Washington Unwilling to Face Debt Crisis

It certainly wasn't the first, but the elder President Bush's emphatic request to read his quivering lips about "no new taxes" — and the broken promise that followed — ended up being one of the more memorable instances of political takebacks in modern history.

After negotiations with the House and Senate stalled, Bush of course went ahead and raised taxes in order to reduce the national deficit and reach a 1990 budget agreement, a move that effectively ended his reelection chances when speechwriter Peggy Noonan's famous campaign zinger was used against him.

Someone should remind both President Obama and Congress that, like then, it's the economy, stupid. And voters are taking it seriously. For as they try to reach a deal on the debt ceiling, they seem as untrustworthy as George H.W. Bush was when he broke that fatal promise.

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