Blogs Oct 2, 2013 at 9:54 pm

Comments

1
They should mint it the size of a ningi, and then use it to finance that Death Star that they said they weren't going to build.
2
They'll never believe it's legal. Then we'll have to start arresting them. Then what?
3
No absolutely not. Don't even admit this an option. Or even that the Constitutional requirement that we uphold the Full Faith and Credit of the US government is a real thing. @2 is right the Republicans won't believe it any way.

Slam it! Slam it! Into the ground. Beat it and Burn it! This shit Cannot Stand. You cannot hold the entire Country for Fuck sake, the entire World, hostage because you lost.

And I don't care how you slice it, like it or not Obamacare won the right to be enacted.

Make your changes as we work it all out but Fuck you if you bring a gun to the table.
4
I'd like to see what happens to the spot precious metals prices if this actually came to pass.
5
Fun fact: I created the petition to mint the trillion dollar coin that went around this January. That was a fun few weeks, watching Twitter friends interviewed on CNN etc about it...
6
To have a trillion dollars associated with such one small object is boggling and a bit distressing. We all remember coins in the pockets going through the washer. Well. what's to prevent that from happening in Bernanke or Lew households?
7
@6 If your on the house Republican (tea party) side of this you just slipped to hopeless level.

8
@3, they brought a gun to the table in the person of the young girl who was interviewed about not being able to be given possibly lifesaving cancer treatment by the NIH. And Harry shot the Dems in the foot with that gun when he publicly and angrily said no, why should he accept the Republicans' offer to fund the NIH program.
9
The chairman of the Fed has already said that they won't accept the coin, but hell, keep dreaming.
10
@6 just shut up already.
11
@8 Yep own it Bitch! It is the Republican party that has become nihilistic.

12
@8 because the Republicans started this crap, and we're not going to let them fund every little piece of the government one by one until everything is funded except for the ACA. It's all or nothing, now or never. We're not playing with you any more.
13
Maybe I'm missing something, but this is irrelevant right now, right? The government is shut down because it can't pass a Continuing Resolution, which is what authorizes the govt to keep spending money in the absence of a real Appropriations bill. Since that money hasn't been authorized, it can't be spent.

The trillion dollar coin addresses the separate (but still looming, in a couple weeks) issue of the debt ceiling. In that case, the government is allowed to spend the money, and theoretically keeps spending money, but isn't allowed to take on further debt to pay those bills. The coin gives the treasury money to pay the bills, but it DOESN'T authorize the spending.

Or I'm confused, because it's a confusing issue. Who cares.
14
@12, yes, I know, and I agree with that. However, the Republicans still found that young girl and brought her to the attention of the media, and Harry Reid said what he said, at a time when he'd been understandably driven nuts by these bastards. If only he'd simply refused to say anything in response to the contemptible Dana's challenge.
15
The House leadership is doing it's own duty, at odds with the White House. This is a problem in presidential leadership. Obama knew this was brewing for a long time, yet has never even met Boehner half way.
One can dislike the what Boehner and Cruz are doing, that they're guided by their political ideology, as Obama is to his. Neither side is pure.
16
@14 sad as it is the answer to your question is Yep happens all the time.
17
So, after you show that you can mint a coin like that, the next battle will be politicians trying to require the president to mint coins for everything they don't want to have their name associated with. Magic platinum coins for every war, ACA payments, and to backfill all shortfalls in pension funding for government employees.
18
For a political reporter, Goldy, you sure don't seem to have spent much time thinking about how the politics of "minting the coin" would play out.
19
#18, it's tough to find talent when all you can pay is $9.19 an hour!
20
Minting the coin would subvert the principles of the Constitution. It would be an Executive Branch grab for power. Just because the Legislative Branch is not doing its job does not mean that the Executive Branch can seize its power. The fallout from a default would be massive. But the principles for governance in our Constitution are still more important. A default is far better than defeating our checks and balances.
21
I'm waiting for China to decide to dump all of the US T-Bills they are holding. Doubt it would happen but a couple of years ago I'd say it would never happen. Now I just doubt it would happen.
22
Raindrop can't even concern troll properly. Guess the poor dear shot his wad early with the Gay_Dude_for_Rmoney schtick.
23
Legal or not, wise or not, I think an interesting question would be "What should be printed on the face of the coin?"

Fun to think about...
24
@15: Thank you for proving with one comment that you know nothing about the situation.

Congress passed a law, SCOTUS upheld it, and now one party is shutting down the government in a petulant tantrum in order to stop thel aw from taking effect.

Democrats simply want the law to be implemented, as was passed by both houses.

The GOP wants the law to be delayed, medicare to be slashed, food assistance to be slashed, a new oil pipeline built, funding eliminated for planned parenthood, the privitization of medicare, Paul Ryan's "fuck everyone but me" budget passed, the REINS act passed, social security slashed, the defunding of the ACA, the elimination of access to birth control and abortion, the expansion of off shore drilling, the reinstatement of the Bush tax cuts, trillions of dollars of additional budget cuts, ending regulations on mountaintop strip mining, stripping the EPA of the ability to moniter greenhouse gas emissions, loosening coal ash environmental regulations, eliminating social service block grants, restricting the child tax credit, and the expansion of drilling on federal lands.

Yeah, this is really "meeting halfway" isn't it?

So are you merely completely ignorant on what is going on, or are you simply a liar with no integrity trying to put a nonsense spin on the issue?

"Meeting halfway." What a joke.
25
Default might be the shock therapy the rest of the word needs to uncouple from the US's economic problems
26
@15: meet us halfway! just cut off all your toes now, and then cut off the rest of your foot in 3 weeks. win win!
27
@20: read section 4 of the 14th Amendment (which is, I recall, a part of the Constitution). Minting the coin would be the President fulfilling his constitutional duty to "take care that the laws be faithfully executed" according to Article II, section 3 of the Constitution. If you're going to argue the Constitution, you'd better have a little more at hand than a second grade lecture about "the marvelous checks and balances of our wonderful Constitution."
28
@24

Well, in their minds "meeting halfway" = "compromise" = comply 100% with Ted Cruz's demands.
29
If it were this simple, Goldy, we could just get rid of reserve banking and the government can print all the money they want, inflate themselves our of the $15t debt, and issue the "New Dollar". Those policies have workes so well for Mexico, Spain, and for that matter, the Weimar Republic. But it would sure make basketball tickets very expensive, since wages would not keep up.
30
R's - We want to eat all the Irish babies.
D's - No.

Media - Obama should negotiate and let them eat half.
31
Nah, Mr. Burns would just give the coin to Fidel Castro anyway.
32
Where is the "Mint the Damn Coin" WhiteHouse.gov "We the People" petition?

Actually, is that site operatonal durring the shutdown?
33
"The fact that we are here today to debate raising America’s debt limit is a sign of leadership failure. It is a Sign that the US Government cannot pay its own bills. It is a sign that we now depend on ongoing financial assistance from foreign countries to finance our Government’s reckless fiscal policies. ...Increasing America’s debt weakens us domestically and internationally. Leadership means that 'the buck stops here'. Instead, Washington is shifting the burden of bad choices today onto the backs of our children and Grandchildren. America has a debt problem and a failure of leadership. Americans deserve better."

SENATOR BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA, MARCH 2006
(Right before he voted against raising the debt ceiling).
34
@15 -- I wonder if folks like you, who say the President (or the Senate) should meet the House members "half way" are really considering the precedent. Just a quick reminder of where we are now. Obama (a Democrat) won the last presidential election (handily). Democrats still control the Senate. Republicans control the House, but just barely. To put things in perspective, more people voted for house Democrats than Republicans, but because of the way the boundaries are drawn, Republicans won a majority. OK?

Now, imagine if the situation was reversed ten years from now. Better yet, imagine that Republicans control all three chambers. However, imagine the Democrats hold 45 seats (allowing them to filibuster). Now, imagine the Democrats want to repeal some law (say, the Patriot Act). What if the Democratic senators filibuster until the law is repealed? What other laws should they try to repeal. How long should they shut down government (and fuck with the credit of the U. S.) until they get their way, or the Republicans decide to "meet them half way"?

Look, we get it. Republicans think this was a bad law. Fine. Congress passes bad laws all the time. If you really think it is a bad law, then convince the rest of the country that it is a bad law. Get your people elected and then get rid of the law. It obviously isn't that bad, or you would have been able to defeat the guy whose name is attached to it (unofficially).
35
@6 That's funny! (I'm assuming that was meant to be a joke.)

But @15, that is a complete load of crap! When in the last 20 years have the Repugs met the Dims halfway on anything, ever? Example: Clinton and Obama, huge numbers of judicial nominees held up by Congress, vs. Bush almost no nominees blocked.

Obama won re-election campaigning on Obamacare (among other things), Dims won the Senate, and Repugs hold the House based on A MINORITY of the total votes cast, due to Gerrymandering. Bush was appointed POTUS (eventually known to have lost the vote in Florida by the best count, not to mention the election fraud overseen by his brother's voter disenfranchisement schemes) but proceeded to govern as if he'd won by a landslide. The Bush League triumphantly enacted every crazy, destructive plan they wanted. It's the Dims' turn to actually enjoy the power they won.
36
@30 Perfecto.
37
#30, the only compromise the R's will settle for is to eat half of each Irish Baby.

Why is Obama so unwilling to compromise???
38
Raindrop/Gay Dude for Romney - you comments in this thread are a perfect example of why you and your imbecilic brain drippings deserve nothing but condescension and ridicule.
39
Minting a coin will mask the symptom, but not cure the disease. Don't default on the debt, but do withhold Social Security payments. Let the Republicans hear from a million retirees why they need to increase the debt limit. Then reimburse the retirees with interest. California issued IOUs for a while and the State did not collapse.
40
@15: "Halfway"? The Republicans want the Democrats to give up Obamacare. What are the Republicans willing to give up? I haven't heard of anything.
41
Just when I thought David Goldstein coulden't get any stupider.

Yay for federal reserve the biggest scam in world history.
42
Creating money of no intrinsic value may devalue a currency, especially if the holders and traders of that currency believe so.

Borrowing money doesn't devalue a currency. This is because the terms of the loan are negotiated and both parties agree that it's repayable, and hence temporary.

In other words, the coin is a bad idea. Raising the debt limit is a good idea. Defaulting on our debt is a lunatic idea. We definitely shouldn't do that.

We don't have to, either. The Executive Branch can simply prioritize tax collection and debt service as the primary function of government when the debt limit is reached. Anything else, like running up utility bills, is non-essential. Turn off the lights and phones in the Capitol (after all, they didn't have electricity or telephones for the first 100 years or so and managed to do useful work -- the traditionalists should love this), shut down the airports and ports and Amtrak, stop sending out Social Security checks, suspend all employees at all agencies except Treasury and IRS and the White House, bring all troops back to base and prepare for evacuation and demobbing. Shut it all down, but keep paying those bonds.

Should take about 15 minutes for the Republicans to cave.

Please wait...

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