The debt ceiling is a blame shifting diversion at best and a serious threat to the global economy at worst. America must be able to pay its bills, and mandated spending without sufficient tax increases should imply permission to borrow.

We got along fine without a debt ceiling before 1917 and we are the only democratic country with one aside from Denmark. It does not constrain spending but only prevents paying for what Congress already bought.

Some recent history from the 2015 article The House leadership fiasco shows we need to eliminate the debt ceiling once and for all:

Everyone agreed on how insane it would be to default — until Obama became president and the Tea Party achieved its victories in 2010, bringing in a new generation of Republicans who were not only incredibly conservative, but also uninterested in governing. They saw maximal confrontation as their very purpose for coming to Washington. And there lay the debt ceiling, a weapon so dangerous nobody had seriously considered using it before. So they forced crises — in 2011, again in 2013, and possibly again now — pushing America to the brink of default.

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