LET'S SAY WE DO HONOR OUR DEBTS W/O RAISING THE DEBT CEILING

(h/t The Daily Howler)
The NY Times article from which I took the chart below offers this analysis:

Pulling the plug on one or more of the Treasury’s automated payment systems might be one way to reduce spending, analysts have said. “The way that they are set up, they can either be set to ‘on’ or ‘off,’ ” Credit Suisse analysts said in a note to clients. “A system either makes all of its payments, or it doesn’t make any at all.”

Breaching the debt ceiling would mean that the Treasury would be forced, in effect, to balance the government’s budget. It would need to refrain from sending out about 30 percent of the government’s payments until Congress raised the ceiling again — enough to tip the economy into a recession in a matter of days or weeks, many economists say.