By Byron York - washingtonexaminer.com
You want to get attention on Capitol Hill? Threaten to lower the U.S. government credit rating.
The news that Standard & Poors has lowered its outlook for the United States from stable to negative shot through congressional offices on Monday. An already-hot fight over raising the national debt got even hotter.
Today S&P sent a wake-up call to those in Washington asking Congress to blindly increase the debt limit House Majority Leader Eric Cantor said in a statement released minutes after the news broke. House Republicans will only move forward on the presidents request to increase the debt limit if it is accompanied by serious reforms that immediately reduce federal spending and end the culture of debt in Washington.
On the other side Democratic Rep. Peter Welch of the liberal Congressional Progressive Caucus sent out a letter to Democratic leaders signed by 114 House Democrats demanding that Congress pass a debt-limit bill without any spending reforms at all. Mr. Cantor should today abandon his dangerous plan to leverage Americas duty to pay its bills to achieve a partisan advantage in budget disputes Welch wrote.
Given all the maneuvering you might think a debt-limit showdown is coming soon. Its not. Lawmakers who are currently enjoying a two-week Easter recess have plenty of time before they are required to act.
Two weeks ago Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner sent a letter to congressional leaders with his best estimate of when the United States will actually hit the $14.3 trillion limit on its borrowing ability. It will happen in mid-May Geithner told Congress but the Treasury Department can take certain extraordinary measures to put the deadline off a little longer. Geithner said there will be no headroom to borrow left by July 8.
Maybe Geithner was trying to prod lawmakers to act quickly but when Hill politicos read that they immediately thought: We have loads of time. It doesnt hafta hafta be done until July 8 says one GOP Senate source. Weve got all of May and all of June. Remember the last crisis averting a government shutdown was literally settled at the 11th hour on the day the government was to have closed.
Thats why Geithner took to the talk shows on Sunday to argue that there cant be shutdown-style brinksmanship this time. If you take it too close to the edge then people will start to wonder really what are we doing what are we thinking Geithner told ABC.
The treasury secretary is unlikely to get his wish. Both sides are so far apart and feel they have so much time that its impossible to imagine the issue being resolved before the end of June or maybe early July. Especially not with Speaker John Boehner telling President Obama that the White House can forget about getting a so-called clean bill that is one that raises the ceiling without other measures to control spending. There will not be an increase in the debt limit without something really really big attached to it Boehner said at a fundraiser April 9.
But heres the problem for Republicans. They control the House of Representatives. The debt ceiling has to be raised -- Boehner has always conceded that -- and the party in power has to do it. Even as Boehner demands spending concessions as the price of raising the ceiling the White House knows that in the end he will have to pass a bill. Our bargaining power derives from our controlling the House but is also limited by it says a House GOP source.
In the Senate on the other hand minority Republicans will be free to oppose any debt ceiling bill that isnt to their liking because in the end it will be the Democrats responsibility to pass it. Protest-minded Republicans are heartened by Obamas recent admission that his own vote against raising the debt ceiling in 2006 was a political vote as opposed to doing what was important for the country.
People know there is hypocrisy coming out of the White House says the GOP Senate source. Someone who took a political vote and let the other party pass the debt ceiling bill -- well its a little difficult for him now to say you shouldnt do that.
The bottom line is the debt ceiling issue wont be settled before an extended game of chicken one in which Republicans will undoubtedly win some concessions but will in the end have to give in.
Byron York The Examiners chief political correspondent can be contacted at byork@washingtonexaminer.com. His column appears on Tuesday and Friday and his stories and blogposts appear on ExaminerPolitics.com.
