Here are some of the topics that have caught my attention as I’ve been browsing the internet:
1. I listen to Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.’s I Have a Dream speech from the August 28, 1963, March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom on this holiday celebrating his birthday and legacy. Click here for National Public Radio’s website, which has the entire audio and a transcript. The Majority Report also has its annual compilation of King’s speeches, including a previously unheard address about reparations, white economic anxiety, and guaranteed income.
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2. We need to talk about the national debt limit. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen notified Congress that the U.S. would reach the limit on Thursday, January 19, requiring extraordinary measures to avoid a debt default. But at some point early this summer, even those will not be enough.
The national debt limit represents the cap on the amount of money the federal government can borrow. Raising the national debt limit only authorizes the Treasury to issue the debt needed to fund the spending and revenues on which Congress and the President previously agreed. It’s about paying the bills already due, not about future spending.
The House Republican majority has declared that it plans to use the need to increase the national debt ceiling to extract concessions from President Biden and the Democratic majority in the Senate. The Washington Post reported that the House GOP has a plan to direct the Treasury to prioritize certain payments once the U.S. reaches the national debt ceiling. “The plan, which was previously unreported, was part of the private deal reached this month to resolve the standoff between House conservatives and Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) over the election of a House speaker. Rep. Chip Roy (R-Tex.), a leading conservative who helped broker the deal, told The Washington Post that McCarthy agreed to pass a payment prioritization plan by the end of the first quarter of the year.”
Oh great.
The U.S. defaulting on the national debt would have terrible consequences for the national and world economies. In 2011, as this New York Times story explains, we learned that just approaching a national debt limit breach negatively impacts the economy and individual finances.
So avoiding a breach of the debt limit is vital.
Do President Biden and Congressional Democrats have any choice but to agree to significant budget cuts—including to programs like Social Security and Medicare—to prevent that outcome?
I hope the Democratic leadership is examining several alternatives outlined by economists and Constitutional experts. Here are some, in the order of my preference:
a. Declare that the national debt limit is unconstitutional. Many people point to Section 4 of the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, “The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned.” This point is important, but I agree with Thomas Geoghegan’s argument that this language in the 14th Amendment confirms the 1787 Constitution’s prohibition on Congress from using its powers to default on the national debt. Geoghegan explains, ”Were Congress to use its power to willfully trigger a debt ceiling default, it would be no ordinary constitutional violation. It would be a repudiation of the Constitution in a much more fundamental way, a betrayal of the very purpose of leaving the Articles of Confederation—which did not grant borrowing powers to Congress—behind; that is to say, it rebukes the very thing that gives our Constitution its legitimacy. From the perspective of Hamilton in Federalist 30, it would be tantamount to terminating the Constitution itself.”
b. Biden declaring ignoring the debt ceiling to be the ”least unconstitutional” option as he works to meet his Constitutional requirement to faithfully execute the laws Congress passes. Vox’s Dylan Matthews explains the argument made by University of Florida law professor Neil Buchanan and Cornell law professor Michael Dorf: “Buchanan and Dorf note that Congress, by setting spending and tax policy as well as a debt limit, has given the president three mandates: to spend the amount Congress authorizes, to tax the amount Congress authorizes, and to issue as much debt as Congress authorizes. When the debt ceiling is breached, it becomes impossible for the president to obey all three of these legal requirements.”
c. Mint the trillion dollar coin. A 1997 law gives the U.S. Mint the power to mint platinum coins of any denomination. Congress created the law so the Mint could make money from coin collectors, but there are no upper limits in the law for how much any coin can be worth. In a different Vox article from the one I mentioned above, Dylan Matthews explains the idea and discusses it with attorney Carlos Mucha, who first proposed it on an internet discussion board in 2010 as one of the first debt ceiling battles was coming into focus. As Matthews writes, “Instead of issuing new debt and running afoul of the debt ceiling, the Treasury secretary could simply fund the government by minting platinum coins. In 2013, even former US Mint Director Philip Diehl agreed it would work, and over the years, influential voices like financial journalist Joe Weisenthal and New York Times columnist Paul Krugman have also promoted the idea.
But all these people did not simply stumble upon this law. It was brought to their attention by Beowulf, a blog commenter and “reply guy” better known as Atlanta-area attorney Carlos Mucha.”
There should be a robust debate about how much the federal government taxes and spends. But that’s why we have a budget and appropriations process. Minting the coin would be better than seeing the U.S. default on its debt. But I’d rather see the debt limit—and its potentially horrible impact on the national and world economy—eliminated from the conversation.
3. The American Prospect’s David Dayen argues that regulators, led by the Security and Exchange Commission’s Larry Gensler, prevented a broader economic calamity from the recent cryptocurrency meltdowns by shielding the primary financial system from crypto.
4. Beautiful Public Data’s Jon Keegan writes about how the Federal Highway Administration’s (FHWA) Manual on Uniform Traffic Control works to help to make our roads safer. He writes, “Driving across America today, you will encounter a dizzying variety of cultures, landscapes, people and animals. But the one consistent thing that will stay the same from Maine to California are the signs you pass on the highway. And that is because America’s roads and highways have a big, fat style guide.”
Government entities do a great deal of work behind the scenes. It is vital that we properly acknowledge how much these regulations make our lives safer and better.
5. The Daily Beast’s Marcel Plichta reviews all of the high-tech Western military weapons that Ukraine is about to receive to help with its defense against Russia’s invasion.
6. I remember when the media ran many, many stories about the price of gasoline before the election. Esquire’s Jack Holmes has noticed how gasoline isn’t a story now that prices have dropped after the midterm elections
7. Pepsi is replacing Sierra Mist with a new lemon-lime soda called Starry. It’ll be another attempt to take some market share away from Coca-Cola’s Sprite. According to Insider’s Bethany Biron, “In 2021, Sprite raked in $6 billion in sales and carried 8.3% of the overall market, according to Statista data. By comparison, Sierra Mist comprised less than a tenth of 1% of market share, according to Beverage Digest data provided to CNN, which first reported on the launch of Starry.”
8. I.News soccer writer Daniel Storey profiles the community behind the Wrexham soccer team that actors Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney purchased a couple of years ago. (The purchase and their first year of ownership is also the focus of the outstanding FX documentary Welcome to Wrexham.) Storey goes into the history of the city, the team, and how Reynolds and McElhenney’s efforts have brought a sense of hope to a group of people who haven’t had much to cheer the past decade or two.
9. One can’t emphasize enough that Robert E. Lee was a traitor to the United States.
There were 8 full bird Colonels from Virginia in the United States Army in 1860.
6 did not commit treason.
1 resigned, took a commission in the Virginia Militia, then resigned that when Virginia provided the militia to the Confederate Army.
The other was Robert E. Lee.
— Dagger John 🇺🇸🇺🇦 (@theSloopJohnM) 5:31 PM ∙ Jan 14, 2023
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