Federal legislators as high wire daredevils walking a tightrope above the Grand Canyon deck without a net have never mastered the fall.

There are only two ways to fall: To the left of the wire or to the right of the wire. It is always a question of balance to avoid a fall and survive.

A controlled fall to the left is “controlled inflation,” raising of the debt ceiling, printing fiat money and concomitant prices rising, which they’ve learned pretty well starting around 1967.

Since 1913, the date of the organization of the Federal Reserve Bank by an act of Congress, the dollar has consistently fallen in value on average.

Numismatically that 1913 gold-backed dollar, specie money, is very valuable, a rarity you know, but that 1913 dollar’s purchasing power can now by one cent of stuff.

A controlled fall to the right of the wire is “controlled deflation” and is what those legislators do not know how to control. And what recently the Republican Congress has tried to effectuate.

How can one unprint money? (Withdraw money from circulation, while increasing real growth, a nice trick they do not know how to accomplish). Or how can one lower the debt ceiling? (Pay off the sovereign debt, etc.).

It is the unbalance between “controlled inflation,” virtually known, and “controlled deflation,” virtually unknown, that is the main problem of today, a very serious problem.

Take note: Those two virtualities above are very important qualifiers and are ambiguities fraught with danger.

A 90-day extension is the definition of “kicking the can down the road.”