(CNN) -- As a historian and a former speaker of the House who negotiated successfully through two government shutdowns, a successful welfare reform bill, the first tax cut in 16 years and four balanced budgets, I am offended and a little frightened by President Barack Obama's deliberate dishonesty about the debt ceiling.
On Wednesday, speaking to the Business Roundtable, Obama said:
"You have never seen in the history of the United States the debt ceiling or the threat of not raising the debt being used to extort a president or a governing party and trying to force issues that have nothing to do with the budget and nothing to do with the debt."
This is just plain false, and he knows it. That he would say something so factually false in a prepared text is very worrisome.
First of all, issues such as Obamacare don't have "nothing to do with the budget" and the idea that it is unusual for Congress to bring them into the debt ceiling debate is absurd. Far from having "nothing to do with the budget and nothing to do with the debt," Obamacare is a major part of the budget, and it is now projected to cost twice what the president promised.
The president's historical claim is completely wrong, as well. Let's set the record straight.
Debt ceilings have been used since President Dwight Eisenhower in the 1950s to enable conservatives to put limits on government spending.
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