Debt ceiling crisis options

By Frank Moraes

Yesterday, Adam Liptak wrote an interesting article in theNew York Times, Experts See Potential Ways Out for Obama in Debt Ceiling Maze. It discusses three ideas—two of which you have probably heard before. And the one new one is kind of dumb. Still, I think it is important to discuss them.

But before getting to the specifics, I should note: the White House could not be any clearer that none of these ideas is valid. And I think we should believe them. There are two sides to this. One the front side, they have to say that to put pressure on Congress to use normal order to raise the Debt Ceiling. But on the back side, I'm sure that Obama is concerned that if he does anything that is considered even slightly shady from a Constitutional perspective, the House would almost certainly vote to impeach him. Just the same, I think this is typical cowardly Obama, because the Senate would never have the votes to convict. What's more, the Republicans would end up looking really bad, impeaching two consecutive Democratic presidents over trivial issues that they more or less created. But I think that Obama might change his tune if we are on the verge of default.

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