Debt Ceiling Stuff

Balkinization has some good posts on the debt limit.

Sandy Levinson asks Will Obama drive us over the cliff while proclaiming his constitutional purity?.

"So are we going to go over the cliff, with Obama, the legendary former professor of constitutional law at the University of Chicago and president of the Harvard Law Review, saying, like Buchanan, "I know this is terrible, but what do you expect me to do, since I've sworn to uphold the Constitution?" Or will he, like Lincoln (and other predecessors), decide that driving over the cliff in the name of constitutional fidelity, when faced with a Congress that is traducing their own such duties, isn't really such a great idea? If that is the decision, will he do by becoming, almost uniquely, a Type I "constitutional defier" (violating the Constitution in order to save the American order, which Michael Stokes Paulsen argued, incidentally, was a power given by the Oath of Office, which is how he defended Abraham Lincoln and, more recently, George W. Bush). Or will he, like most political leaders, decide that there might be some merit in the Section Four argument for presidential authority after all, whatever grade it would receive from his mentor at the Harvard Law School?

As Jack argues, incidentally, it is vital that Obama begin to educate the public about the unconstitutional behavior of his Republican adversaries, and if there is anything we seem to know about him, it is that he will be extremely reluctant to do so. But without such attempts at public education, preferably in a nationwide address addressed to the greatest potential crisis since September 11, he allows all of this to be reduced to "pure politics," with the Constitution serving only as a "suicide pact." Will that be his legacy to American constitutionalism?"

Larry Tribe posts two letters on the constitutionality of the debt ceiling.

Finally Sandy Levinson writes An anecdote from almost 50 years ago in which he describes his reaction to the Cuban Missile Crisis at the time and now. It's short and very much worth a read. "I will let all of you make any applications you wish to the present Debt Limit Crisis."