being stacked on the $14.3 trillion the United States has already racked up.  This vote may be political theater, yet it is conventional wisdom in Washington that there will be a debt limit increase bill with some attempt to reduce the debt before August 2^nd.  The debt limit increase vote will fail today, but another version of a debt limit increase will be back in the next few weeks for another round of votes. (more…)