Department of Now It All Makes Sense

Only briefly, because I don't have time to tease this out: Here's Young Ezra's franchisee on what the requirements are for the IRS under ObamaCare; a tax preparer on stuff the IRS can do with its new toys; and a post by Chris Street ("Agenda 21" alert! (from a guy who also cites EFF)) on what the specs for those new toys are: Military grade.* Read below the fold...

On May 9, 2013, The Republican House passed H.R. 807 the Full Faith and Credit Act. The Bill says in part:

(a) In General- In the event that the debt of the United States Government, as defined in section 3101 of title 31, United States Code, reaches the statutory limit, the Secretary of the Treasury shall, in addition to any other authority provided by law, issue obligations under chapter 31 of title 31, United States Code, to pay with legal tender, and solely for the purpose of paying, the principal and interest on obligations of the United States described in subsection (b) after the date of the enactment of this Act.
(b) Obligations Described- For purposes of this subsection, obligations described in this subsection are obligations which are--
(1) held by the public, or
(2) held by the Old-Age and Survivors Insurance Trust Fund and Disability Insurance Trust Fund.

So, in brief, the Bill provides for the Treasury, even when it is about to reach the debt ceiling, to issue additional debt to pay principal and interest on debt instruments issued to the public including foreign nations, and to pay principal and interest on Social Security (SS) “trust fund bonds” in the course of paying SS recipients. Read below the fold...

An interview of Tom Paxton by Pete Seeger

"Buy a gun for your son" Read below the fold...

Journalists in the service of Pete Peterson

January 16, 2013 — Each spring since 2010, some of Washington’s A-list politicians assemble in the capital to submit to questions from some of the media’s A-list journalists on the future of the federal fiscal policy.

Read below the fold...

Enthusiasm for using Platinum Coin Seigniorage (PCS) to produce a Trillion Dollar Coin, or coins totaling a few trillion dollars continues to increase. Read below the fold...

Introduction Read below the fold...

This post records the history of platinum coin seigniorage in the blogosphere through the debt ceiling agreement on August 2, 2011. Read below the fold...

Read below the fold...

I stumbled across this book, by John Holloway, entitled Crack Capitalism. No, it doesn't have anything to do with crack cocaine - it has to do with looking at the world completely differently, something that I've recently started to do. I'm so very, very tired of all the pointing fingers and daily atrocities. I'm posting pp. Read below the fold...

The first thing you need to know about natural selection is that it's everywhere. Reality's most powerful tool of precision is like a great Grim Reaper wrapped around the face of the internet, relentlessly jamming its truth into anything that smells like bigotry. In fact, the history of the recent elevator-gate scandal, which doubles as a history of the skepticism movement, reads like a what's what of ideas.

h/t, of course, to the Mighty Taibbi. Read below the fold...

Many MMT posts and other writings on fiscal responsibility, including my own, focus on the myths of neoliberalism, pointing out why they are myths and developing an alternative MMT perspective in some detail. Off hand, and I may have forgotten something, I couldn't think of a brief positive MMT narrative related to fiscal responsibility containing primarily the truths, rather than the myths. Read below the fold...

Many MMT posts and other writings on fiscal responsibility, including my own, focus on the myths of neoliberalism, pointing out why they are myths and developing an alternative MMT perspective in some detail. Off hand, and I may have forgotten something, I couldn't think of a brief positive MMT narrative related to fiscal responsibility containing primarily the truths, rather than the myths. Read below the fold...

Many MMT posts and other writings on fiscal responsibility, including my own, focus on the myths of neoliberalism, pointing out why they are myths and developing an alternative MMT perspective in some detail. Off hand, and I may have forgotten something, I couldn't think of a brief positive MMT narrative containing primarily the truths, rather than the myths. So, here's my version. Comments, criticisms, recasting in more effective form, are all welcome.

-- The US Government can't involuntarily run out of fiat money because it has the constitutional authority to create it without limit. Congress constrains and regulates this ability; but its existence is still a stubborn fact! Read below the fold...