Tuesday, October 1, 2013

Annotating Obama’s 2006 speech against boosting the debt limit

“I think if you look at the history, getting votes for the debt ceiling is always difficult, and budgets in this town are always difficult.”
— President Obama, news conference, Jan. 14, 2013
 “The fact that we are here today to debate raising America’s debt limit is a sign of leadership failure. It is a sign that the U.S. government can’t pay its own bills. ... I therefore intend to oppose the effort to increase America’s debt limit.”
— Then-Sen. Barack Obama, floor speech in the Senate, March 16, 2006

As the saying goes, “where you stand depends on where you sit.” This is certainly true of the votes to boost the national debt limit, where almost by tradition, the party not holding the presidency refused to support an increase in the debt limit. (One big exception, as we have noted, is in 1953 during the Eisenhower presidency.)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/fact-checker/post/annotating-obamas-2006-speech-against-boosting-the-debt-limit/2013/01/14/aa8cf8c4-5e9b-11e2-9940-6fc488f3fecd_blog.html 

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