"Could Obama just ignore the debt ceiling?"

Catherine Rampell at NYT's Economix:

In the ongoing debate over raising the debt ceiling, one option has not had much prominence: whether the Obama administration could ignore it altogether, and just spend the money it owes anyway. Would that be legal?

Matthew Zeitlin at The New Republic spoke with a few political scientists, budget wonks and constitutional scholars who argue that it would be.  An excerpt:

Garrett Epps, a legal journalist and professor at University of Baltimore School of Law, has made an even broader argument in a pair of articles for The Atlantic’s website. In an interview, Epps told me that there was a strong argument that the debt ceiling is unconstitutional because it exceeds the legislative branch’s power of the purse. The argument goes like this: Because Congress already appropriated the funds in question, it is the executive branch’s duty to enact those appropriations. The debt ceiling, then, is legislative “double-counting,” because the executive branch is obligated to spend the money Congress appropriates, without having to go back and ask again for permission.

Of course, ignoring the debt ceiling could have some severe political consequences, especially since most Americans do not seem to realize that doing so primarily requires making good on payments already promised, as opposed to committing to new spending. That may explain why most Americans still are against raising the ceiling.

Jonathan Chait at New Republic adds this to the discussion of simply invoking Constitutional authority to "ignore" the debt ceiling:

Indeed, it's not even clear that the Republican leadership actually wants the enormous and destructive power it now demands. Its base may be demanding a debt ceiling showdown, out of specific opposition to Obama and general ignorance of how the debt ceiling works. But John Boehner knows full well that we can't just ignore the debt ceiling. If Obama successfully asserts the power to ignore the debt ceiling vote, then he'll allow the debt negotiations to proceed in a less fraught environment, and have defused a massive source of ongoing political instability. Cutting a deal to lift the debt ceiling may soothe the markets more in the short term, but it merely pushes the political risk further back.

This is a daring concept. I don't have anything to add to the issue of political or legal ramifications. I am simply left wondering why such a fundamental recognition that this entire "debate" may be rooted in ignoring that the Constitution mandates the full faith and credit of the US Treasury has never been discussed before the GOP's hyper-politicized, hostage-taking approach to the issue.  Have we been watching an extra-Constitutional Kabuki whenever the debt-ceiling has been raised - as it always has been? Is the GOP simply engaged in destructive mind-games that are an attempt to contravene what the Constitution already mandates?