Republican Fiscal Credibility Is On The Line

The largest tea party group in America has come out forcefully in opposition to raising the debt limit, adding more pressure to House Republicans who can kill plans to permit deeper borrowing by the federal government and thus mandate the most dramatic government cuts in spending in decades.

Mark Meckler and Jenny Beth Martin, co-founders of the Tea Party Patriots, said in a statement, "Republican credibility as fiscally responsible managers of public resources is on the line" with the issue of the debt limit.

"In a matter of weeks, Congress will vote on whether to raise the nation's debt ceiling," they wrote. "The American people are united in saying 'no,' with recent polls indicating almost 70 percent of the American people opposed to this reckless action. Once again, congressional Republicans will have the opportunity to demonstrate to the American people that they are serious about bringing fiscal responsibility to Washington. Tea Party Patriots will be watching."

The tea party leaders said their group applied immense pressure to see that Republicans lived up to their pledge to cut an initial $100 billion from the budget. They called that "a good start" and a "first step."

"Now it is time to do the right thing by not raising the debt limit," they said. "The whole nation is watching."

Shock the Washington establishment by participating in the "No More Red Ink" campaign and shut down all new plans for bailouts, "stimulus" spending and even the funding for Obamacare.

More and more House Republicans are recognizing the biggest vote they will cast this year is on the question of whether to raise the debt limit because the new majority in the lower house can, by inaction alone, force the most dramatic spending cuts in American history.

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