This was all completely predictable. The government is facing a massive fiscal crisis because House Speaker Kevin McCarthy is a lethal combination of excessive ambition and extreme weakness.
He was so desperate to win the House’s top job that he sold his soul to a group of hard right-wingers — even fellow Republicans called them the “Taliban 20.” One critical price he paid for their votes, after 15 fruitless ballots, was to promise a showdown over raising the debt ceiling: the limit on how much the government can borrow to pay its bills.
