No, really, the debt ceiling is stupid and must die

This is Bloomberg Opinion Today, a space rock of Bloomberg Opinion’s opinions. Sign up here.Today’s Agenda The debt ceiling is stupid and sh [Bloomberg]( Follow Us [Get the newsletter]( This is Bloomberg Opinion Today, a space rock of Bloomberg Opinion’s opinions. [Sign up here](. Today’s Agenda - The [debt ceiling is stupid and should die](. - Good luck [making 2022 predictions](. - Hurt [Putin with this one weird trick](. - Maybe the [Treasury market is too big](. Flirting With Disaster Back in October, an asteroid the size of a Frigidaire passed within 1,800 miles of Earth, or about the distance from New York City to Denver. It was small, but it was scary because it came from the direction of the sun, so we [didn’t see]( it until it was just four hours away. Had it been a civilization-killer, we might have had just enough time to binge-watch a few more episodes of “Yellowstone” before we started pushing our belongings around in [grocery carts](. Alas, [space rocks]( zip by this planet all the time. Sometimes they are civilization-killers, which is why humans run the world today and not our predecessors, the [Sleestaks](. Fortunately, the world’s best minds, and also Elon Musk, are working on the problem, shooting [rockets]( at asteroids to fend off such disasters. If only Congress could be as forward-thinking about a far-more-predictable catastrophe menacing the global economy. I’m talking, [once again](, about the U.S. debt ceiling, a construct more pointless and wasteful than David Siegel’s [Versailles](. If the U.S. ever breaches this ceiling and fails to pay its debts, then it really would be belongings-in-grocery-carts time. Despite many close calls over the years, Congress has dodged such a disaster time and time again. It did so just yesterday, with a bipartisan agreement to kick the risk down the road to 2023. Jonathan Bernstein has a suggestion, though: [Why not just kill the debt ceiling?]( Unlike asteroids, which are solid rocks flung at us from deadly space, the debt ceiling is a stupid law, just sitting there on stupid paper. It could be eradicated not with a SpaceX rocket but with the stroke of a pen. Democrats could do it under reconciliation. They could jam it into the Build Back Better policy tofurkey that might pass before Christmas. What a holiday surprise that would be, one that doesn’t involve [burning Christmas trees](. But it probably won’t happen: For some mysterious reason, congresspeople fear eliminating the debt ceiling more than they fear voting for multiple trillion-dollar spending bills in a year. Disaster still looms. Nobody Knows Anything One fun thing about markets is that for the most part nobody knows anything, and predictions are usually garbage. But every holiday season we get together and make them anyway, knowing they’re as ephemeral as a [Fox Christmas tree](. This year is [even more impossible than usual for market predictions](, writes John Authers, with Covid shape-shifting all over the place, but more importantly sky-high inflation making a hash of value calculations. That should also make the Fed and other central bankers [toss their useless inflation forecasts]( now, writes Dan Moss. At the very least, the Fed will likely surprise markets at its upcoming meeting by [raising its interest-rate forecasts]( higher than traders expect, writes Bill Dudley. This could be one of those [burning-tree](-type surprises. So You Want to Punish Russia A far less preventable disaster than a debt-ceiling breach is a Russian invasion of Ukraine. Leonid Bershidsky has [suggested]( Vladimir Putin won’t bother with this and risk the Nord Stream 2 pipeline. But President Joe Biden can’t just rely on that hope. And unfortunately, the sanctions the West has already used to punish Russia for its many misdeeds, from invading Crimea to hacking the 2016 election, haven’t hurt much. But Marcus Ashworth and Brian Chappatta suggest the U.S. could really wield the power of the dollar by [clamping down on foreign transactions in Russian debt](. This would be a targeted dose of extreme financial pain that wouldn’t hurt average Russians. Bonus Russian-Opposition Reading: New German chancellor [Olaf Scholz is a proud Smurf](. Is he up to the challenges of Russia and Covid? — Andreas Kluth Telltale Charts More and more people are [holding more and more Treasury bonds](, which could be a problem for trading, writes Paul J. Davies, especially when everybody wants to cash out of them at once. [European asset managers had a bad year](, and next year could be worse, writes Mark Gilbert. Further Reading The EU and U.K. must work together to [solve their shared migrant crisis](. — Bloomberg’s editorial board Mandating Covid boosters would [undermine public trust in the basic shots](. — Faye Flam The SEC is [right to target spring-loaded options](, which can enrich executives with inside information. — Michelle Leder [We can’t let cash die until]( we have central bank digital currencies ready to protect consumers. — Andy Mukherjee There’s enough [room in the crypto universe for Bitcoin]( and some of its many rivals. — Jared Dillian China has [unexpected things to teach us about democracy](. — Clara Ferreira Marques and Matthew Brooker ICYMI A third Pfizer shot might [take care of omicron](. The U.K. will be [working from home again](. Area [banker quits for a startup](, becomes a billionaire. Kickers Museum T. rex gets a [nice Christmas sweater](. (h/t Ellen Kominers) [Camels kicked out of Saudi beauty contest]( for using Botox. (h/t Mike Smedley) Gravitational waves should [permanently scar space-time](. Adult dogs can [understand up to 215 words and phrases](. Notes:  Please send Christmas sweaters and complaints to Mark Gongloff at mgongloff1@bloomberg.net. [Sign up here]( and follow us on [Twitter]( and [Facebook](. Like Bloomberg Opinion Today? [Subscribe to Bloomberg All Access and get much, much more](. You’ll receive our unmatched global news coverage and two in-depth daily newsletters, The Bloomberg Open and The Bloomberg Close. Before it’s here, it’s on the Bloomberg Terminal. Find out more about how the Terminal delivers information and analysis that financial professionals can’t find anywhere else. [Learn more](. You received this message because you are subscribed to Bloomberg's Bloomberg Opinion Today newsletter. [Unsubscribe]( | [Bloomberg.com]( | [Contact Us]( [Ads Powered By Liveintent]( | [Ad Choices]( Bloomberg L.P. 731 Lexington, New York, NY, 10022