Economists at Davos

Nobel prize winning economist Joseph Stiglitz, who is also at Davos, said that while he is worried about some of the US states debt problem, he thinks debt may not be as bad as some people think. In fact, Stiglitz would even be for increasing our debt even more. As long as it was spent on things like infrastructure and education, which can produce jobs, and boost incomes. So there is a debt cliff, but the US may not be there yet.

Stiglitz wants to increase the %500 billion in student loans, 40% of which are likely to default. probably infrastructure to Obama is the Choo Choo train, the construction of which will drive up oil imports and crash the private sector. HSR also causes unequal development, taking from the state that need the money and wasting it on mainly the Washington DC corridor.

Notice he is talking at Davos where the underlying model is extend and pretend to keep the bankrupt banks from defaulting.
Alternative view:

In that backdrop, the US debt seems bad. At a dinner of economists on Wednesday night, economist Carmen Reinhart predicted that the US was headed toward a crisis where we would be forced to cut many of our social services.

Here the model is to watch carefully and take out the money before the banking collapse.

Notice that the Stiglitz model assumes we never had a Tea Party victory, so he will argue the 'If we had done this" thing when it is all over.