Video: Obama's Kerry-esque Flip Flop on Debt Ceiling

In 2006, then Senator Barack Obama made quite the sound argument for not raising the debt ceiling. Then again, George W. Bush was president and arguing against Bush was more important. If you need a better example of how the Tea Party means what it says when it denounces the fiscal policies of George W. Bush, good luck finding it. In this case, many of them are actually saying they agree with the 2006 Obama. There's a small problem with that; we're facing the 2011 Obama.

Via ABC, here is what Obama said in 2006:

“The fact that we are here today to debate raising America’s debt limit is a sign of leadership failure,” he said. “It is a sign that the U.S. Government can’t pay its own bills. It is a sign that we now depend on ongoing financial assistance from foreign countries to finance our Government’s reckless fiscal policies. … Leadership means that ‘the buck stops here.’ Instead, Washington is shifting the burden of bad choices today onto the backs of our children and grandchildren. America has a debt and a failure of leadership. Americans deserve better. I therefore intend to oppose the effort to increase America’s debt limit.”

It's amazing what lengths ideologues will go to in order to be partisan. In an effort to oppose Bush - who was wrong - Obama made sense.

Now, however, in the wake of the Boehner-led budget deal 'cave,' Obama is saying that his opposition to raising the debt ceiling was a mistake. Here's Robert Gibbs's replacement, Jay Carney, giving America his best chicken little impersonation. Isn't it funny how whenever this government wants more money and runs into resistance, it plays the 'Armageddon' card?



He was not alone. Here is Harry Reid in 2006, decrying increased spending: