The Uncomfortable Truth About the Republican Defeat

Senator Ted Cruz returned to Texas a hero while the senator from two states away, John McCain, called it an "agonizing odyssey ...one of the more shameful chapters that I have seen in the years that I have spent here in the Senate”. The split in the Republican Party has grown so wide that a Pew Research poll found that among all Republicans, 51% consider the Tea Party as “separate and independent” (table). So alarmed is the traditional branch of the party that the grapevine says Karl Rove plans to use his SuperPAC to help more moderate Republicans from being “primaried” by Tea Party challengers.

But there was a point that was not specifically made in the relief that greeted the end of the government shutdown and ending of the debt ceiling threat. A quick review:

Republicans in the House first went through the ritual of passing a bill
that would keep the government funded and raise the debt ceiling only in return for stripping all funding from Obamacare. That could not get past the Democratically controlled Senate. House Republicans would then have been satisfied if the “individual mandate” — the requirement that everyone above certain income thresholds obtain health insurance — be delayed for a year. That too was beyond consideration by the Senate and the President. It risked the loss of essential income from the young and healthy that insurers need to offset the cost of pre-existing condition applicants who are certain to apply for insurance and whom insurers must now accept.

With the government shut down, House Republicans then resorted to a flurry of small bills that would re-open national parks, the National Institutes of Health, etc. These, too, were rebuffed by a Senate that foresaw a government with only the elements that Conservatives like and which diminished pressure to end the stoppage.

Finally the Senate came up with a small proposal stripped of all of this. With all attempts by essentially the Tea Party to force their will exhausted, House Speaker John Boehner allowed a vote. The agreement funds the federal government through January 15 and lifts the debt limit through February 7. Everything about Obamacare had fallen away except for a requirement that the IRS certify incomes of those applying for subsidies to help them pay for health insurance. The exchange system already accesses the IRS to verify an applicant’s income claims, so nothing was gained.

The bill passed in the Senate 81 to 18 and in the House 285 to 144.

So what was the point that has yet to be made?

It is this: By voting ‘no’ to this bill, 162 members of Congress — all of them Republicans — voted for the United States to default on its debts for the first time in history and in violation of the Constitution’s 14th Amendment.

The warnings of consequences were dire. International Monetary Fund chief Christine Lagarde forecast that damage to world finances would send the world economy into a tailspin. It would “mean massive disruption the world over and we would be tipped again into massive rupture”.

Leaders at the World Bank said much the same.

Credit would again freeze up and there were widespread fears that the default would cause a reprieve of the Great Recession, erasing the gains of the arduously slow recovery.

After the last debt ceiling showdown, the world continued to place its money in U.S. treasuries, but the repeating cycle of dysfunction every time the economy bumps up against the ceiling will ultimately cause countries to invest elsewhere, with our government having to offer ascending interest rates to attract the money it needs to finance spending.

Long term, the worst of all would have been the threat to the dollar as the world’s reserve currency. The debt ceiling debacle had China and Russia resuming their talk of a “basket” of currencies to replace the dollar as the value in which almost all world trade is denominated. What a former president of France, Giscard d'Estaing, resentfully called the "exorbitant privilege" of owning the bedrock currency around which all others fluctuate. That is what the 'no' voters tampered with. China’s official state-run news agency called it “perhaps a good time for the befuddled world to start considering building a de-Americanized world”.

If you find the vote for default — and that is what it was, that is what would have happened — an irresponsible defamation of the United States, then you might want to make a note of whether your Congress member was on the ‘no’ roster. Here are the lists:

The first three listed are expected to run for the presidency. The rest are listed alphabetically:

Ted Cruz (Tex.), Marco Rubio (Fla.), Rand Paul (Ky.), Tom Coburn (Okla.), John Cornyn (Tex.), Mike Crapo (Idaho), Mike Enzi (Wyo.), Charles Grassley (Iowa), Dean Heller (Nev.), Ron Johnson (Wis.), Mike Lee (Utah), Jim Risch (Idaho), Pat Roberts (Kan.), Tim Scott (S.C.), Jeff Sessions (Ala.), Richard Shelby (Ala.), Pat Toomey (Pa.), David Vitter (La.).

Alphabetical by name and with state district:

Robert Aderholt          AL-4     Robert Latta             OH-5
Justin Amash             MI-3     Billy Long               MO-7
Mark Amodei              NV-2     Frank Lucas              OK-3
Michele Bachmann         MN-6     Blaine Luetkemeyer       MO-3
Andy Barr                KY-6     Cynthia Lummis           WY-1
Joe Barton               TX-6     Kenny Marchant           TX-24
Kerry Bentivolio         MI-11    Tom Marino               PA-10
Rob Bishop               UT-1     Thomas Massie            KY-4
Diane Black              TN-6     Michael McCaul           TX-10
Marsha Blackburn         TN-7     Tom McClintock           CA-4
Kevin Brady              TX-8     Mark Meadows             NC-11
Jim Bridenstine          OK-1     Luke Messer              IN-6
Mo Brooks                AL-5     John Mica                FL-7
Paul Broun               GA-10    Candice Miller           MI-10
Larry Bucshon            IN-8     Jeff Miller              FL-1
Michael Burgess          TX-26    Markwayne Mullin         OK-2
John Campbell            CA-45    Mick Mulvaney            SC-5
John Carter              TX-31    Randy Neugebauer         TX-19
Bill Cassidy             LA-6     Kristi Noem              SD-1
Steven Chabot            OH-1     Richard Nugent           FL-11
Jason Chaffetz           UT-3     Alan Nunnelee            MS-1
Chris Collins            NY-27    Pete Olson               TX-22
Doug Collins             GA-9     Steven Palazzo           MS-4
K. Michael Conaway       TX-11    Steve Pearce             NM-2
John Culberson           TX-7     Scott Perry              PA-4
Ron DeSantis             FL-6     Tom Petri                WI-6
Jeffrey Denham           CA-10    Joe Pitts                PA-16
Scott DesJarlais         TN-4     Ted Poe                  TX-2
Sean Duffy               WI-7     Mike Pompeo              KS-4
Jeffrey Duncan           SC-3     Bill Posey               FL-8
John Duncan Jr.          TN-2     Tom Price                GA-6
Renee Ellmers            NC-2     Trey Radel               FL-19
Blake Farenthold         TX-27    Tom Reed                 NY-23
Stephen Fincher          TN-8     Jim Renacci              OH-16
Chuck Fleischmann        TN-3     Tom Rice                 SC-7
John Fleming             LA-4     Martha Roby              AL-2
Bill Flores              TX-17    Phil Roe                 TN-1
J. Randy Forbes          VA-4     Mike Rogers              AL-3
Virginia Foxx            NC-5     Dana Rohrabacher         CA-48
Trent Franks             AZ-8     Todd Rokita              IN-4
Scott Garrett            NJ-5     Tom Rooney               FL-17
Bob Gibbs                OH-7     Dennis Ross              FL-15
Phil Gingrey             GA-11    Keith Rothfus            PA-12
Louie Gohmert            TX-1     Ed Royce                 CA-39
Robert Goodlatte         VA-6     Paul Ryan                WI-1
Paul Gosar               AZ-4     Matt Salmon              AZ-5
Trey Gowdy               SC-4     Mark Sanford             SC-1
Kay Granger              TX-12    Steve Scalise            LA-1
Sam Graves               MO-6     David Schweikert         AZ-6
Tom Graves               GA-14    Austin Scott             GA-8
Morgan Griffith          VA-9     F. James Sensenbrenner   WI-5
Ralph Hall               TX-4     Pete Sessions            TX-32
Andy Harris              MD-1     Jason Smith              MO-8
Vicky Hartzler           MO-4     Lamar Smith              TX-21
Jeb Hensarling           TX-5     Steve Southerland        FL-2
George Holding           NC-13    Chris Stewart            UT-2
Richard Hudson           NC-8     Steve Stockman           TX-36
Tim Huelskamp            KS-1     Marlin Stutzman          IN-3
Bill Huizenga            MI-2     William Thornberry       TX-13
Randy Hultgren           IL-14    Michael Turner           OH-10
Duncan D. Hunter         CA-50    Ann Wagner               MO-2
Robert Hurt              VA-5     Tim Walberg              MI-7
Bill Johnson             OH-6     Greg Walden              OR-2
Sam Johnson              TX-3     Jackie Walorski          IN-2
Walter B. Jones          NC-3     Randy Weber              TX-14
Jim Jordan               OH-4     Brad Wenstrup            OH-2
Steve King               IA-4     Lynn Westmoreland        GA-3
Jack Kingston            GA-1     Roger Williams           TX-25
Doug LaMalfa             CA-1     Joe Wilson               SC-2
Raul Labrador            ID-1     Rob Woodall              GA-7
Doug Lamborn             CO-5     Kevin Yoder              KS-3
James Lankford           OK-5     Ted Yoho                 FL-3