Dem Rep. Yarmuth in June: ‘We Can Pay Off Our National Debt Tomorrow with the Key Stroke’

EXCERPT:

YARMUTH: "Interestingly enough, CBO, the Congressional Budget Office, makes those [inaudible] standard forecasts, so basically carrying cost of the national debt is not going to increase significantly over the next 10 years because the interest rates are so low. Secondly, we choose to pay interest on the money that we borrow. We don’t have to do that. In other words, China owns a trillion dollars worth of our debt. We can say to China tomorrow, 'Okay, China, you have a trillion dollars here in an account for you. Do with it what you want, but you’re no longer going to get one percent of whatever on those treasures.' We have the ability to do that at any time, so we can pay off our national debt tomorrow with a key stroke, because people would still choose to trust the United States government with their money for safety reasons."