Our political Quote of the Day comes from The Politico’s Mike Allen who in one paragraph capsualizes a key part of what is going on in the controversy over raising the debt limit ceiling — and what it means:
Establishment Republicans practically spit contempt for what they call “the default caucus” – the small number of House and Senate members who say they won’t vote to raise the debt ceiling under any circumstances. “I’m embarrassed to be a Republican,” a GOP don told us. “These guys don’t understand capital markets. This isn’t about who wins an election. This is about whether people are going to be able to finance a house.”
Be sure to read THIS COLUMN as well.
And THIS required reading by John Avlon.
And this must-read by David Brooks.
Notice a common theme? They’re essentially about straying from America’s mainstream…yet how a group can have power so it can negatively impact the vast majority of Americans who live in the mainstream…including those in their own party.
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.