[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 157 (2011), Part 9]
[Senate]
[Page 12270]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                              DEBT CEILING

  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, the clock is ticking. In just a few 
days, the U.S. Government will no longer have the ability to borrow 
money to pay its bills--a situation the President and his advisers said 
would trigger an economic Armageddon.
  I was shocked last night when 53 Senate Democrats issued a letter 
saying they intend to vote against the only piece of legislation that 
has any chance of preventing all this from happening. Even more 
shocking is the fact that Democratic leaders and the President himself 
have endorsed every feature of this legislation except one, and that is 
the fact that it doesn't allow the President to avoid another national 
debate about spending and debt until after the next Presidential 
election. Every other feature of the House bill was essentially agreed 
to earlier except for one--the President wants to avoid having another 
discussion about deficit and debt before the election. This assurance 
is the only thing the President and Senate Democrats are holding out 
for right now.
  The Democrats can try to justify their opposition to the House bill 
any way they want. They can claim they are worried about a stalemate 6 
months from now. They can ignore the fact that of the 31 times Congress 
and the President have raised the debt limit over the past 25 years, 22 
of those debt limit increases lasted less than a year. President 
Reagan, in 1984, signed three bills in the course of his election year 
that raised the debt ceiling. It was not unusual. In fact, what is 
unusual is to ask for $2.7 trillion in debt limit increase. That is 
unusual. That is unprecedented.
  So what is worse, a default now or a potential default 6 months down 
the road? Because if those 53 Senate Democrats follow through on their 
threat to filibuster the House bill, that is what they will be doing--
ensuring default now rather than working with us to prevent it later. 
Why would you want to do that? The answer is, to make the President's 
reelection campaign a little bit easier.
  It is inconceivable to me that the President would actually follow 
through on this threat. After all, the President's first responsibility 
is to do what is best for the country, not his reelection campaign. The 
same goes for our friends on the other side of the aisle. It is 
inconceivable to me that they would actually block the only bill that 
would get through the House of Representatives and prevent a default 
right now. Inconceivable. It is inconceivable to me that they would do 
this for no other reason than to help the President avoid having 
another debate before the election about the need for Washington to get 
its fiscal house in order. But that is precisely what we may be headed 
for this weekend--guaranteed default or a bill that takes the specter 
of a default off the table, while giving us another opportunity to 
address the very deficits and debts that caused this crisis in the 
first place.
  Senate Democrats are playing with fire, and it is hard to conclude 
they are doing it for any other reason than politics. So I urge our 
friends on the other side of the aisle this morning to rethink their 
position and join Republicans in preventing default.

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