Senator Pat Toomey to Republicans: Prepare to shut down government over the debt ceiling

[Purveyor]

The deal to avert the so-called fiscal cliff hasn’t even been signed by President Barack Obama yet, but Sen. Pat Toomey (R-PA) has already moved on to the next fight by suggesting that Republicans should shut down the government if they don’t get drastic spending cuts before agreeing to raise the nation’s debt limit.

Speaking to MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough on Wednesday, the Pennsylvania Republican defended his decision to vote for the bill that made permanent nearly 99 percent of the temporary tax cuts passed under President George W. Bush.

“What we did is spared as many Americans as we possibly could from a tax increase and we never had any leverage on spending,” Toomey explained. “Our opportunity here is on the debt ceiling. The president’s made it very clear, he doesn’t even want to have a discussion about it because he knows this is where we have leverage.”

“We Republicans need to be willing to tolerate a temporary, partial government shutdown, which is what that could mean,” he added. “And get off the road to Greece because that’s a road that we’re on right now. We can only solve this problem by getting spending under control and restructuring the entitlement programs. This president doesn’t want to go there. We’re going to have to force it, and we’re going to have to force it over the debt ceiling.”

Time‘s Mark Halperin pointed out that another fight over the debt ceiling could cause U.S. credit to be downgraded again and create more chaos in the stock markets.


MORE...Raw Story (http://s.tt/1xSDb)

[Mojorabbit]

1. Well there we have the plan it seems. nt

[alcibiades_mystery]

2. Democrats have to be ready for a government shutdown + 1 day more than GOPers are ready for

There can be little doubt that Biden went into both the Senate and House Dem conferences and told them that they're not budging on the debt ceiling. It will go to government shutdown. The great thing happening now is that the GOPers are giving up their leverage through their ridiculous behavior. They are clearly being defined as the obstructionists here - that's the real campaign "tactic" that they're screaming bloody murder about. But they continue to do it to themselves.

Government shutdown over the debt ceiling is coming. Be clear on that. We need to be out there everyday, starting today, laying it at the feet of the Republicans, just as surely and consistently and insistently that we defined Romney in the summer of 2012, laying the groundwork for the election.

The obstructionist GOP are babies who won't negotiate. Period. Any government shut down is on them. They won't pay for the things they already approved. They raised the debt ceiling eight times for Bush: remember all the fights about the debt ceiling when Bush was in office? No? Me neither. There's weren't any. We need to have charts indicating the number of times the term "debt ceiling" appeared in the press between 2001 and 2008, and how many times it has between 2009 and 2012. My guess: thousands of more times in Obama's term, though it hasn't been raised as frequently.

Define them now.

[octoberlib]

3. Check out this article . They voted 19 times to raise debt ceiling during Bush's presidency.

http://thinkprogress.org/politics/2011/04/14/158424/republican-leaders-debt-limit-hypocrisy/

[Cali_Democrat]

12. Bush also had lighter skin and an "R" behind his name

That was helpful to him. For GWB, it didn't matter if he was wasting trillions on wars and tax cuts for the wealthy. For him, raising the debt ceiling was privilege.

[leftyohiolib]

4. it's not a good idea for a man to father a child with his sister

[MiniMe]

5. Fine, lets start the discussion with cutting defense spending

Hello, Mr. Toomey, are you still there?

[WCGreen]

6. Says the guy with a real chussy tax payer funded retirement....

[RomneyLies]

7. Okay, Toomey. Put up or shut up.

Dems aren't backing down. you either shut it down and face the politcal and economic consequences of your decision or you treat this like the SEVENTY-NINE times the Congress raised the debt limit without a peep prior to Barack Obama being elected president.

[FSogol]

8. Again? Ask Newt how that worked last time, since the GOP seems to have forgotten.

[bunnies]

9. Do it, asshole.

We'd love to see the Rs get blamed for another dysfunctional "crisis".

[Cali_Democrat]

10. I see the GOP is ready to manufacture another crisis

They never give up.

[spanone]

11. go ahead assholes, shut it down..i hope your paychecks are the first ones withheld.

[CBHagman]

13. DU, prepare to contact Senator Pat Toomey.

[url]http://www.toomey.senate.gov/?p=contact[/url]

[PA Democrat]

14. He has a bunch of clueless teabaggers working for him.

I've called his office numerous times and I swear I feel like I've lost a few IQ points every time I talk to one of his staffers.