They believe in smaller government. What better way to make it smaller than to blow it all up? They believe in lower taxes, but only for corporations and the rich. That's not populism, it's plutocracy. They believe government is the antithesis of business, that is creates no wealth, jobs, or value, yet it must be run like a business, dedicated to profit and directly measurable quarterly returns instead of serving the public good. Businesses are also allowed to fail and go bankrupt (unless you're Wall Street and can grovel for a government bailout) but the government cannot go bankrupt without an unprecedented enormous social disaster, and there's no one but us taxpayers to bail it out. Maybe if we throw enough immigrant maids at the IMF they will spare us a few shekels.
Fooled with politricks into signing nonbinding antitax "pledges" by right wing anti-government groups like Grover Norquist's Americans for Tax Reform, (seriously, Grover, you expect a POLITICIAN to keep his WORD?!) these political kidnappers are threatening to shoot the hostage (while claiming Americans voted for it!) in the hopes that they will look pleasing to their corporatist masters, who will shower them with semi-legal campaign contributions and lucrative private-sector jobs while the real citizens of this country go destitute.
This moment in history is America's fall from grace. It is fitting that this great Nation collapses while trapped fighting an unwinnable decade-long quagmire in Afghanistan, that ancient Graveyard of Empires from Alexander the Great to Ghengis Khan to the Soviet Union. However, we were not done in through military defeat or global thermonuclear war, but by Congressional malfeasance; obstinate hyperpartisan aversion to compromise and adherence to a bankrupt dogma with no basis in economic reality.
The government's debts are REAL and backed by the 14th Amendment to the Constitution. The "debt ceiling" is an imaginary bogeyman that the Tea Party has hauled out of the closet and sworn to defend, despite the dire consequences of mortal harm to the economy. All of us real citizens will be caught in the middle as collateral damage. The "recovery" is a hoax. We are in a Depression with huge long-term unemployment, zero job growth, and a stagnant GDP. Allowing the government to implode out of blind faith in a fairy tale will only worsen the situation. Just look at what's happening in Europe. The Tea Party sees Spain, Greece, Ireland, and Portugal, and says, "WE WANT THAT."
These Tea Party brigands have been offered a tremendous deal - huge spending cuts in exchange for merely closing corporate tax loopholes - but they spurn the notion of even the most minimal tax increases to curry favor with the wealthy corporate plutocrats, who demand to be worshiped as "job creators," sit on huge cash reserves, take in astronomical profits, and pay themselves appallingly opulent executive bonuses, yet can't be bothered to actually create any jobs.
It will be the real citizens of America - that massive segment of the disenfranchised population, the real majority referred to by the power elite on a spectrum of increasingly dehumanizing terms as "constituents," "voters," "taxpayers," and that most odiously degrading slur, "consumers" - who will bear the real brunt of this economic catastrophe. We are the beasts of burden that carry this country while the oligarchs wield the whip. We are the giant pool of money they draw from to amass their fortunes. We could demand so much more from our elected representatives if we weren't so damn busy just trying to stay alive.
Congress has given up trying to pass anything meaningful to solve the problem they created and have instead gone into damage control mode. GOP trying to blame Dems, House trying to blame Senate, all of them trying to blame Obama. They have no interest in saving the country, only in saving their own reputations, so that in their fantasy version of Post Arma-debt-on America, they can scoop up lobbyist positions, consulting jobs, and book deals while the proles like you and me stand in bread lines.
I see three possible outcomes after the USA defaults and the government goes belly-up:
- Obama says, "Fuck all y'all," and ignores the debt ceiling to save the country, citing the 14th Amendment. This royally pisses Congress off, and they embark on a lengthy, expensive, unpopular, and ultimately unsuccessful impeachment adventure against the President.
- Corporate John Galt-wannabes step into the power vacuum and enslave American citizens in the post-government neofeudal dystopia they've always dreamed of.
- Society as a whole collapses into roving blood cults that pillage a weakly connected collection of warring Bartertowns.
