The latest debt limit hostage situation/drama reminds me of a story from my youth which has always struck me as illustrative of some very basic realities about human nature and responsibility. So here goes.
2/ Back when I was in 8th grade my friend Craig and I were teachers assistants in the Computer Science class. As near as I can tell this consisted of our getting class credit for hanging out in the comp sci classroom during an off period and goofing off. In theory I guess ...
3/ we did some assisting for the teacher, Mr. Cisco. But the story turns on the adjoining classroom. That was Mr. Yam's classroom, a somewhat legendary science teacher in the community. Mr. Yam had a lot of tall tales and his room was filled with like a million cages of various..
4/ animals: rabbits, gerbils, bugs, mice. The big one I remember was there was an iguana. That was a big attraction, the iguana. In any case, as I said, the main responsibility of the teacher's assistant was goofing off and doing stupid things. So somehow Craig and I ran out ...
5/ of stupid things to do in the comp sci room and started finding things to do in Mr. Yam's science classroom. Off period in both rooms. So no one there but us. Eventually Craig and I got into this pattern where I'd start opening the cages of the different animals and then ...
6/ Craig would have to capture them and put them back into their cages. Not surprisingly Craig eventually got tired of this happening each day and pledged that the next time he wouldn't recapture them and I'd have to do it. This was the beginning of a daily test of wills.
7/ Craig would tell me how he was done recapturing the animals. I would release them all again and wait. He'd lecture me about how he was calling my bluff. It wasn't his problem. He was done. Then we'd wait. He'd say I had to do it. He'd insist he wasn't going to do it.
8/ And the clock would tick. Pretty soon it would be next class period which would bring Mr. Yam and all the students back into the classroom with all the animals going wild. And I'd watch Craig start to get fidgety. Maybe a bead of sweat would form over his brow.
9/ Eventually of course he caved and rounded up all the animals. And of course the same thing happened again the next day and the next, each time with more confident or adamant or whatever claims that my reign of terror was over because he was done recapturing the animals.
10/ And each day the result would be the same. Now you're probably thinking, "Jesus, Josh, why were you such a transgressive little fuck?" And you'd be right to say that. My mom had died in a car wreck two years earlier and for a number of years I had this mischievous ...
11/ practical-joking side of my personality. Clearly I was acting out at some semi-sublimated level. But back to our story. I never flinched partly because I simply didn't give a fuck. But far more it was because I knew Craig and I knew he was an inveterate rule follower.
12/ He got good grades. He was responsible. He was from such a young age building a CV that would lead him to various of the best schools in the country. But back to our animals. I knew he would break. Because he was responsible. As the clock ticked down and the iguana was...
13/ running around back and forth with the mice and the gerbils and even the rabbit were zooming this way and that, it was too much for him. His responsibility was my license. His rule following allowed me to be a transgressive little fuck.
14/ And that's been the story of debt limit hostage taking for the last decade. Democrats care about the functioning of the government and recoil at the absolute horror of a national debt default - which actually violates the constitution. Republicans know this. They don't care.
15/ Critically, because they're transgressive little fucks who've been lighting fires throughout the house of state for years everyone takes this for granted about Republicans. Countless press write ups will describe this as a crisis for Democrats and barely mention ...
16/ Republicans because it's simply taken for granted that Republicans break things and Democrats clean up after them. So perhaps Democrats should decide just to let it happen to make a point or teach Republicans a lesson. But who are we kidding? Defaulting on the ...
17/ national debt is so catastrophic it's like lighting your own house on fire. Or perhaps like lighting your house on fire and your kids and your grandkids houses on fire too. It's so unimaginable they will never let that happen. GOPs know that so this will happen every time ...
18/ there's a Democratic president endlessly out into the future. Because Republicans are transgressive little fucks and being a transgressive little fuck gives you a paradoxical and vast power.
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