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Congressman blocks trillion-dollar coin idea
Oregon Republican Congressman Greg Walden has introduced a bill outlawing trillion-dollar debt-paying platinum coins.
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This final note today, about the numismatics of the debt ceiling crisis that's gonna be upon us as soon as the Treasury Department runs out of money mid-February or early March sometime.
We told you Friday about the trillion-dollar platinum coin, a semi-tongue-in-cheek drive to get the Treasury Secretary to mint just a single coin, made of platinum, decide that it's worth a trillion dollars and then use it to backstop all our debt.
Well, it was a good idea while it lasted. Oregon Republican Congressman Greg Walden has introduced a bill outlawing trillion-dollar debt-paying platinum coins.
Absurd and dangerous, he called the idea. No real appreciation for tongue-in-cheek, either, I guess.
In this story you said "It was an interesting idea while it lasted".
This framing makes NO SENSE. Your statement implies a law has been passed that precludes what was possible before. But no such law has passed, and it is not reasonable to expect that such a law ever will exist. A legislator's "proposal" doesn't even mean his bill will ever even get discussed in a commitee, let alone voted on as a bill. Indeed, even if the house passed such a bill, we know the senate has no reason to even consider it, let alone pass it. AND, even if both houses of congress passed it, there is no reason to believe the president would sign it into law. Furthermore, any future republicon administration will never limit their own power this way, as "selfish hypocrasy" is the first core belief of that party.
As a journalist, you should have already known all of this basic civics. Instead of creating the false impression that this has already happened, you should have informed your audience that this is certain to fail.
