Senate Democrats Promise To Cause Default Rather Than Cutting Spending

The Democrats have sent a letter to House Speaker John Boehner warning the House not to bother passing a debt-ceiling bill that doesn't push our financial problems past the next election, because they won't support it. Despite the panic-mongering of the President, and the rest of the Democrats, about the economic catastrophe on our doorstep, if they don't get what they want (increased taxes and this issue pushed past the 2012 elections) they're going to go ahead and push the nuclear button. They say.

I've taken the liberty of correcting the letter, a little bit...

Senate Democrats Promise to Reject Boehner Plan

Dear Speaker Boehner,

With five days until our nation faces an unprecedented financial crisis [largely of our own making], we need to work together to ensure that our nation does not default on our obligations for the first time in our history [witness us fighting against fiscal sanity during an election campaign]. We heard that in your caucus you said the Senate will support your bill. We are writing to tell you that we will not support it, and give you the reasons why.

A short-term extension like the one in your bill would put America [Democratic politicians] at risk [of having this discussion again before the election], along with every family and business in it. Your approach would force us once again to face the threat of default [consequences of our profligate spending] in five or six short months. Every day, another expert warns us that your short-term approach [our failure to control spending] could be nearly as disastrous as a default [that we're threatening to force if you don't raise taxes] and would lead to a downgrade in our credit rating. If our credit is downgraded, it would cost us billions of dollars more in interest payments on our existing debt and drive up our deficit. Even more worrisome, a downgrade would [cost us the Senate and the White House in 2012 and] spike interest rates, making everything from mortgages, car loans and credit cards more expensive for families and businesses nationwide. [Despite those catastrophic results, we'll go ahead and cause this anyway if we don't get the taxes we want and a ceiling high enough to last past the next election.]

In addition to risking [Despite the bill preventing] a downgrade and catastrophic default, we are concerned that in five or six months, the House will once again hold the economy captive [attempt to deal with the budget problems] and refuse to avoid another default unless we accept unbalanced, deep cuts [meaningful and rational restructuring] to programs like Medicare and Social Security, without asking anything of the wealthiest [(which, under our definitions, means pretty much anyone with a job)] Americans [other than that they continue funding the whole thing as they're already doing].

We now have only five days left to act [but if we don't get our way, we'll force the default]. The entire world is watching Congress. We need to do the right [politically expedient] thing to solve this problem [avoid debating this again in an election year]. We must work together to avoid a default [cutting spending] the responsible way – not in a way that will do America more harm than good [by limiting our ability to use tax dollars to buy votes from our interest groups].