Tennessee Gov. Bill Haslam believes we should face our national debt problem realistically. Instead, he says, politicians are playing an "incredibly serious game of chicken" as a partial federal default nears.
"Until Washington shows that we can live within our means and come to a political agreement about how to solve that," he said, "you're not going to see banks willing to loan money, you're not going to see people willing to invest their own capital, and so we won't have any job growth until that happens."
He's right, but the responsibility he urges is lacking in Washington.