Republicans Are Playing Into the Hands of Putin and Xi Jinping

In today's Republican Party, the only thing that matters is pandering to the increasingly ugly base of the party or, if you are Kevin McCarthy remaining Speaker of the House at any cost.  One of the costs McCarthy is only too willing to pay is damaging the best interests of America and playing into the hands of America's enemies. Conduct that in the past would have been deem traitorous - e.g., the January 6, 2021 insurrection - is perfectly fine as is indirectly aiding America's enemies so long as the haters and bigots of the party base are thrilled and one holds on to power.  Give the GOP's anti-abortion agenda, book banning, desire for unrestricted gun sales, and cultur wars, the wants and opinions of the majority (which oppose the GOP on these issues) simply does not matter.  A guest column in the New York Times by Hillary Clinton - who was, in my view, 100% correct in her evaluation of the dangers and unfitness of Trump - lays out how McCarthy and MAGA Republican extremists are playing directly into the hands of dictators like Vladimir Putin and China's Xi (not to mention pushing cuts that would harm millions of Americans).   Here are excerpts:

Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy is making a ransom demand. His hostages are the economy and America’s credibility. Mr. McCarthy has threatened that House Republicans will refuse to raise the federal government’s debt ceiling, potentially triggering a global financial crisis, unless President Biden agrees to deep cuts to education, health care, food assistance for poor children and other services.

Mr. McCarthy repeatedly invoked the threat of Chinese competition as justification. The speaker is right that this debate has significant national security implications — just not the way he says.

With Russia’s brutal invasion of Ukraine in its second year, tensions with China continuing to rise and global threats looming, from future pandemics to climate change, the world is looking to the United States for strong, steady leadership. Congressional brinkmanship on the debt ceiling sends the opposite message to our allies and our adversaries: that America is divided, distracted and can’t be counted on.

Let’s start by dispelling a myth. The debt ceiling debate is not about authorizing new spending. It’s about Congress paying debts it has already incurred. Refusing to pay would be like skipping out on your mortgage, except with global consequences. . . . defaulting on our debts could spark a worldwide financial meltdown.

Republicans in Congress have consistently voted to raise the debt ceiling with little drama when a fellow Republican is in the White House — including three times under President Donald Trump. But during Democratic administrations, they have weaponized the debt ceiling to extort concessions, despite the danger of default.

I was secretary of state during the debt ceiling crisis of 2011, so I saw firsthand how this partisan posturing damaged our nation’s credibility around the world.

I vividly remember walking into a Hong Kong ballroom that July for a conference organized by the local American Chamber of Commerce. Congressional Republicans were refusing to raise the debt ceiling, and the prospect of a default was getting closer by the day. I was swarmed by nervous businessmen from across Asia. . . . The regional and global stability that America had guaranteed for decades was the foundation on which they had built companies and fortunes. But could they still trust the United States? Were we really going to spark another worldwide financial crisis? And the question that no one wanted to ask out loud: If America faltered, would China swoop in to fill the vacuum?

Later that day, I headed to a villa in mainland China for a meeting with my counterpart, State Councilor Dai Bingguo. Over the years, I had heard monologues from Mr. Dai about America’s many supposed misdeeds, his criticisms at times bitingly sardonic but usually delivered with a smile. So I was not surprised when he, too, turned the conversation to the debt ceiling, barely containing his glee at our self-inflicted wound.

Fortunately, Congress and President Barack Obama finally reached an agreement to raise the debt ceiling before careening into the fiscal abyss. But the S&P still fell 17 percent, consumer and business confidence nose-dived, and the government’s credit rating was downgraded for the first time ever. After another crisis in 2013, the lesson was clear: Negotiating with hostage-takers will only embolden them to do it again.

Fast-forward a decade, and Republicans are playing the same game. Except now, the risks are even higher.

Today the competition between democracies and autocracies has grown more intense. And by undermining America’s credibility and the pre-eminence of the dollar, the fight over the debt ceiling plays right into the hands of Xi Jinping of China and Vladimir Putin of Russia.

America’s leadership around the world depends on our economic strength at home. Defaulting on our debts could cost the United States seven million jobs and throw our economy into a deep recession. Instead of the “arsenal of democracy” capable of outcompeting our rivals, dominating the industries of the future such as microchips and clean energy and modernizing our military, America would be hobbled.

Even setting aside this economic carnage, brinkmanship over the debt ceiling reinforces autocrats’ narrative that American democracy is in terminal decline and can’t be trusted.

Trust matters in international affairs. We frequently ask other nations to put their faith in the United States. Our military will be there to protect allies, our financial system is secure, and when we warn about compromised Chinese telecom equipment or an impending Russian invasion, we’re telling the truth. Threatening to break America’s promise to pay our debts calls all that into question.

Today America’s credibility will help determine whether nervous Europeans continue to stand with us and support Ukraine or seek an accommodation with an emboldened Russia. It could determine whether more Asian nations welcome American military bases and troops to deter Chinese aggression, as the Philippines recently did, or buckle to Beijing’s bullying.

There’s more. Playing games with the debt ceiling imperils the dollar’s pre-eminent position in the global economy and the power that gives the United States. . . . This is why Fareed Zakaria recently declared in a Washington Post op-ed that “the dollar is America’s superpower.”

It’s no surprise that Mr. Xi and Mr. Putin are eager to disrupt the dollar’s dominance and defang American sanctions. At their recent summit in Moscow, Mr. Putin suggested Russia may start selling oil around the world using Chinese yuan rather than dollars, which it is already doing for shipments to China.

If Congress keeps flirting with default, calls for dethroning the dollar as the world’s reserve currency will grow much louder — and not just in Beijing and Moscow. Countries all over the world will start hedging their bets.

It’s a sad irony that Mr. McCarthy and many of the same congressional Republicans seemingly intent on sabotaging America’s global leadership by refusing to pay our debts are also positioning themselves as tougher-than-thou China hawks. They talk a good game about standing up to Beijing, yet they are handing a major win to the Chinese Communist Party.

Republicans should stop holding America’s credit hostage, shoulder their responsibilities as leaders and raise the debt ceiling.

Once again, she is 100% correct.