good name. this is real. when i hear people trying to downplay the consequences of that, i think that s really irresponsible. and i m happy to talk to any of them individually and walk them through exactly why it s irresponsible. if you stay tied to the harpoon rope, while the harpooned whale is diving to the bottom of the sea, you will die at the bottom of the sea. republican members of congress are not convinced. the harpoon is set, the rope is tied on and it turns out next week the whale is diving and it s really deep water. republicans increasingly have decided not just that they don t want to cut that rope, but that they don t need to. if you are captain john boehner, holding the whale boat hatchet looking at that rope right now, what do you do? joining us us now is allan krueger, he s an economics
downplay the consequences of that, i think that s really irresponsible. and i m happy to talk to any of them individually and walk them through exactly why it s irresponsible. if you stay tied to the harpoon rope while the harpooned whale is diving to the bottom of the sea, you will die at the bottom of the sea. republican members of congress are not convinced. the harpoon is set, the rope is tied on and it turns out next week the whale is diving and it s really deep water. republicans increasingly have decided not just that they don t want to cut that rope, but that they don t need to. if you are captain john boehner, holding the whale boat hatchet looking at that rope right now, what do you do? joining us us now is allan krueger, he s an economics professor, the former chief of economic advisors, thank you very much for being with us. my pleasure. i m sorry i had to introduce you with a long story involving
how does it affect the judgment of the captain if his crew is screaming at him and struggling with him that they don t want to be saved? because john boehner s crew, his republican caucus in congress increasingly does not want to be saved. they see no risk, why cut the rope when everything is going to be fine? this talk about default by the u.s. treasury is nonsense. we are not going to default on the public debt. republican congressman joe barton explaining that it is nonsense to worry about hitting the debt ceiling. republican congressman john flemming also does not think there is anything to worry about with the debt ceiling. he told the new york times, quote, economists, what have they been doing? they make all sorts of predictions, many times they are wrong, so i don t think we should run government based on
about whether or not he has the captain s wisdom and judgment on that ship. will he cut that line if he needs that line to be cut because they re all going to die if they don t? interesting fable, right? simple moral interesting fable. now we have a new problem on our ship. now we have a whole new modern twist that they never had to deal with on a 19th century ship. that is the crew does not think that the captain has to cut the rope ever, no matter what. turns out the crew is bonkers. the captain sees that the whale is ready to sound, go down to the bottom of the ocean and drag the whole boat down with them. the captain stands ready to cut the rope, but the whack do crew says we would rather go all way to the watery depths because we heard somewhere it will be no big deal. and we also heard the bottom of the sea is not all that bad a place to be this time of year and maybe we ll make friends with the giant squid.
now here s the thing. the harpoon has a rope attached to it and they tie the rope up to the boat. by virtue of that rope and that harpoon, that little whaling boat is now essentially tied to a very angry whale. which weighs what, like 40, 50, 60 tons and the whale because it has been stuck with a harpoon, inevitably takes off swimming. and because the boat is tied to it, the whale is towing it dragging our little 19th century crew in our little boat, across the waves, going more than 20 miles an hour. our whaling boat is essentially water skiing behind a wounded, furious, huge creature, a creature that is way bigger than them. when that creature ties out and they re able to complete the kill. our little crew is going to be the richer crew on the ocean tonight, they got their whale. but if something goes wrong,