A Surreal THEN and NOW

But we'll do them in reverse order - see the NOW above.

Except here was Obama from back in 2006 while serving in Congress:

Five years ago, then-Sen. Obama (D-Ill.) voted against raising the debt ceiling and even spoke about it on the Senate floor before the Republican-controlled Senate voted 52-48 to increase it.


"The fact that we are here today to debate raising America's debt limit is a sign of leadership failure," Obama said on March 16, 2006. "Leadership means that ‘the buck stops here.’ Instead, Washington is shifting the burden of bad choices today onto the backs of our children and grandchildren. America has a debt problem and a failure of leadership. Americans deserve better. I therefore intend to oppose the effort to increase America's debt limit."

Hah!

You know at least Barney Frank dissembles his rank hypocrisy...

Lest any of y'all forget - raising the debt ceiling is nothing more than a euphemism for *printing more money*.

And it should be noted that many of the (majority) Republicans who voted to raise it back then, if they've also changed their tune principles....they too would fall into the self-serving hypocrite category.

Of course these politicians are, across-the-board, economically illiterate.

But they all seemingly agree that *printing money* is good for nearsighted incumbents.

Now I don't necessarily agree with that hypothesis.

Make no mistake, both parties are trying to figure out how to manipulate the stock, bond, and commodity markets (dumping from the Strategic Preserve this month?) in furtherance of their interests in next November's election.

I personally think that it would be a tactical mistake to try to prop up everything for the next 1.5 years. If I were Obama I'd want a crash now or early this fall so that the money pump would have time to generate a faux recovery leading into the election.