Apparently growing frustrated with the Tea Party element within his own Party, Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) took to the Senate floor Wednesday and said their current demands with regard to the debt ceiling debate were "bizarre" and "unfair" to constituents. He read from an Op-Ed piece in the Wall Street Journal wherein the Tea Partyers and those following them were compared to Middle Earth hobbits, a scathing critique of the perceived delusion guiding the movement that its opposition to President Obama and Democratic plans would place the blame for a government shutdown and default on its loans squarely on the Democrats. McCain added that it was "amazing" Republicans would think they could force the issue of a balanced budget amendment in its "present presentation," calling the maneuver "foolish."
"What is really amazing about this is that some members are believing that we can pass a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution in this body with its present representation -- and that is foolish," McCain said on the Senate floor, according to The Hill. "That is worse than foolish. That is deceiving many of our constituents."
Sen. McCain's harsh words came on the heels of reports that Tea Party Republicans were refusing to back the budget deficit reduction plan proposed by Speaker of the House John Boehner (R-Ohio). Boehner's plan, which called for a two-part raise in the debt ceiling overseen by a bipartisan committee for recommending spending cuts, was dismissed by many of the more hard-nosed conservatives within the Tea Party movement due to its lack of a balanced budget amendment. A plan passed previously in the Republican-controlled House, nicknamed the "cut, cap, and balance" bill, was defeated in the Senate, which is controlled by a majority of Democratic Party members.
Congress has been at an impasse on the question of raising the debt ceiling for months. Talks between various groups, which included meetings of the bipartisan "gang of six" and other gatherings between Republican and Democratic leaders (including President Obama), have ended in stalemate and ideological gridlock. Several proposals have been made, each with varying degrees of failure.
And while most Americans are calling for a compromise and an end to the talks so a government shutdown can be avoided, many conservatives, most aligned with the no-tax, spend less, smaller government Tea Party politicians, are refusing to compromise on deals that will either increase revenues through changing tax laws or contain only spending cuts.
McCain's statements and the reading from the Wall Street Journal seem clear: Not compromising on the debt ceiling would not leave Republicans blameless for a historic first-ever government default and a likely re-descent into recession. Holding out for a balanced budget amendment, an amendment which McCain said he agreed with, was not the way to go about getting that amendment. There simply was not enough time.
The debt ceiling deadline, a date U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner has maintained will expire Aug. 2 (depending on total revenues taken in but allowing for little leeway in the following days), is the boundary between the U.S. government making good on its debt, services, and contractual obligations and having to shut down all nonessential programs and services, possibly risking default on the government's outstanding debt.
The one thing most legislators agree upon is the debt ceiling must be raised. However, how to go about it seems to be what is in question. The Tea Party believes that by not raising the debt ceiling, a government shutdown will force drastic cuts to government spending and a default will be avoided by simply paying the interest on the debt, then prioritizing which programs and services receive the remainder of the funds taken in by the government's existing revenues.
Prior to his words Wednesday, McCain told the National Review Online that presidential candidate and Tea Party leader Michele Bachmann was "committed... to vote against raising the debt ceiling under any circumstances." He blamed the current debt ceiling on Republican thinking of post-shutdown prioritizing and the ratcheting up of tensions by President Obama's public announcements, such as the possibility that Social Security checks might not go out on time.
McCain seemed to allude to Bachmann again Wednesday.
"There are those that argue somehow in a bizarre fashion," he said from the Senate floor, "that somehow we could prioritize our payments to the most urgent requirements, such as our veterans, such as Social Security."
In the quoted words of the Wall Street Journal Op-Ed, Tea Partyers are "hobbits" fighting the evil President Obama: "The Republican House that failed to raise the debt ceiling would somehow escape all blame. Then Democrats would have no choice but to pass a balanced-budget amendment and reform entitlements, and the tea-party Hobbits could return to Middle Earth having defeated Mordor."
It would appear McCain is letting his fellow Republicans, especially the less-experienced elected officials, know that the current battle over the budget and the debt ceiling is no fantasy -- and the Tea Party and those who would follow its lead would do well to understand that political fact as they go about doing the business of governing.
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