I'm drinking gin on a hot Saturday afternoon, putting on my 'Evil Obama' hat and playing 'You Choose' here at The Washington Post.
Imagine you are Obama.
You want to transform America into a European socialist welfare state. The Republicans are standing in your way. They want to freeze the debt ceiling where it is to deprive you of the opportunity to follow through with your dramatic spending increases, which have tripled the annual budget deficits.
The monthly revenue stream will leave you short by something around $125 billion on average without the freedom to sell new debt.
The people who will vote for you need to get their money in a government shutdown.
The people who will not vote for you anyway must not get theirs.
You'll make your choices, and when your enemies complain they're not getting their dough, you can plausibly blame the Republicans for tying your hands.
In the process you can destroy the full faith and credit of the United States and cut her down to size, and finish the (crony) capitalists once and for all.
You can end the wars and bring home the troops (saving tons of money and improving your popularity at the same time).
You can tank the economy and get sweeping powers to spend the trillions of dollars Paul Krugman wanted you to spend in the first place (on people who will vote for you).
Does he have the guts? Or does he just want to play golf for the rest of his life?
