Washington – House Speaker John Boehner and his Republican deputies are in a fight to the buzzer to round up enough support to pass his deficit-reduction bill, as the House begins arguably the most harrowing series of votes in his tenure -- with the nation's borrowing power, the economy and everybody's interest rates in the balance.

As Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner said over the weekend, the administration did not expect Congress to come this close to the Aug. 2 deadline. That's the date when the country will no longer be able to pay all its bills without a debt-ceiling increase, according to Treasury, risking the possibility of default.

Barring the last-minute entrance of a compromise bill, there are only two options for skirting that deadline -- a Democratic bill in the Senate that Republicans deride as a "blank check" for President Obama, and Boehner's bill...

(CNSNews.com) – Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner oversaw the largest increase in the national debt of any Treasury secretary in American history, presiding over a $3.7 trillion increase in the debt.

According to data from the Treasury Department’s Bureau of the Public Debt, the national debt has increased $3,723,575,990,130.10 from Jan. 26, 2009 until June 30, 2011, Geithner’s entire tenure to date as Treasury secretary.

When Geithner took office the total national debt stood at $10.6 trillion. As of June 30, 2011, it had risen to $14.3 trillion...

(CNSNews.com) - Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said Tuesday that a deal to raise the legal debt limit, which he expects to be completed in the next few weeks, will be only a short-term “down payment” on solving the nation’s debt problem, and that it would be "irresponsible" to reduce the massive federal deficit anticipated over the next ten years with spending cuts alone.

What is needed, he said, is a longer-term deal on a “balanced framework” that includes “revenue increases through tax reform”...

The federal government will not need to shut down and could find ways to pay its obligations even if the debt ceiling is reached before a law is passed to raise it, congressional researchers told lawmakers at a recent briefing.

The Congressional Research Service briefing and two reports provided by Congress' investigative arm suggest the government could potentially limp along after Aug. 2, the date by which Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner says Washington has to raise the debt ceiling or face the possibility of default.

One CRS report outlined several options for paying the bills should the Treasury Department run out of ways to avoid crossing the $14.3 trillion threshold. The department currently is tapping federal retirement funds and using other maneuvers to keep U.S. finances in the safe zone, but those tactics are only short term. read more »

The pressure on lawmakers to strike a budget deal became even heavier Monday as the U.S. government bumped up against its $14.3 trillion debt ceiling, triggering a string of last-resort measures from the Treasury Department to keep the country from going into default.

Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner formally notified Congress Monday morning that the government would reach the statutory debt limit, forcing his department to suspend investments to two government employee retirement funds and "redeem a portion" of prior investments, a move the department claims will not affect federal workers.

The soft debt-ceiling deadline comes and goes as lawmakers from both parties continue to meet with White House officials in hopes of reaching a deficit-reduction agreement. Both sides say they're ready to deal, but they disagree over how much and what to cut. read more »

With a week to go until Congress returns from recess, Democrats and Republicans are hardening their positions on the debt ceiling. GOP leaders, with a growing number of lawmakers behind them, suggest they might let the federal government hit that cap unless their demands for spending cuts are met. And the White House is employing more dire rhetoric to explain why that can't happen.

"It would be terrible folly to play games with this," White House Press Secretary Jay Carney said. Asked about GOP lawmakers who suggest the economic impact of failing to raise the ceiling would not be as bad as the administration claims, Carney said those skeptics are "dead wrong."

The heightened warnings from both sides presage yet another drag-out budget fight to the last possible second, or beyond, once Congress returns from its two-week break. The federal government is expected to hit the $14.3 trillion debt limit by mid-May. read more »

Mark it on the calendar. The next big deadline in Washington is May 16, if not earlier.

Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner now estimates that the nation's debt ceiling will be reached no later than that date. In a letter to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, Geithner wrote that Congress must act in a matter of weeks to raise the limit or face a fiscal calamity potentially worse than the one from which the nation is recovering.

Geithner noted that the Treasury Department can take "extraordinary measures" to buy time -- about eight extra weeks, maximum -- after the May deadline. But he said once those measures are exhausted the U.S. government would not have enough money to pay its bills. Military salaries, Social Security payments and jobless benefits would cease, he warned, adding that a default on the debt would drive up interest rates, erode home values and cause a new financial crisis...

The Obama administration on Thursday told Congress the government is about to hit the $14.3 trillion debt ceiling and will need authority to borrow more, kicking off the first major test of spending restraint and the strength of Republicans' new congressional power.

Republicans said they won't agree to a higher debt limit unless Democrats agree to strict new spending controls. Democrats warned the GOP not "to play chicken" with the economy and said hitting the limit could be worse than the financial collapse of 2008.

"Never in our history has Congress failed to increase the debt limit when necessary," Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner said in a letter to Congress. "Failure to raise the limit would precipitate a default by the United States. Default would effectively impose a significant and long-lasting tax on all Americans and all American businesses and could lead to the loss of millions of American jobs"...

(CNSNews.com) – Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner admitted to the Senate Finance Committee Tuesday that the deficits the federal government will run in the foreseeable future are “alarmingly high,” but said the administration would still like to make some provisions of the stimulus bill permanent.

“There are limits to what the government can do now. Our deficits, as everybody says, are alarmingly high. read more »

Washington (AP) - Officials handling the multibillion dollar bailout of insurance giant American International Group Inc. mismanaged an initial rescue attempt and may have overpaid other banks to wind down AIG's business relationships, a government watchdog says.

The Federal Reserve Bank of New York -- headed at the time by now-Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner -- paid AIG's business partners full face value for securities so they would cancel insurance contracts AIG had written in order to ease the firm's liquidity crunch. But at least one of those partner banks offered to canceled the contracts for less, according to a report Monday from Neil Barofsky, the Special Inspector General for the $700 billion financial bailout Congress approved last October...