Thanks, teahadists:
Stocks were weighed down again on Wednesday by worries that the United States could default on its debt or see its credit rating cut as lawmakers in the world’s largest economy appeared no nearer to an agreement on raising the borrowing limit.
In morning trading, the Dow Jones industrial average shed 140.47 points, or 1.12 percent, to 12,360.83. The broader Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index lost 20.27 points, or 1.52 percent, to 1,311.67, and the technology-stock-heavy Nasdaq composite index lost 62.47 points, or 2.20 percent, to 2,777.49.
The United States has one week to reach a deal to increase its $14.3 trillion debt limit or face not being able to pay all of its bills.
Republican leaders had promised a vote on Wednesday in the House of Representatives on a plan to increase the debt limit and avoid America’s first-ever default. But the vote was put off until at least Thursday.
Though most investors think a last-minute deal to raise the debt limit will eventually emerge, the difficulty of reaching an agreement may leave a lasting impression on investor sentiment, some traders fear. That was evident in the price of gold, widely used as a haven investment; it reached a nominal record high above $1,625 an ounce on Wednesday.
At this point, I think most in the market incorrectly believe there will be a deal. They simply still do not understand how insane the people they put in office are. The closer we get to the default, the more excited these clowns will get- you saw their barely concealed erections after watching The Town last night. They like this. They think of themselves as revolutionaries. This is “their moment!” This is their time! This notion that some serious people can reel in the crazy is farcical. These guys think of themselves as the vanguard of the proletariat. You’ll see! When the default happens, no matter what happens, they will think of it as a win. Out of chaos and disruption can come the pure conservatism, the real conservatism, the true conservatism that Rush Limbaugh and Jim DeMint and Grover Norquist have been promising them. And when it all comes crashing down, well, they will just claim that Obama and the Democrats and some intransigent Senate Republicans didn’t let them be pure enough.
For fuck’s sake, read this stuff.
sapient
Can’t read it. Sorry, just can’t do it.
BGinCHI
Link to redstate??
I’m not getting out of the boat.
Unabogie
I thought you read it so I don’t have to?
Do your job, Blog Boy!
shortstop
I can’t do it either.
apostropher
Yeah, no thanks.
Culture of Truth
Speaker John Boehner has canceled a House vote on the GOP plan.
“The decision to move the vote to Thursday or beyond came after the CBO reported late Tuesday night that the package Boehner crafted would only reduce deficits by $850 billion, $150 billion short of the speaker’s goal of $ 1 trillion in budget and spending cuts.”
ruemara
The title of your link warned me not to go. I don’t care anymore. We default, lose an A, Obama whips out his Constitutional runaround, we move on to the next manufactured crisis, rinse repeat until the election and we’ll see based on the voting if Americans have learned a goddamned thing.
Steve in Iowa
As we read the market tea leaves I for one want to point out the report that came out a few weeks ago that Cantor owns securities that short US Bonds. It’s not that big of a position (somewhere on the order of $15-20,000) but I think it definitively answers the question stupid or evil and tilts it in the evil direction.
arguingwithsignposts
I got out of the boat:
Erick son of Erick considers himself some sort of Gen. Patton of the 101st Chairbourne.
ETA: Apparently, the teahadists have lost Bill Kristol. We are so fucked.
General Stuck
Spot on dissection of the teahadist mentality. senor Cole.
catclub
“These guys think of themselves as the vanguard of the proletariat.”
Galtitariet – kinda like gauleiter but with newer uniforms.
j low
Ugh. You just sent me to redstate. Jerk.
Derf
Yawwwnnnn…..
Give it a rest Captain Doom John Galt Cole. You will be proven wrong on this like everything else you spew about.
You are too dumb to realize you are doing EXACTLY…exactly what the right wing manipulators want you to do. It’s called divide and conquer. Disenfranchise people from the process and they win!
Poopyman
Me neither. Unless it’s seriously out of character for RedState (which I’m sure it is not), I have no desire or stomach for their shit.
Yevgraf
The letter back from my teatard. Is anybody else getting this templated, Koch written piece?
America, fuck yeah. The microeconomics of kitchen tables and small businesses are how you run the macro of a large national economy.
For those “household budget” screamers, what happens to everybody else in the household when daddy gambles the weekly paycheck, then uses any occasional winnings to buy Rolex watches, sports cars and lots of guns to go antagonize the neighbors with?
Samara Morgan
I think teabaggers pisses them off more than teahadists.
Jewish Steel
From the comments:
Eh? Nice, huh?
Keep the pressure up, you loons!
Culture of Truth
The other reason they want default is that they believe it will force Obama to make budget cuts, when we run out of money, making simultaenously do their work for them while getting all the blame for doing it. While they strut around bragging that they protected Medicare and Veterans from Obama’s cuts.
Poopyman
By the way, as of 11;28 the DOW was down “only” 90 points. People can make up whatever fantasy they want as to why the market does what it does, but in the end it’s just a collection of irrational cattle, spooked by whatever the boogieman of the moment is. Yeah, the debt ceiling is a real (though manufactured) crisis, but this ain’t the market plunge that that will trigger.
Martin
Well, only some of them. I’m sure that business leaders are talking to lots of Republicans in the House and getting sensible answers, because it’s really on the Tea Party causing all of these problems. The rest of the rank-and-file Republicans (half or a bit more) are desperate to just raise the debt limit and knock this shit off, but politically they know they’re going to come out HUGE losers after ramping this shit up to 11 for no reason and then having to ask the Dems to bail them out. But ultimately those Republicans are going to cave. The teatards aren’t, and the teatards are more than happy to burn the place down, because we can pay our bills with Jesus dollars or whatever batshit insane thing they believe.
Culture of Truth
NUTS
Well, that is one downside when your base is crazy people.
Eventually you learn that while they may be your nuts, they are still insane.
Han's Big Snark Solo
I spent a great deal of time thinking of the proper response to Eric son of Erik and the bugass crazy teabagger freaks. I wrote it all down, spell checked it, proofread it, it was good. But it wasn’t up to the task. So instead, let me pass on this link to the baggers. Go, read, do what it says, and the world will be a better place.
http://www.amishrakefight.org/gfy/
Judge Crater
You’re right. This “deficit crisis” has all the elements of the millennialist rapture. The 27 percenters can’t wait for Washington bureaucrats to be driven from their posh government cubicles from whence they tyrannize the good people of America.
Default will be cleansing – socialism, liberalism, collectivism will be consumed by the flames god’s righteous wrath.
Or something like that.
Ivan Ivanovich Renko
Jesus, Mary and Joseph. Mark links to that fetid fever-swamp more clearly, will ya?
kthxbai
dr. bloor
It’s a negligible position, and anyone who isn’t holding something similar right now (and on an ongoing basis) needs another money manager or self-help guide.
Not that Cantor isn’t evil, though. He most certainly is.
JGabriel
John Cole @ Top:
This happens every time Erik fantasizes about hobbits and reads The Very Secret Diaries.
.
Samara Morgan
this is the last demographic chance for teabaggers to capture the WH and they know it.
white (non-hispanic caucs) voters are a declining electoral demographic. In 1970–90%, in 2008–72%.
And a third of NHC’s vote democratic.
By 2020 conservatives won’t be able to get over 49% of the electorate anymore.
Hawes
Jesus, Cole, howsabout a warning for that link?
I have to clean my hard drive, now.
gene108
Wall Street/Hedgefund managers, et.al. plowed a $100 million or more of their own money into defeating Dems because of Fin Reg, in 2010.
I wonder how they like the Republicans they helped to elect now?
Martin
@Yevgraf: I like the flat-out lie in the first content sentence:
Uh, no. We hit the debt ceiling on May 16. We’re out of fucking money on August 2. You guys have been busy jerking off for the last 2 months rather than:
Assholes.
Han's Big Snark Solo
That is exactly what they say about the Bush years, isn’t it? Historically precedent says you are correct.
Yevgraf
Being a violent wingnut Christian is easy – Jesus fixes all your fuckups and violence directed at your victims in the afterlife, and soothes them over the misery you inflicted on them in this one.
That filthy deathcult gives them the excuse to act the way they do.
DBrown
Ugh, my eyes … that link was to redstate and no warning! That is evil!
Bulworth
I always let my cursor hover over the linked part to make sure I don’t end up at RedState or some other destination my psychiatric team has asked me not to visit, out of concern for my emotional and intellectual well-being.
Face
If? Really? They used “if”? Damn, the delusion is thick.
A Mom Anon
I think they want chaos because it’s easier to steal and pillage when everyone is freaked out and scared.
I really loathe these fuckers. If they hate this country so much,and hate Americans even more,then why don’t they get the hell out?
Dennis SGMM
The loonies believe that once chaos ensues they’ll be greeted as liberators by a tearfully grateful America. We’ll realize that They Were Right All Along and shower them with acclaim, rose petals and candy.
The Moar You Know
I have to admit, this is certainly one way to wring the excess valuation out of the stock market (it’s been the world’s biggest bubble for a few decades now).
But damn, this is not how I would go about it. Kind of like burning down your house to get rid of termites.
jwb
We should take bets on how many points the DOW has to shed before our Galtian overlords recognize they are going to have to start kneecapping the teatards. The real question is whether overlords actually have it in them to do what needs to be done. I’m betting not and am back to praying Obama has put together a well thought through contingency plan when the increase of the debt ceiling fails to pass.
Han's Big Snark Solo
@Hawes:
No doubt! Last week one of the BJ posters referenced “Crush Porn” which was a new one by me; so I went and looked it up. It was far less troubling than Red State and Eric son of Eric. I’m a tad worried that having clicked on the link above that my computer might stop doing calculations correctly. Republican math has nothing in common with regular math. Is Microsoft immune to cyber stupidity?
Citizen Alan
People keep saying this. How long was South Africa able to keep it’s white Christians on top?
Amir_Khalid
@John Cole:
When I saw the post headline, I found myself thinking about the Orange One’s man-boobs.
I am not allowed alcoholic brain-bleach. I hate you.
eric
re Jewish Steel…they dont even realize that it already failed and cannot succeed because of the 2/3 requirement for consitutional amendment.
monkey scribes all of them
Yutsano
@Samara Morgan: Damn. She just can’t quit us can she. O HAI M-C!!
Scott
They do this stuff because the world didn’t end in 2000. The GOP has decided that if they can kill America, they can get Jesus to come and end the world. Then they don’t have to worry about their victims getting past the front gates and burning their homes to the ground.
jwb
arguingwithsignposts: What did Bill Kristol say? He’s always wrong, so now I’m very fearful.
Kirk Spencer
To be blunt, the markets (bond and stock) aren’t my biggest concern. Not that I don’t think they matter, it’s just I’ve a larger one.
Credit Default Swaps. There’s a whole cascade of failure waiting to happen.
Do a little reading about how people were worried about the effect of Greece on CDSs. Sure, I’d love to see a bunch of banks get theirs, but I don’t really want to see total failure of 80% of the banks (by monetary value) in the world.
Yevgraf
In 1932 to 1935, the average, run of the mill conservative German “went along with” the Nazi destruction of Weimar and liberal German society because they didn’t like leftist concepts, and thought they could control their tards. As a plus, is was easy to go along to get along while the tards went after Jews and the DFHs of the 30s.
Look how that turned out…
GregB
Erickson telling the nutters to “hold the line”.
Although he thinks he’s Eisenhower or Schwartzkoff he’s actually Lt. General Pickett.
Yevgraf
A mental exercise – before the raters started jacking with Greek interest rates, did Greece miss a bond payment? No? Then why the catastrophic rate hikes?
shortstop
They don’t really hate America. They think they own it and we’re not part of it. That is, the non-wealthy, easily led GOP foot soldiers hate everyone in it other than themselves. They are more than happy to offer up that hatred as a means for the tiny plutocracy, which feels total indifference toward both us and said foot soldiers, to finish looting the place.
shortstop
I’ll ask you the same question you asked Corner Stone, and for which you got no answer: What needs to be done? What exactly will the “overlords” do to convert the teatards? How precisely will this be accomplished?
Davis X. Machina
@Poopyman: How much of that trading is now computers chasing each others’ high-frequency tails at this point?
Yevgraf
I’d argue that medical compensation to physicians, facilities and allied health are.
When the economy crashes, Grover Norquist is bragging under a viaduct about how free everyone is (while roasting a dead child over a guttering blaze of EE bonds and stock share certificates) and docs are drafted into the unpaid service of warlords to treat thugs for sucking chest injuries, that bubble can pop.
Only then can our uniformly teatard national medical corps realize the extent of Galtian freedom they reached in their staunch opposition to health care reform.
Halteclere
How many teabaggers have followed Glenn Beck’s advice to put all of their savings in Gold, and are seeing these tactics as a means of profit, and of a validation that “they were right” about the upcoming collapse, when in reality they are temporarily creating a self-fulfilling prophesy?
I really cannot wait until this gold bubble bursts and all those wingnuts at least feel some ramification of the problems they have inflicted on everyone else.
The Moar You Know
So wrong you are. The day the GOP stops using Hispanics as a punching bag is the day the GOP gets the permanent majority they’ve been bleating about for so long.
Admittedly, that may not happen and they may simply go the way of the Whigs. But a “conservative” party of some sort would take their place, and Hispanics are a very natural fit for such a party.
PeakVT
@Yevgraf: Because the market for Greek sovereign debt is small enough that a few speculators can move it? /cynical
Actually, unlike the US, Greece really does have solvency problem. If it fixed its tax collection system and the ECB allowed more inflation, it might be able to muddle through, painfully. But neither policy change is likely.
Judas Escargot
@Poopyman:
FTFY.
Doesn’t undermine your point at all… just noting that “the Market” (may peace be upon it) is even less connected to ordinary people than it was just 10-15 years ago.
catclub
Moar @ 37 “Kind of like burning down your house to get rid of termites.”
s/termites/children/
Cassidy
I keep saying it, they really want their civil war. West probably jerks off at night thinking about leading a grand conservative army. If violence is not a taboo, it is only a matter of time. I think we are on the slow and inevitable march in that direction.
Martin
They won’t do that. African Americans are no less conservative than Latinos, and the GOP has gotten worse, not better on that front in the last decade. They can’t quit that habit.
Ash Can
Ah, for the good old days when the criminally insane were identified, and treated, as such.
Yevgraf
He’ll wind up shining the shoes of some fat, never served blogger who calls himself “Gen’ral”. Cain’t have no nigruhs in the New White People’s Army.
catclub
Yevgraf @ 15 “household budgets”
How many families have their own currency and pay their debts in said currency?
How many families have millions of investors lined up to loan them money for ten or more years at negative real interest rates, with NO security?
How many families have the most powerful aremd forces in the world?
Not to mention, How many families borrow to pay for necessities or invest in profitable future prospect?
arguingwithsignposts
Meanwhile, in Europe, the rabble aren’t too happy about all this austerity business.
catclub
Haltclere @ 55 “I really cannot wait until this gold bubble bursts and all those wingnuts at least feel some ramification of the problems they have inflicted on everyone else.”
The market can stay crazy longer than you can stay solvent.
Poopyman
@Davis: (and Judas)
Fair point. Why surely, the MOTUs paid all those big bucks so the algorithms would take into account where trades originated, wouldn’t they? Smart folks could easily foresee an endless loop of competing computers pingponging trades as the prices plummet, and the MOTUs are the brightest guys in the room. They told me so.
Still, when actual people decide to pull their cash out of all of those 401ks, the fund managers are going to have to sell off their positions. And as more sell off, more people will get panicked. That’s when the fun begins.
The Moar You Know
The last gold bubble burst in 1980 as I recall. The equivalent in today’s dollars would have been about $2200/oz. We’ve got a bit of a way to go yet, but not too much longer.
Price of production for an ounce of gold is still the same – about $300-$400 per ounce.
cat48
I’m enjoying watching Schumer. He started out STERN earlier today. The presser they gave a few minutes ago he was semishrill. He insulted them every chance he got! Can’t wait to see him next. They WILL give him a Ceiling Bill thru early 2013!!
ed drone
@ # 40
Actually, the Republicans bought up all the first-generation Pentium chips they could get, back in the day, and base their monetary strategies on machines using those and Magic 8-balls.
Ed
licensed to kill time
@Bulworth:
Bulworth is right, folks. Hover and check! is my motto.
Stogz
Jeez. They really do talk like that, huh? Fuck a duck. Not only do they like to dress up but they actually alter the manner in which they speak in order to capture that mid-18th century vibe. Gotta admire their moxie. I’d be embarrassed as hell if anybody heard me speak like this, but hey, whatev.
And ye the harshest judgement brought by God shall be on to those puerile savages with balls on their eyes.
Ocularum scrotum tyranum!!!
gocart mozart
From the comments/ Poe or no poe
El Cid
Generations of militia types thought that the way to take down the Fedrul Gubmit was to train for armed resistance and on occasion take violent acts to try & provoke a government over-reaction (“martial law”).
Little did they realize that all they had to do was spend decades convincing the political establishment that it was time to get government out of all this free market banking and financial sector, and then scream about the deficit and debt when the predictable (and predicted) collapse came about.
Also, little did they know that the majority of the center and press would go along with that debt panic.
Linda Featheringill
True enough. But what would likely arise would not be what we used to call conservatism. It would probably be tyranny of the oligarchs, by whatever name and with emphasis on the tyranny.
Limbaugh and DeMint and Norquist probably know this.
Linda Featheringill
And in passing, I don’t see a deal coming either. On the other hand, I’ve been wrong frequently in the past. It would be good to be wrong this time.
Ash Can
@gocart mozart: I’d really, really like to believe that’s spoof/snark. Really. Because it’s way too damned early to start drinking, and I have way too damned much still to do today.
Corner Stone
@shortstop:
I’ve answered that question time and again.
The finance Republicans are not all susceptible to being primaried out by the TP nutters. They haven’t been given a plan to vote for because Boehner knows he’s finished either way this situation turns out. Boehner’s working every thing he has until the fuse burns down.
Samara Morgan
@Cit Alan
wont work here, nigg*rs and spics already got the vote, an we have a BLACK PREZNIT.
2008 was the first year that white kids became a minority in children under five.
in 2021 those kids become voters, and every year after that there are more of them and less bluehairs.
NHC christians are the entire base of the GOP at this point. And that demographic is in freefall.
game ovah.
Ben Cisco
@ruemara:
Yeah, pretty much this.
TG Chicago
At the RedState link Erickson says that they must “hold the line”.
What is the line they are holding? Is it “Cut, Cap, and Balance”?
I just want to understand where they’re coming from. If I understand correctly, their preferences in order are:
1) CCB is passed into law
2) the US government is downgraded and defaults
3) anything else
Is that right?
Samara Morgan
@Cassidy, Cisco
i think if the teabaggers fail at crashing the economy, they will try to start a war between Israel and Iran in september when the NATO vote happens so the US will get drawn into it.
it will happen in september because Iraq is kicking the US out in december, and the teabaggers want to use the airbases there to bomb Iran before we are forced to give them up.
fasteddie9318
Does Erick Erickson spend literally every day of his life acting out some kind of war porn fantasy via his computer?
kay
It doesn’t really matter what the overlords do to convert the teatards (which I think will happen, by the way). Harry Reid just said not a single Democratic Senator will vote for Boehner’s bill.
So it just goes back to the House as Reid’s bill, and then Boehner has to accept Democratic votes + non-teatard Republican votes to pass Reid’s bill or destroy the country.
Harry Reid is (in effect) controlling both the House and Senate as soon as Boehner’s bill passes (or doesn’t pass), because Reid (through Pelosi) can deliver Democratic votes in the House, but Boehner can’t deliver Democratic votes in the Senate.
Rick Taylor
#83 fasteddie9318
__
Sometimes he calls on his troops to send odd object to congress people. Recently he called on them to send to weasels to McConnell for being a weasel when he proposed allowing the President to lift the debt ceiling in return for regular votes of disapproval from Republicans.
JGabriel
@fasteddie9318:
It’s not just a hobby, it’s Erikson’s career.
.
Rick Taylor
I think most already realize the tea party Republicans are never going to vote to raise the debt ceiling. The only ones in denial on this point are Boehner and Cantor, who seem to think they can get them to approve a bill that calls for anything less than a constitutional amendment.
__
The real question is, will the remaining Republicans who realize destroying the world economy is a bad idea join with Democrats in raising the debt ceiling, and go on to face the ire of their fellow tea party Republicans who will be convinced they were on the verge of winning and these quislings sold them out.
Rick Taylor
@85 Add:
You can see the <a href="weasel“>toy weasels he wanted them to send to McConnell here.
Rome Again
OT, but I just wanted to point out that since Republicans haven’t offered any jobs and we’ve been constantly asking where are the jobs, I find it highly ironic that as someone who lives in Arizona, I’m receiving a localized ad on this post for Ben Quayle’s Job Fair on August 10th. Hmmmm, is Ben hiring? Is he going to show me how I can be just like my daddy? WOW, it takes balls to be a legacy congresscritter and think you can show people how to find work.
Rome Again
The Hill is reporting that Boehner is currently sloughing votes away from the Tea Party opposition. i can’t find that information anywhere else. Are they lying?
Link: http://thehill.com/homenews/house/173827-house-gop-wins-support-for-boehner-bill
kay
God. What an idiot. Is he drunk again?
Rome Again
@kay:
Yeah, I know. I wondered the same thing myself.
Ash Can
@kay: Is he ever sober?
Ben Cisco
@Han’s Big Snark Solo:
BWAHAAHAAHAA!
kay
Corner Stone
Boehner is posturing. He wants enough support to pass his bill, which he knows Reid will bigfoot and send right back to him as some combo of the Reid/Boehner plans. It’s what he wants to happen.
Then there will be a bunch more kabuki, some stressful sound bytes and a lot of facepalming throughout Punditland and Lesser Blogtopia.
Then President Obama will sign whatever reaches his desk, we’ll get a short extension and everyone will forget about this fake ginned-up crisis bullshit.
Until the next one.
MazeDancer
@gocart mozart:
That repulsive racist comment quoted from RedState is possibly made up. It’s just too cartoonish. But at least the replies said racism is not tolerated here.
I started reading RedState comments couple days ago. Know thy enemy tactics.
They are delusional. They truly believe they are saving America. They have no interest in facts with any genuine, factual basis. Some of them are pretty good writers.
There is no reasoning with them. They are Holy Warriors. And they’ve got serious power to rule the Repubs and the media now.
The only hope – slim though it is – is for the future and getting very serious about elections. Voter registration drives. Getting the people who need them ID’s. Sending money wherever it’s needed.
And no matter what one’s opinion of our President, truly no matter what he does in the next year, if one of those monsters takes over the White House, truly we will be wishing W was back. And every Democrat better be working hard to get these RedStaters out of Congress.
kay
No.
I have a friend here who is a public health nurse. Pat. She is the calmest, most relentlessly practical person I know, or have ever met. If I were in some kind of catastrophic natural disaster, I would happily follow her orders.
When Boehner rose to national prominence, she sent me this absolutely unhinged block of text email with ALL CAPS and CRAZY PUNCTUATION about what a drunk he is and how he passed out tobacco checks on the House floor.
So funny, coming from her. I saved it.
Ben Cisco
Wow. Some actual good news from, rather than about, John McCain:
__
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@kay:
I think the baseline BAC for the AOS is about .11, and it takes to about .19 before his speech even starts to sound slurred. He’s been at this a long time. But you knew that – you remember when he was a skirt chasing boozer in the statehouse.
kay
Hah! Not true. I didn’t know that. I have people I know who knew that….I was moving from state to state every six months taking weird low-paying jobs when he was a skirt chasing boozer in the statehouse, back before I was respectable.
I had sort of a looooong, misspent youth. I’m completely upstanding and conventional now, though :)
HyperIon
Thank you Poopyman #19 (damn you, missing reply thingy) for reminding us that no one can really say why the stock market goes up or down when it is happening.
But pundits/”journalists” have to say/write something.
jefft452
“Hold the line. When the Congressional Budget Office is saying that Harry Reid’s plan actually cuts more money than John Boehner’s even beyond budgetary gimmicks.
Hold the line. We can do better. We must do better. The future of the country depends on it.” – Erik son of Erik
“Hold the Line” – Heinrich von Breymann, moments before he was shot by his own troops at the Battle of Bemis Heights (Saratoga, NY) 7 Oct 1777
Phoenician in a time of Romans
How many families have their own currency and pay their debts in said currency?
The best analogy I’ve seen is that the American government needs to balance its books in precisely the same way a referee needs to take points away from some players before they can give them to others.
benintn
You see that? Gold at an all-time high? Glenn Beck was right – who’s laughing now, bitches?