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Republican Congressman Phil Gingrey of Georgia says he'll vote against raising the debt limit because nothing bad will happen if we don't:

The country doesn’t go off a cliff [if debt ceiling not raised] because revenues come in, tax revenue, and we just simply prioritize. We pay the interest on the debt first, we make sure that seniors get their Social Security checks, and we honor Medicare. But when we get to discretionary spending, whether that’s the Department of Education as an example, or the Department of Commerce, then, all the sudden, we reach in the hat and we decide who [unintelligible].

So nothing bad will happen because we'll pay our creditors first, we'll make sure seniors get their share, and then we'll fight over whatever's left. Brilliant! Except that even if Gingrey is able to pull of the first two things (and that's a big if), the stuff that will be left over represents virtually every function of government, from the military to the FAA to FEMA to paying the companies it does business with.

If Republicans like Gingrey block an increase in the debt limit, the consequence will be that the Federal government will go into default on its obligations. In the short-term, the only question is who will be left holding the bag. But in the long-term, it will mean nobody in their right mind will trust the government of the United States to keep its word, dealing a severe blow to our position in the world.

Simply put, Phil Gingrey doesn't have a clue what he's talking about. Even the U.S. Chamber of Commerce is alarmed at this kind of talk, and they are now lobbying Republicans to step off the ledge. I just hope they realize that the guys they are trying to talk off the ledge are the same guys that they put into office in the first place.

WSJ:

Chamber Urges Lawmakers to Raise Debt Limit ‘Expeditiously’

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce waded into the fight over increasing the government’s borrowing limit on Friday by urging members of Congress to raise the debt ceiling “as expeditiously as possible.”

The business community’s chief lobby in Washington made the case in a letter to lawmakers signed by Bruce Josten, the group’s head of government affairs, arguing that failure to pass legislation authorizing an increase in borrowing by Aug. 4 “would create uncertainty and fear, and threaten the credit rating of the United States.”

As conservative critics of raising the debt-limit grow louder and louder, the White House and Republican congressional leaders need groups like the Chamber along with small banks and businesses in members’ districts, to persuade lawmakers that default would be a huge blow to credit markets, crippling the economy.

The real problem here is that House Republican leadership has treated the debt ceiling as a bargaining chip. They're more interested in placating their political base than in doing the responsible thing. That's not a shock, it's sort of funny watching the Chamber beg the guys who they put in power to not wreck the economy.

If Republicans were willing to raise the debt ceiling without taking any major policy issues hostage, I'm sure enough Democrats would join them in raising it that the debt limit would be raised without either party needing to take the blame. But that's not what they're doing. They are making unreasonable demands and promising their political base things that they will never be able to deliver. Given the way things are playing out, it's easy to see how this could spiral out of control—House Republican leadership needs to find a way to walk themselves back from the ledge, but they haven't even taken a baby step in the right direction. And odds are, until the Chamber does more than simply sending a letter, they won't.

The single biggest obstacle to getting anything done on long-term fiscal policy is that when it comes to balancing budgets, Republicans don't believe that there are two parts to the equation: revenue and spending. They think what goes out the door is the only thing that matters—not what comes in the door.

Put another way, the GOP simply doesn't believe in math.

It wasn't always this way, and Salon's Steve Kornacki highlights what he believes are the two seminal moments in defining the GOP's flawed budget arithmetic. The first was the 1980 primary between Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush:

In this wing of the GOP, a new economic theory offered by Arthur Laffer was taking hold: that slashing income tax rates would actually lead to higher government revenues, with lower taxes spurring economic growth and increasing Americans' taxable income. ... On the other side of the GOP ideological spectrum was Bush, representative of the "town father" wing of the GOP -- pragmatists who saw a meaningful role for government in Americans' daily lives but who were wary of bureaucracy and who saw evil in red ink. ... To Bush and his ilk, Laffer's theories were utter nonsense and a recipe for fiscal disaster. ...  Bush declared: "It is impossible for Gov. Reagan to balance the budget -- an essential component of bringing down inflation -- if he is to reduce taxes by more than $220 billion over the next three years."

Flash forward to 1990 and President Bush signed into law a tax increase that conservatives—incorrectly—believed touched off a recession. It set off a rebellion inside his party and ever since then, virtually no Republicans have been willing to do anything about taxes other than lower them, and there is no sign that everything is different today.

All hope is not lost, however. If Republicans won't let revenue become a part of the discussion, then at the end of 2012, all Bush-era tax cuts will expire and we'll return to Clinton-era tax rates. After that, even without changing tax rates, tax revenue as a share of GDP will continue to rise, thanks to inflation. That might not be an ideal scenario, but it would be fiscally responsible. And short of another Democratic cave, unless Republicans agree to come to the table, it's exactly what will happen.

No, they didn't actually endorse his campaign. But they did give him the hug of death. Sam Stein:

WASHINGTON -- The Obama administration, on Friday, continued to apply a veritable death hug to likely Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, praising the health care law he passed as Massachusetts’ governor despite Romney’s insistence that there were major distinctions between his and the president’s approach.

“We have said before that health care reform that then Governor Romney signed into law in Massachusetts is in many ways similar to the legislation that resulted in the Affordable Care Act,” White House Press Secretary Jay Carney said in an off-camera briefing at the White House. “And as to the issue of flexibility, as you know, earlier this year we made quite a big deal out of the fact that the president wanted to move up to 2014 … the starting point at which states can ask for waivers to opt out of the Affordable Care Act as long as they, of course, demonstrate their capacity with their own ideas to achieve the same objectives.”

“We wholly endorse flexibility and we obviously feel that Massachusetts took a smart approach towards health care reform,” the press secretary added. “Its provenance was so mainstream, there are great similarities between Massachusetts' law, the Affordable Care Act and legislation proposed by then Rhode Island Republican [Senator] John Chaffee in 1993.”

Chafee's bill contained an individual mandate. And yes, as a Senate candidate in 1994, Mitt Romney endorsed it.

Conservative Washington Post blogger Jennifer Rubin mocks Mitt Romney's health care speech by Twitter:

the only idea dumber than this speech was strapping the irish setter to the top of the car

More on the story about the Irish setter that Mitt Romney strapped to the top of his car here. And more reaction to the speech here. Jonah Goldberg calls it a disaster here.

Bonus: National Review slams Romney. And the Democratic governor of Massachusetts says the reason why he supports the individual mandate...is because Mitt Romney convinced him to.

Double bonus: The DNC puts together a montage of Mitt Romney on RomneyCare through the years:

Bottom-line: Mitt Romney didn't revive his candidacy yesterday. He ended it.

Just in case you thought the GOP had completely abandoned its proposal to repeal Medicare and replace it with a voucher system, check out Dave Weigel's post on his answer to a question today about what it will take for Republicans to raise the debt limit:

"There are going to have to be budget process reforms," said Boehner, speaking dismissively of the "spending caps" proposed by Bob Corker and Claire McCaskill. "I won't tie myself down in terms of what those are. I don't want phony caps, I don't want phony targets. All the gimmicks that have been used in the past have never worked. Congress has found a way to wiggle out of all of them."

What to do, then, if spending caps were just gimmickry?

"The only way to do this is the right way," said Boehner, "and that's to go in and have real program changes that put these entitlement programs on a much stronger foundation, where they can [be] preserved for the tens of millions of Americans who count on them."

As Weigel pointed out, the GOP's plan for entitlement reform is embodied in the Ryan plan, which would end Medicare as we know it. It's not clear that Boehner will insist on the Ryan plan itself or some other sorts of cuts, but he doesn't seem to be alone: Mitch McConnell is also saying Medicare cuts will be necessary to get GOP support for raising the debt limit:

The top Republican in the Senate says it'll take cuts both to agencies' budgets and to long-term spending on programs like Medicare and Medicaid to win his vote to permit the government to keep going into debt to meet its obligations.

Sen. Mitch McConnell issued his demands after a Thursday morning meeting with President Barack Obama.

McConnell said the need to raise the so-called debt ceiling is a "major opportunity" for Republicans and Democrats to come together and do something about the spiraling national debt.

Obviously, Republicans are bluffing. Their financial backers would be furious if they refused to raise the debt ceiling and touched of a global economic crisis. So Democrats shouldn't take the GOP threats of economic terror too seriously.

But it's worth remembering that to the extent there are long-term cost issues with Medicare, the GOP's only answer is to reduce benefits. Democrats, on the other hand, have pursued ideas to reduce costs without compromising care, ideas such as letting Medicare negotiate on prescription drug prices, creating a Medicare-based public option, or strengthening the ability Medicare's Independent Payment Advisory Board to reduce expenditures on services that don't improve the quality of care.

If Republicans were serious about reducing costs, they'd work with Democrats on these sorts of ideas. The fact that they won't is yet another reminder that when it comes mto fiscal policy, the GOP just isn't serious.

So Mitt Romney's big speech on health care is over. You can watch it here.

Romney defended the plan he signed into law in Massachusetts, including its health care mandate, which he mentioned by name, saying it was a good solution for the problems Massachusetts faced.

Romney argued that the mandate he signed into law was acceptable because states have the right to impose mandates, but that the mandate President Obama signed into law was unconstitutional because it was national in scope.

Romney's entire argument is rooted in the notion that states are "laboratories of democracy." According to Romney:

If states compete, voters in those states will vote out the people that didn't come up with good ideas, and vote in the people who have better ideas, and we'll end up with a system that's more effective and gives people better care.

So what would that system look like? Here's what he said in 2007:

I think you're going to find, when it's all said and done, after all these states that are laboratories of democracy get their chance to try their own plans, that those who follow the path that we pursued will find it's the best path, and we'll end up with a nation that's taken a mandate approach.

So in 2007, Mitt Romney believed we'd end up with a "nation that's taken a mandate approach" to health care reform. To be fair to him, he thought we'd get there by letting every state pick its own system, but to be fair to the health care reform law President Obama signed last year, any state that doesn't want to have a mandate can receive a waiver to allow it to use a different system of its own choosing.

Basically, Romney's argument is that the only thing wrong with President Obama's health care plan was that it was applied at the national level instead of at the state level. But that if it were applied on the state level, pretty much every state would end up following the same general approach.

Obviously, Romney's relying on a pretty thin thread to hold up his argument. It's entirely process-oriented: he agrees that our national approach to health care reform will require mandates, but he thinks states will get there on their own and that it's okay if some don't. The plan Obama signed into law also requires mandates, but acknowledges that some states may prefer a different approach, and gives them the opportunity to waive the mandate—as long as they find a different way to achieve universal coverage.

But while Romney 2007 and Romney 2011 might be able to keep a somewhat straight face while grasping that thread, it's worth pointing out that Romney 1994 and Romney 2009 both endorsed plans featuring a national health insurance mandate.

In 1994, as a candidate for U.S. Senate, Romney supported a plan by Rhode Island Senator John Chaffee to provide universal health care by imposing a national health insurance mandate. And here he is in June 2009 on Meet The Press:

We have a healthcare plan. You, you look at Wyden-Bennett, that's a healthcare plan that a number of Republicans think is a very good healthcare plan, one that we support. ... We have a model that worked. One state in America, my state, was able to put in place a plan that got everybody health insurance, and it did not require a public government insurance company. ... That we can do, as we did it in Massachusetts, as Wyden-Bennett is proposing doing it at the national level.

Both the Massachusetts plan and the Wyden-Bennett plan require individuals to buy health insurance. Mitt Romney supported them both. The difference? The Wyden-Bennett plan featured a mandate at the national level. And Romney's support for it—and his support for Chafee's plan in 1994—undercuts the supposed authenticity of everything else he said today.

As Mitt Romney defends himself from conservative critics of his past support for the individual health care mandate, it's worth noting that Romney isn't the only one with a problem: Newt Gingrich has supported them too. Sam Stein:

In a June 2007 op-ed in the Des Moines Register, Gingrich wrote, "Personal responsibility extends to the purchase of health insurance. Citizens should not be able to cheat their neighbors by not buying insurance, particularly when they can afford it, and expect others to pay for their care when they need it." An "individual mandate," he added, should be applied "when the larger health-care system has been fundamentally changed."

And in several of his many policy and politics-focused books, Gingrich offered much the same.

In 2008's "Real Change," he wrote, "Finally, we should insist that everyone above a certain level buy coverage (or, if they are opposed to insurance, post a bond). Meanwhile, we should provide tax credits or subsidize private insurance for the poor."

In 2005's "Winning the Future," he expanded on the idea in more detail: "You have the right to be part of the lowest-cost insurance pool and you have a responsibility to buy insurance. ... We need some significant changes to ensure that every American is insured, but we should make it clear that a 21st Century Intelligent System requires everyone to participate in the insurance system."

Not surprisingly, Gingrich's campaign refused to comment about Stein's article, but if the media or his fellow candidates keep the issue alive and force Gingrich to respond, he will no doubt claim that he supported allowing people to post bonds to cover their care instead of health insurance, but that that's just a fancy way of describing self-insurance, and it would only be an option for people with enough resources to self-insure.

The bottom-line is he supported a federal mandate to require people to either purchase health insurance or set aside enough money to cover any potential health care expenses. And according to the conservative world view, doesn't that make Newt Gingrich a support of tyranny?

So how will conservatives receive Mitt Romney's health care speech defending himself for having supported the individual heath insurance mandate? Well, if the Wall Street Journal editorial board is a leading indicator (and it is), the answer can be summed up in one word: abysmally. They write:

It's no accident that RomneyCare's most vociferous defenders now are in the White House and left-wing media and think tanks. They know what happened, even if he doesn't.

For a potential President whose core argument is that he knows how to revive free market economic growth, this amounts to a fatal flaw. Presidents lead by offering a vision for the country rooted in certain principles, not by promising a technocracy that runs on "data." Mr. Romney's highest principle seems to be faith in his own expertise.

More immediately for his Republican candidacy, the debate over ObamaCare and the larger entitlement state may be the central question of the 2012 election. On that question, Mr. Romney is compromised and not credible. If he does not change his message, he might as well try to knock off Joe Biden and get on the Obama ticket.

Setting aside the policy substance of the WSJ editorial, politically it reflects what many of us have been saying for a long time now: Mitt Romney is toast in the GOP primary. His only way out is to repudiate everything he's done in Massachusetts. But if he does that and somehow manages to win the primary, he'll be unelectable in the general. Nobody will believe a word he says. (Not that they believe him now.)

Most Republican operatives will probably blame Romney for this mess. But the real problem here is that Republican conservatives have moved so far to the right in the past couple of years that many of them honestly believe Mitt Romney should run on President Obama's ticket. That's an insane proposition. But from the party that nominated Joe Miller, Sharron Angle, and Christine O'Donnell, it's not exactly a shock.

So it's official. Newt Gingrich has announced he's running for President. Again.

The thing is, and I admit, maybe this is just me, but the only question I really want to know the answer to is whether he's sporting a spray-on tan or if he got it in a tanning salon? I mean, check out those eyelids. And if I'm not mistaken, the left side of his neck (his left) doesn't seem nearly as orange as the rest of his face.

Maybe he needs to have a sitdown with John Boehner. Or maybe it's the lighting. The only thing I can be sure if is that this is the most serious question to be asked about Newton F. Gingrich.

Update: Yes, the polling shows President Obama would nuke Newt—52%-38% in the latest PPP survey.

With the return of Countdown With Keith Olbermann a little more than a month away, we're learning a bit more about who will be on the show. Today, Current TV announced the broadcast's first group of regular correspondents, including our very own Markos Moulitsas. From Current's announcement:

“Countdown With Keith Olbermann,” the much-anticipated week-nightly commentary show slated to launch on independently owned Current TV on June 20th, is announcing its first group of regular contributors, which will include notable policy-makers, documentary film makers, award-winning journalists, bloggers comedians and other progressive voices. Lending their views and voices to “Countdown” on a regular basis will be film maker Ken Burns, Nicole D. Lamoureux, Executive Director, National Association Of Free Clinics, comedian Richard Lewis, film maker Michael Moore and Daily Kos founder Markos Moulitsas.

This news that Markos will be one of the regular contributors probably won't come as a shock. Markos was a regular on the old Countdown before MSNBC's top brass blacklisted him. Countdown With Keith Olbermann returns to the air on June 20th at 8PM ET and today we're learning a bit more about who will be in the show.