Forum Post: The Fourteenth Amendment

Despite what the Rs and faux noose claim, raising the debt ceiling spends no money at all. It tells the world that we will pay the bills PREVIOUSLY passed by congress.

President Obama should IMMEDIATELY invoke the 14th Amendment to hike the debt ceiling unilaterally to prevent a government default.

House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer & Nancy Pelosi agree. “It’s his power to do so,” Hoyer told MSNBC. “Very frankly, if it came down to his looking default in the eye or taking this action, as President Clinton said, better to take the action and find out later that perhaps he went beyond his authority but at least protected the credibility of the United States of America.”
“The Republicans, through their failure, have given you license to do whatever it takes to not let the American family go down into the abyss,” Rep. Xavier Becerra (Calif.), vice chairman of the House Democratic Caucus said.

The republiclans are looking forward to using the threat of a default and worldwide financial disaster to blackmail the President and the Senate into cutting Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security. This WORKED in August 2011!
The Rs, after gerrymandering districts, suppressing the vote, cheating with voting machines and telling endless lies – still could not resume their wealth transfer from the 99% to the 1% using normal political power.
So their primary weapon is blackmail.

Many observers of the debt-limit debate have said the 14th Amendment which states that the

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“the validity of the public debt … shall not be questioned”

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empowers the president to raise the debt ceiling without ANY congressional input.