At his first press conference since March, President Obama said that if his daughters can complete their homework ahead of time, without having to pull all-nighters, then Congress should be able to figure out how to raise the debt ceiling without bumping up against a deadline. He could also have mentioned that Sasha and Malia don’t need to ask for extensions.
But that’s exactly what seems to be happening with so-called hard-and-fast deadlines on when to raise the debt ceiling. The deadline was recently pushed from early July to August 2, but there have even been talks about the August date being “artificial.” And while senior White House adviser David Plouffe said there is nothing random about the date, he wouldn’t say with 100 percent certainty that it wouldn’t change.
“It's a real date,” Plouffe said on NBC’s Today show Thursday morning. “We're in the danger zone now.”
While he said the date is “real,” he also mentioned that there would be “additional guidance tomorrow or next week” from Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner.
But Plouffe was quick to say that the time is now for action.
“If the United States of America does not pay the bills, it would have catastrophic implications on the economy,” he said. He then echoed a portion of Obama’s words from Wednesday, saying, “These economic problems didn't happen overnight.... They’re not going to be solved overnight.”
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