Paul warns failure to reduce debt will have global consequences

Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul warned again on Wednesday that failure to start reducing the federal debt will have dire consequences for both the United States and the rest of the world.

“I believe we’re in denial here in the Congress,” the Texas Republican said on the House floor. “If we had the vaguest idea of how serious this crisis is financially, not only for us but for the world, we’d cut spending, because you can’t solve the problem of debt by accumulating more debt.”

Paul, who has been less visible in Washington lately due to his campaign for the White House, blamed both parties for running up the debt when the country was perceived to be more wealthy. But now, he said, times have changed.

“If we don’t do something, we will be forced under very dire circumstances, because we cannot bail out the world,” Paul said.

“We’ve been downgraded, France is downgraded, Greece is downgraded, and we believe that all we have to do is spend more money and inflate the currency. Believe me, we ought to face up to reality and live within our limits.”

The GOP lawmaker deadpanned that the federal government’s overspending can at least be limited to two places.

“Where do we spend too much money? In two places: overseas and domestically.”

Paul’s comments were in the context of afternoon debate on President Obama’s request to increase the debt ceiling by $1.2 trillion. That increase is prescribed in last year’s Budget Control Act (BCA), although Paul, like other Republicans, argued that the measure gave Obama too much authority to raise the ceiling.

“This process is a really very mixed effort to try to curtail spending,” Paul said. “This power of the president to ask for a debt increase and then we have to get two-thirds of the Congress to prevent this from going up … this is a creature of Congress.”

The House is expected to vote on a resolution disapproving of Obama’s request later Wednesday evening.