Sure it can.
But if it were, as noted above, the time to make that principled objection is during the appropriations process. We have, in effect, already agreed to spend this money. We should honor that agreement, either by borrowing the money or raising our revenue to allow it.
If it was honest objection to the debt, don’t you think that the Republicans would engage in honest debate about how to lower the debt BEFORE it got to this point?
Honest debate would be looking at both sides of the solution to debt - income and expenses - rather than the current Republican strategy which is to ignore income (taxes, which are currently at historically low levels) and not compromise, negotiate, discuss or otherwise act like mature grownups.
<on edit> or what Bricker said.
… and I am sure some made the “principled objection” at that time and were outvoted. Are those allowed to make another “principled objection” at this time as well?
And, of course, some others are utter unprincipled hypocrites and are only playing politics. What I am wondering is why you think the whole group of those who object are one and not the other.
Bait and switch.
“Big government is the problem”.
The problem is perpetuated by one political party (Hayes was a Republican too).
“How naive”.
Then on issues such as providing the indigent with healthcare or fundamental rights to homosexuals, we need to oppose big government. Forgetting which party is responsible for the failure of governance.
Edit:
It’s also the two wrongs / tu quoque fallacy. Because Hayes did it / your side did it, it can’t be wrong when we did it.
There is no such thing as “honest debate” during campaign season. Unless you think that bringing up a candidate’s history of high school pranks is “honest debate”.
It’s funny (to me) that people who lament the lack of “honor” and “principles” in politics turn around and advocate “compromise”. “Honor” and “principles”, if someone actually has them, cannot be compromised.
Indeed, I heard a member of congress, I think the speaker, bragging about how they would once again drag the country to the precipice of a default and then blaming Obama for irresponsibly bringing us there :smack:
There you go!! Way to own it. You should change your custom title to that. 
(I kid of course as I have no opinion on your Jackassedness whatsoever, Extraordinary or otherwise).
Political grandstanding? In an election year? Say it isn’t so! :rolleyes:
In this thread we can see the gamut of Republican thought. Bricker, knee-jerks to defend a small element, even though he disagrees with the whole. He has an attachment to his side, and their goals, but finds the method distasteful.
On the other side of the spectrum we have Terr, who is so profoundly ignorant of reality and the universe we actually occupy that he thinks destroying the world economy would be awesome because *liberty *or something.
I’m sure Clothy is shouting at an armadillo somewhere, and will be along shortly.
Maybe the Republicans are playing a long game: They can refuse to raise the debt ceiling, cause a Constitutional crisis, cause Obama to either ignore the ceiling or raise it by executive order, take the whole mess to the Supreme Court and then claim the Kenyan Muslim Usurper is now a Tyrant taking over the role of Congress, and finally get a nice, new civil war to pay for thus finally, improving the economy!
Whew. Problem solved!
So that would explain why many Republicans stuck to their principles and fought the debt ceiling when Reagan raised the debt ceiling 18 times for a total increase of 199%?
When George W. Bush raised the debt ceiling 7 times for a total increase of 90%?
Were those times OK then? Because I don’t recall a peep from those principled Republicans then.
Well, no. Taking the parties as a whole, at least some GOP support was needed to pass the appropriations bill – or at least to invoke cloture.
I don’t want to construct your argument for you – are you now saying that some subset of senators had principled objections then and retain them now?
Fine. What, then, of the senators that agreed to cloture? What’s their excuse?
Non-sequitur. I don’t consider any politician to be “honorable” or “principled”. Such people do not run for office to begin with.
It’s hard to determine which is worse-- that the Republicans cling to this nutty tactic, or the fact that a good chunk of the American people think it’s a good idea. The yseem to hear nothing but “debt”, then immediately shut their brains off. I guess the one follow from the other.
Oh, I agree completely. “Unconstitutional” is the wrong ord. But there really needs to be some mechanism put in place to prevent this kind of abuse.
Does it matter? If you’re wondering “would I object to the Democrats doing this”, then yes, yes I would. This is the wrong time to push an agenda, and even if wasn’t an agenda that was disgustingly backwards and wrong. The fact of the matter is, if this is anything like the debates in 2011, the Republicans are going state demands, and hold the full faith and credit of the USA hostage until they get those demands. That is not okay. There are no circumstances under which that would be okay.
…Wait, you want them to ruin the country?
Oh, it can’t be both?
Er… kinda.
This is actually a subtle point, and it’s one that I see very often missed or misused on this board.
It might be a tu quoque, or it might not be. It all depends on what the underlying argument is.
In this case, it seems to me Terr made two arguments, but so intertwined that it becomes difficult to separate them and address each one.
(1) BPC’s outrage is manufactured, not real, and exists only because the GOP is the actor.
(2) The underlying actions of the GOP have a principled basis.
As to the first argument – it’s not tu quoque to say your side did it too. Because that’s the gravamen of the argument: that the objection is not to the tactic, but to the player.
But as to the second argument, it’s absolutely a classic tu quoque.
It could be that some had principled objections (well, not really, since, as I pointed out above, people with honor or principles do not run for office), yes. And then some are unprincipled political scoundrels. Those who voted against the appropriations bill and now are objecting to debt ceiling rise are of the second variety. As are those (for example, one whose name rhymes with Bobama) who were all "honor"ably and "principle"d-ly against raising debt ceiling a few years ago and are all for it now.
…but I’m old enough to recall a time when opposition to the other party wasn’t always an absolute, ‘they are the enemy’ proposition. We are founded on a 2-party system, so we need a loyal opposition to keep the ship of state from veering off course to badly one side or the other.
I wonder if, in my lifetime, we’ll see the classic ® displaced by a more principled party. I doubt it, but then again I haven’t met anybody planning to vote “Whig” lately, either…
The problem is that every Congress is in a position to make its own rules, with no more majority required than the majority to make the last set of rules.
The mechanism is ideally the voting public. And I have come to believe that perhaps what the voting public needs here is a dose of reality. In other words, I offered up a list of things earlier that would be at risk with the failure to raise the debt limit – some trivial, some not.
In this case, the GOP is playing on a public perception of useless bureaucrats. But – as exemplified by the confused man with the “Get Your Government Out of My Medicare” sign – the public is not internalizing what a government abdication of these commitments actually means.
As painful as it would be, I think that the public needs a dose of what it actually means to stop paying for appropriattions.
Again – so what?
The question is: what’s the right thing to do? You’re trying to make the question about the motives of the Democrats. How is that relevant?