The Sore Loser Party Threatens to Hold its Breath
POSTED AT 10:32 AM ON AUGUST 1, 2011 BY HOWARD PORTNOY
It is premature for any faction in the debt ceiling debate to declare victory, particularly since “nothing is agreed upon until everything is agreed upon.” The rank and file on each side still have to sign off on the deal, and some members of Congress, especially on the left, are now threatening to vote no.
Among the dissenters is Raúl Grijalva (D-AZ), who co-chairs the Congressional Progressive Caucus. Almost simultaneously with the president’s announcement last night that a deal had been struck, Rep. Grijalva told his constituents he would not support it. Don’t look for the mainstream and other liberal media to call the congressman a “traitor” or “terrorist” or claim he is “holding the economy hostage” by threatening to vote no. That criticism is reserved only for the Tea and/or Republican Parties.
Back in the not-so-distant past, when the Democrats controlled both houses of Congress and the White House, they had no use for the phrase full faith and credit, which in recent weeks has become their mantra. The head of the executive branch, Barack Obama, had run on the promise to nationalize health care, and by golly, Congress was going to deliver on that pledge even if it meant ignoring the will of a large segment of the populace and resorting to parliamentary chicanery.
As though irony is needed to punctuate the hypocrisy of the left, it has since been determined that ObamaCare—originally advertised as a strategy for magically reducing the deficit, then as deficit-neutral—will add $2 trillion to the nation’s already staggering debt.
Democratic members of Congress are not alone in their bellyaching this morning. The New York Times editorial board and the paper’s op-ed residential whiner, Paul Krugman, have already proclaimed that the nation is doomed. Admonishes Krugman, an economist by trade:
The worst thing you can do in these circumstances is slash government spending, since that will depress the economy even further. Pay no attention to those who invoke the confidence fairy, claiming that tough action on the budget will reassure businesses and consumers, leading them to spend more. It doesn’t work that way, a fact confirmed by many studies of the historical record.
Krugman seems to forget, as do his Democratic brethren in government, that we tried it his way. In fact, it was that grand experiment in government spending known as the American Recovery and Investment Act, or stimulus (aka “confidence fairy&rdquo
that put the nation in this bind in the first place. It is time for the Democrats to swallow hard, remember that they had their moment in the sun, and then grow a pair.
