An Ignoble Experiment: GOP is blocking an easy fix to the debt disaster

By Liza Hearon

TOP STORIES

Wednesday, Sept. 29

THERE'S A REALLY SIMPLE WAY TO FIX THE DEBT CEILING MESS Congressional Democrats could raise the debt ceiling on their own, as Republicans have been insisting, if the GOP just lets the Democrats vote in the Senate without filibustering. But there's only one problem: Republicans prefer to make the act of raising the debt ceiling as painful as possible in protest of Democrats' social spending and climate proposal, the Build Back Better Act. [HuffPost]

WHY DON'T DEMOCRATS JUST DITCH THE DEBT CEILING? The U.S. government will fail to pay its bills come Oct. 18, potentially causing an economic crisis, unless Congress raises a legal limit on how much the Treasury Department can borrow. If Democrats have to deal with it themselves, why don't they just abolish the limit while they're at it? [HuffPost]

JUDGE WONDERS HOW 'LAW-ABIDING' AMERICANS 'MORPHED INTO TERRORISTS' ON JAN. 6 A federal judge accepting a misdemeanor guilty plea from a woman who said she wanted to shoot House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) "in the friggin' brain" during the Capitol attack wondered aloud how many law-abiding Americans like her had "morphed into terrorists" on Jan. 6. The judge called Dawn Bancroft's comments "outrageous." [HuffPost]

BRITNEY SPEARS DOCUMENTARIES CAN'T MATCH HER OWN WORDS Ahead of a hearing today on whether the conservatorship of Britney Spears will come to an end, Hulu, Netflix and CNN all have documentaries about the pop star. But nothing in the entire saga has been as powerful as hearing Spears' own testimony, Marina Fang writes. [HuffPost]

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WHAT'S BREWING

SENATE FINALLY SIGNALS ACTION ON VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN ACT The Senate is finally showing signs that it's ready to move forward with renewing the Violence Against Women Act, something it has failed to do since the law's authorization lapsed in 2019. HuffPost has learned there's a hearing related to the issue scheduled for next Tuesday. [HuffPost]

WHY THE $3.5 TRILLION SPENDING PLAN ISN'T SO UNPRECEDENTED President Joe Biden's Build Back Better agenda includes a variety of major initiatives, such as a quasi-universal child care program and dental coverage for Medicare recipients. It's definitely huge in scope, but if you compare it with reforms of the Great Society and New Deal, or to peer countries across Western or Northern Europe, you get a different perspective, writes Jonathan Cohn. [HuffPost]

GABBY PETITO'S DAD SAYS OTHER CASES DESERVE SAME ATTENTION The parents of missing 22-year-old Gabby Petito thanked everyone who helped make progress on their daughter's case, but her father urged reporters and internet sleuths to give similar cases the same treatment, touching on the national conversation about why missing people of color don't attract the same level of attention. In other developments, an attorney for Brian Laundrie, Petito's missing boyfriend, revealed that Laundrie went camping with his parents after he arrived home from a roadtrip without Petito. [HuffPost]

PROGRESSIVES RAGE AFTER PELOSI 'BETRAYAL' Progressive lawmakers erupted after House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) walked back a key pledge she made to her party months ago ― that all of Biden's legislative agenda would move through Congress at the same time. The Congressional Progressive Caucus is threatening to revolt if Democratic leaders don't make good on their promises. [HuffPost]

MAGA FAN BEHIND ARIZONA AUDIT CRUSHES CONSPIRACY THEORY Cyber Ninjas CEO Doug Logan denied a right-wing conspiracy theory that he called to "decertify" the 2020 election results in a secret report as a result of his findings in Maricopa County, where a partisan audit of the results was conducted. Logan's firm found that Biden actually won the election by a slightly larger margin than is reflected in the county's official results. [HuffPost]