My plan to save our strip club currency, the US dollar so that strippers still t

I agree, right now this is looking like a huge victory for Democrats. As they said on the radio yesterday "Nobody has done more to increase the popularity of ObamaCare than Ted Cruz". Only worry I have is that Obama and Reid push it too hard and snatch a defeat out of the jaws of victory here...

Well, markets start opening in three hours. We'll see!

I wouldn't be surprised if elected officials think everything will be fine if we default and it takes 2 or 3 more weeks to get a deal. No No, No, it will not. I believe doing so will do permanent damage to the US economy. We have a bunch of idiots who don't even know the US markets are open on Monday. Not to mention foreign creditors who start demanding more interest to actually loan money to a deadbeat country that doesn't pay on time.

Gonna be one fucking hell of a week!

Imagine how inconvenient clubbing will become if our currency goes the way of Weimar Republic Marks. You'd need a wheelbarrow to carry your money. Strippers could no longer stash their tips in their shoes unless they wore size 17EEEEEE. On the other hand, stuffing bills into their bras would make them look extremely well-endowed.

Shark, Read the 14th Amendment, section 4 and the subsequent court decisions on the subject. A default on interest payments on our national debt is not legally possible. Nor is is legally defensible to stop payments on SSI or veteran's pensions - for the same reason. Congress does not have to do anything for both to continue being paid.

The US expects to collect $2.5 TRILLION dollars in the current FY 2014. Interest on the national debt will be $230 Billion. Social Security and veteran's pensions will total about $900 Billion. Combined that is still less than half what we will collect and the constitution says that debt and pensions get paid first!

The problem is that without more borrowing the government will have to cut back or end other things. Since the press is very liberal, the president is very liberal and the rest of the Democrats are mostly liberal - they do not want to cut social programs, government jobs, agency oversight functions, or give up any of their power and perks. The result is a major press push with scare tactics like the "default" stories and other sky is falling news. The Republicans haven't tried very hard to counter this message, perhaps to retain some bargaining leverage, or maybe just because they don't want to lose any perks either.

Whatever happens, the good ole' dollar, the underpinning and anchor of American (US not Canada) strip clubbing, should be safe for the next few years. Canadians don't make it rain, the dancers up there say those loonies hurt!

The shutdown just reveals a weakness in the US Constitution, that this sort of stalemate is possible. Neither party is more to blame than the other.

The debt limit is just stupid. They should not have voted to spend the money in the first place if they didn't want the debt to go up above the current limit.

The Constitution says the CONGRESS must make good on the faith and credit of the US; it doesn't say what will happen if they don't. But it's the job of Congress to do it.

It doesn't say the president has to give members of congress a BJ or they don't have to pass a budget and pay our bills. They still have to do it. Obama really doesn't have to do anything as it's not his job as president. The very fact he's even addressing the Republicans is at his bequest.

It's interesting that the Tea Party's defeat in this will be so large. The Democrats(wrongly in my opinion) are now saying unless the Republicans don't refund the sequester, the only legislation the TP passed, they won't vote with them to end it. The GOP has little choice at this point.

If the people who elected the TP gang have any intelligence (which is questionable at best) they'll realize that the intransigence of the house members not only didn't end Obamacare, but they lose the sequester on top of it! They will all be voted out, albeit to be replaced with replacement Tea Party members.

Maybe the new group will realize compromise in Washington is the only way to get things done.

I do not think anyone learned anything since the last election. Everyone voted for the same people and suddenly lots of people who voted for Obama thought all this was over with. When the country is split almost 50/50 with opposing parties, you need to compromise to get things done. I don't think anyone learned anything. I do not think we even have an agreement over how to get out of our debt mess. I am in agreement with Obama over increasing growth rather than massive spending cuts. Spending cuts can come after growth threatens to send inflation a lot higher. If Obama had acted like the Fed on tapering, he could have just set a given inflation and GDP growth target where if it looks like inflation will exceed the target, government spending cuts kick in as long as expected GDP growth remains or exceeds a target. Growth stays up, other parties stay happy with automatic spending cuts to quell inflation if needed. If a large budget surplus develops, debt starts getting paid off.

Great. So the stability of the world economy now all rests on the discretion of Ted Cruz not to filibuster here...

Ass clown Republicans can't even come up with a bill to pass the House even though they have a majority there. Obama and Reid might have smashed them too badly here. LOL!

More people voted Democratic than Republican in House races in 2012. The Republicans control the House only because of gerrymandering.

The US is just fucked. We should have been paying down the debt during the boom years before 07. Now we can't do the worker retraining and fiscal stimulus we need because we can't afford the additional debt it would require.