republicans are at it again....pushing the US economy towards the brink in an ill conceived plan that could only reap short term political gain.
essentially they're threatening to shut down the US govt and also default on the US debt because they don't like the health care law in the US.
one can only hope the adults in the GOP will eventually step in and put an end to this before it's too late.
a bit more background info:
Washington could be mere days away from a government shutdown – and a few weeks out from a catastrophic default on the national debt.But the reality of this looming fiscal crisis has many Americans wondering how we ever got ourselves into this mess. And, more importantly, what Congress can do over the coming days to avoid it.
We take a look at some of the questions that lawmakers are dealing with – and the possible answers.
What do Congress and the president need to do to meet these deadlines?First, Congress must pass a spending bill, called a continuing resolution or “CR,” which would continue spending after Sept. 30, the end of the 2013 fiscal year.
Republican House Speaker John Boehner speaks to the media Thursday, saying that the House will pass a plan that defunds the Affordable Care Act and addresses the budget.
If, as expected, the Senate rejects a House-passed CR that defunds Obamacare, then Speaker John Boehner might be forced to consider a “clean” CR with no provisions attached.
If he and Majority Leader Eric Cantor can’t find enough votes among their own members to pass a clean CR, they may seek Democratic votes to pass a measure which doesn’t include a “defund Obamacare” provision.
Obama and his spokesmen have repeatedly said he would not accept any resolution that would delay or defund Obamacare.
What happens if Congress doesn’t pass a spending bill?There would be a funding shortfall and the executive branch would begin a partial shutdown of federal operations.
Some workers would be furloughed and some agencies would suspend their functions.more info found in the link below:
What’s the debt limit and when is the deadline for that?Separate from the spending bill impasse is the fight over the debt limit. As it stands now, the government’s legal authority to borrow more money runs out in mid-October.
The congressionally mandated limit on federal borrowing is currently set at $16.7 trillion. The debt limit has been raised 13 times since 2001 and has grown from about 55 percent of Gross Domestic Product in 2001 to 102 percent of GDP last year.
What would happen if the debt limit were reached?At that point, the Treasury “would be left to fund the government with only the cash we have on hand on any given day,” said Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew.
Money from tax payments would still be coming in to the Treasury, but it would not be enough to pay each day’s bills. While some bills to vendors and others could be paid, they’d be paid late.
Investors holding Treasury securities might not get prompt re-payment of their principal when their bonds matured. That in turn could cause a downgrading of U.S. Treasury securities by bonds rating agencies.
Senator Dick Durbin, D-Ill., speaks on the Senate floor Thursday, explaining his view of the debt ceiling and the upcoming budget deadline.
According to the Bipartisan Policy Center, if that date arrived on October 18, the Treasury “would be about $106 billion short of paying all bills owed between October 18 and November 15 … .”
It estimated that about a third of the funds owed for the period would go unpaid.
Shutdowns and debt limits: Making sense of the fiscal deadlines ahead - NBC Politics