PUBLIC CITIZEN Republicans are holding us all hostage

I post these PUBLIC CITIZEN announcements . Solely as a source for information we may not otherwise get a chance to hear . While I most often agree with many of their causes . I post these as more informational than political .

• Every year — through a normal, if often contentious, legislative process — Congress passes bills about how much the federal government can spend, on everything from paper clips to nuclear submarines.
  

• Now Republicans are exploiting the so-called debt ceiling — an arbitrary and, frankly, stupid cap on how much the federal government can borrow — to extort cuts they could never hope to achieve legitimately.
  

• And if their ransom demands are not met, Republicans say they won’t let the government make good on its existing obligations — every single one of which was already authorized by Congress.
  

• Experts are clear that if the U.S. government can’t pay what it owes, the national and global economies will be thrown into crisis. Nearly two million jobs could be wiped out in a week. A default that goes on for months could wipe out 8 million jobs and $10 trillion in household wealth.