Ted Cruz Was Against The Bill, Before He Was For It.

A lot of people are a bit confused about the course of events that are presently taking place in congress. Most people perceive that a piece of legislation passed the House of Representatives and now must go to the Senate to be approved or rejected. The sad truth is that is simply not the way it works in Washington, hasn't for some time. Any more, Washington rules for passing a law are more akin to playing the game mouse trap then what we all learned about in 3rd grade social studies class, so let’s take a moment and try to piece together exactly what is going on what the possible outcomes of the latest and greatest budget battle are.

The House of Representatives passes this Continuing Resolution, which according to most people over there anymore is just as good as a budget without all that paperwork and number crunching that is typically associated with trying to figure out how best to spend $3.5 Trillion dollars. This particular one would fund all the government programs through the end of next year with one minor exception. The American Care Act (i.e. Obamacare, or the ACA) was left out of the bill because the three people in congress who have read it really don’t like it. Then this resolution goes to the Senate, where they have a collection of arcane parliamentary rules that are more messed up and non-sequital then watching Andy Dick do Shakespeare in the Park. The wrench in the cogs here is that in the Senate, senators Ted Cruz and Mike Lee, along with a few others are trying to force Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid to get 60 votes in order to make any amendments to the House passed bill, namely an amendment that would stick the part of the House bill that de-funds the ACA. 60 votes is typically needed to get anything through the senate anymore, but once passed, a parliamentary vote could be called for an amendment to the bill that effectively changes it into something completely different, kind of like when you ask for the Big Mac combo at McDonalds, then wind up with a half-eaten breakfast burrito instead, even though they stopped serving breakfast 8 hours ago.

In order to enforce this 60 vote requirement, Senator Ted Cruz is stating that he will use a little rule called the filibuster, where Ted will take over the floor of the Senate and will then begin yapping about anything from how much he loves Canada to how much he loves Texas, it doesn't really matter, the important aspect being that as long as Ted holds the floor, nothing can be voted on at all. If he gets a few people to join in, they could hold government at a standstill for days, though it seems that an appropriate metaphor for that would involve a molasses on a cold day versus a molasses in a blizzard.

The kind of jacked up aspect of this is as such, Ted Cruz is going to have to stop a vote on the bill itself, as is, if he doesn't get the 60 vote agreement now in order to avoid a parliamentary vote on any amendments to the bill later. He is trying now to avoid a scenario from playing out where a simple majority in the Senate can expo facto send the legislation to a joint committee of house and senate members where it is expected that republicans from the house will cave and allow the amendment that would keep funding for Obamacare to stand.

Got it? So Ted Cruz is going to be against the bill, before being for the bill. But unlike another Senators failed attempt to straddle the electorate, an informed public will know why before, during, and after any vote occurs. There is some evidence that a pretty nasty smear campaign against Senators Ted Cruz and Mike Lee is getting underway in order to undermine their attempt to derail the derailment of the debt and allow the government to keep moving along after the soft Oct. 1st deadline when we apparently are no longer able to use accounting tricks to keep up our funding charade.

Visual Aid on How Congress Works

So why haven’t they started this whole mess then? What’s the hold up? Well, other than some pretty exciting football games over the weekend, there are a lot of things going on behind the scenes from Senator Reid’s side to try and get ready for this battle. First of all, the aforementioned smear campaign to get some public support for his side, secondly, a dream scenario would be to get some moderate republican Senators like McCain and Graham over to his side, enough of these votes and Reid could potentially agree to Senator’s Cruz demand and still get his way as far as the bill is concerned. And of course, lastly, Obama is hoping for something else to go horribly wrong in his foreign policy that will take the spot light off of Cruz as he actually takes a stand for his beliefs and what he feels is a degradation of traditional America. Could you imagine if that kind of attitude caught on with the general public?

Obama Offers Concessions for Debt Limit

House Republicans have passed a Debt Ceiling agreement that asks for only one item, de-fund the American Care Act, frequently referred to as Obamacare. In response to this, Obama has called House Republicans out for doing nothing but attacking him, and not focusing on helping the working class and the economy. However, little do people know that there was a top secret memo sent to the GOP leadership. Items that Obama is willing to compromise on to get the Debt Limit raised and to avoid a government shut down. In this memo, the following items where proposed for finding some middle ground that would allow Obamacare to remain funded, and avoid a crippling shutdown.

In exchange for raising the Federal Debt Limit, the following items are proposed for your consideration;

• Adding 'Spray on Tan' coverage to Obamacare for any current Speakers of the House.
• Republicans will have the ability to place one additional word into next years state of the Union to be unknown to the President until he reads it off the teleprompter.
• Joe Biden can not laugh during another Presidential Debate, ever.
• Hillary Clinton will be rehired as Secretary of State so that she can be fired from the position.
• Paul Ryan will be allowed to be relevant again
• A mulligan will be called on the entire career of Marco Rubio
• An 18 hour TV special will be aired, hosted by Nancy Pelosi, special were she will go through all the contents of Obamacare called "Now that we've passed it, let's find out what's in it"
• Before the 2016 Presidential filing date, The White House will share the name of a very good birth certificate forger with Ted Cruz.
  
• Obamacare will be expanded to include chin enhancement surgery for Senate minority leaders.
• On alternating Tuesdays, House Republicans will have access to John Kerry's yacht, so long as they don't dock it in Massachusetts. 
• The first Presidential Debate of 2016 will be moderated by Ron Paul, the second by Ryan Seacrest.
• Senators McCain and Graham will be required to run in the Democratic primaries for their next election.
• Michelle Obama will publicly announce that this deal makes her proud to be an American for the 2nd time in her adult life.
• President Obama will offer gaff fodder to Republicans in the form of stating that America has no intention of putting pants on the ground in Syria.

And the biggest concession of them all;

• Seven states will be allowed to secede from the U.S., bringing the nation, according to Obama, back to 50 states in total.

The ball is now in Republicans court. Only time will tell if a compromise will be reached before something truly tragic, like the status quo, will result of this deadlock.

Paying Bills the Government Way

Picture this, you are broke, I know for some of us this doesn't require a terribly grand stretch of the imagination, but go with me on this, you are broke, but you want to keep living the way you are living. 

You know what, back up a moment, you aren't just broke, you are really broke. You also have several credit cards that are maxed out. So, what do you do when the cable bill arrives in the mail? How about just crumble it up and toss it over your shoulder? What about at the grocery store? Let's say you just fill up your cart with all sorts of goodies and Cheerios and just walk right out of the store, patting yourself on the back because of all the time you saved by not having to wait in line.

If you just ignore the bills that are piling up around you, you could just make a (terribly false) claim that you are not in any more debt then you where the moment before you opened that first neglected bill. In real life the cable company probably won't turn off your HBO subscription the first day after the bill was due, and that appears to be just the case with the Federal Government.

The US Treasury continues to use "extraordinary measures" to be able to continue to spend well above previously budgeted legal level of $16,699,421,095,673.60 even though we continue to accumulate debt for the two months well above and beyond that.

According to the Daily Treasury Statements for the past 70 plus days, the federal debt has been stuck at exactly $16,699,396,000,000.00. Just $25 million and some change below the legal limit.

Even though the government's official accounting of the debt has not budged since May 17th of this year, the Treasury has continued to sell bills, notes and bonds at a value that exceeds the value of the bills, notes and bonds it was redeeming.

Jack Lew's Signature, or exhibit A of his plausible deniability?

In fact, according to the Daily Treasury Statement for May 17, the Treasury had by then already redeemed approximately $4,776,995,000,000.00 since the beginning of the fiscal year (which started on Oct. 1, 2012). As of that same day, the Treasury had already sold $5,354,508,000.000.00 new bills, notes and bonds during the fiscal year. That represented a net increase in publicly circulating U.S. government debt instruments of $577,513,000,000.00 for the fiscal year. This was the same day that Treasury Secretary Jack Lew (look at the signature on your recently issued dollar bill) sent a letter to House Speaker John Boehner. In the letter, Lew said the Treasury would begin implementing what he called “the standard set of extraordinary measures” that allows the Treasury to continue to borrow and spend money even after it has hit the legal debt limit.

A "standard set of extraordinary measures." Seems to me that on top of a clue, a budget, and some balls, Washington may want to look into getting a dictionary. The real question this all raises, how long before all this magic money shuffling catches up to us? Will it be the electric bill? The water bill? Your Social Security check? Your medicare payment? When a person lies about how much money he's secretly spending fueling a gambling or junk food habit, he's called an addict. What is it called when the government has to hide the fact that it's spending money just leaving the lights on? 

Explaining the Explanation

Today, the President had a press conference explaining the need to raise the debt limit. There has been a lot of confusion reported as a result of some of his comments, allow me to assist with a what they said v. what they meant segment.

"Now right now our economy is growing, and our businesses are creating new jobs. So we are poised for a good year -- if we make smart decisions, sound investments, and as long as Washington politics don’t get in the way of America’s progress."


It's going to be another crappy year, and I will once again blame the House and Republican leadership, and for reasons that even shock and elude me, a lot of people out there will believe it.

"Now, step by step, we've made progress towards <balancing the budget>. Over the past two years, I've signed into law about $1.4 trillion in spending cuts. Two weeks ago, I signed into law more than $600 billion in new revenue by making sure the wealthiest Americans begin to pay their fair share."

We need to focus on raising more taxes because I've already done everything I'm willing to do as far as spending reduction.

"These are bills that have already been racked up, and we need to pay them. So while I’m willing to compromise and find common ground over how to reduce our deficits, America cannot afford another debate with this Congress about whether or not they should pay the bills they've already racked up."

We're not only spending money we don't have, we're spending money that we don't even have a loan for yet. Kind of like inking a deal on a house without talking to your bank yet. So get ready for those stinking republicans who are going to try and say that there is something wrong with this way of governing.

"If congressional Republicans refuse to pay America’s bills on time, Social Security checks and veterans’ benefits will be delayed. We might not be able to pay our troops or honor our contracts with small business owners. Food inspectors, air traffic controllers, specialists who track down loose nuclear materials wouldn't get their paychecks."

Republicans will cause old people to die, our troops to be abandoned, small businesses to go under, planes to collide in mid air, and a nuclear holocaust. This $#*! just got real...

     In response to a question about using executive authority to raise the debt limit without congressional approval;

"...if the House and the Senate want to give me the authority so that they don’t have to take these tough votes, if they want to put the responsibility on me to raise the debt ceiling, I’m happily (sic) to take it. Mitch McConnell, the Republican leader in the Senate, had a proposal like that last year, and I’m happy to accept it."

Could you imagine the kind of $#*! I could get away with if I didn't have to keep asking these pesky congressmen for permission all the time. 

This kind of reminds me of that fourteen year old who asks his or her parents for their own credit card so they can stop annoying mom and pop with requests for their allowance. This analogy falls apart when you realize this teenager would have already spent his allowance for earnings from now until they are in their mid twenties.

Normally this is the part where people begin to wonder how one man can be so naive to actually believe he should have what basically amounts to unilateral control over all spending in the United States Government, which for the remainder of his presidency would equate to something in the $15 Trillion range. I'm flabbergasted because somehow he is pulling this off within the realm of public perception. People are actually encouraging him to bypass congress with chants of the greater good and overcoming dissent through executive fiat. 

I simply want to remind people that whatever is done in this presidency carries over to the next, regardless of which party they might be a member of.