May 27, 2011, Follow the money
Well, well... former President Bill Clinton is now walking back his earlier remarks that a Congressional failure to enlarge the (over $14 trillion) federal debt ceiling by another trillion or two "wouldn't be so calamitous." As is necessary in the Alice-in-Wonderland faux reality that now passes for reality, we'll forget that what the man who gave us "depends on what the meaning of is is" was actually making an accurate statement, to wit, what matters is not the technical default itself, but whether the world's credit markets believe it really matters... Bill Clinton knows God damned well that his remarks themselves may well influence those very same credit markets. So... why would he stray off the official Obama Admin. reservation, even momentarily?
Maybe we should consider... some of Bill's financial relationships with hedge funds... Or maybe we should consider his daughter's... or his son in law's... Much has been written about the fact that the Bush family has no actual members or traditional professions, like doctors, lawyers, teachers, etc... only bid'ness-men (mostly war profiteers at that) and politicians ... but the little Clinton clan seems to realize the lucrative nature of their famous name... where was I?
Oh yes... why would Bill Clinton say something designed to spook markets into believing the possibility of an American default? Oh yes... because he is presumably "talking his book"... in other words, he, his family, or perhaps a major client presumably has an interest in this-- not necessarily to crash the American economy... but possibly to move markets one way or the other with a well-placed long or short position and/or options... or perhaps even some exotic synthetic derivative (remember, those things were illegal-- and rightly so until good old Bill signed a law changing that). Of course... just as with the credit default swaps on mortgages (which should have remained against the law)... the sheer several-times-USA-or-even-global-GDP-magnitude of these things makes one wonder just who is solvent enough to pay out the other side of these bets should some default trigger their coming due? I think we learned that answer back in '08: no one... except the taxpayers.
Anyway, more than one person has suggested to me in the last day or two that the Congressional Republicans, in their zeal to "crush Obama," have no qualms at all about crashing the economy via refusal to enlarge the debt ceiling... but as with Bill Clinton himself... perhaps we should ask the broader question of just who our Congress is actually working for? We know bloody well it's not "us" (unless us has some interest in a hedge fund, investment bank or other financial institution). But just who? And when if we have a similar-to-post-Lehman-Bros.-collapse credit freeze and financial crisis this year (or next... but I think this year)... will said Congress suddenly abandon its sudden debt-hawk drothers (which never apply to tax cuts) and... vote for another financial bailout? Under threat of sending the country into a depression (as if we're not already in one)... will we see trillions more in USA taxpayer commitments flowing to cover wagers of this nature?
Don't know... but that's probably how you bet. This has been... "follow the money."