Former CBO Director: Let Debt Limit Debate Be Short, Sweet and Successful
Tina Korbe /
The debt limit debate waits for the return of a recess-refreshed Congress, but if conservatives are ready for it, they can leverage the issue to enact spending caps and advance the budget the House passed last week, says former Congressional Budget Office director Douglas Holtz-Eakin.
“The Republicans should come back the day after the recess, pass the debt limit and attach to it caps to total spending that match the budget they just passed,” Holtz-Eakin, president of the American Action Forum, said this week at The Heritage Foundation Bloggers Briefing.
According to Holtz-Eakin, such immediate action could then serve as a bargaining chip for conservatives. The White House, after all, has asked Congress to dispatch this debate with all possible speed. If the House does, but the president refuses to sign the debt limit increase because of included spending caps, he undermines his own argument about the need for speed, Holtz-Eakin explained.