Rohan Grey, Assistant Professor of Law at Willamette University, joins Money on the Left to discuss his urgent new paper, "Digitizing the Fisc." During our conversation, we recount the events surrounding Elon Musk & the DOGE boys’ unconstitutional takeover of the Treasury's Bureau of Fiscal Service, while explicating the right-wing theory of the "unitary executive" that underwrites such actions. Next, we analyze the structural deficiencies and choke points in the current Congressional appropriation process that have made DOGE's illegal interventions possible. Turns out, the US fiscal process involves several readily exploitable weaknesses, making it somewhat akin to the almighty Death Star's unprotected thermal exhaust port in Star Wars (1997). Finally, we consider Grey's proposal for a more streamlined, distributed, and democratic digital architecture for coordinating federal expenditures. Building legal concepts and procedures into the very materiality of digital design, this alternative system not only secures Congress's constitutional spending power against authoritarian interference and impoundment. It also unbundles fiscal policy from public debt management, making clear to the world that legislative action does not redistribute extant funds, but rather creates money afresh every time Congress votes to spend.
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Music by Nahneen Kula: www.nahneenkula.com
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