Unless they sold already and plan to buy back in after the dip and just before announcing a compromise? It's hardly rocket science...

That's only true if you think they value money more than power. If power is what they care about more, then they could absolutely believe that creating chaos could be more to their advantage. Given the global rise in authoritarianism, and given that in times of trouble people shift toward favoring authoritarians, it's entirely plausible to me that there are political actors who will create the problems that they then claim they will solve.

Isn't that a "king of the ashes" scenario?

Not necessarily. Take the "heighten the contradictions" types, who believe in either not remediating or even increasing the pain of current societal dysfunctions. They believe that after a blowup and revolution, things will be better.

You see a fair bit of that sort of logic on the right lately. Saletan's "The Corruption of Lindsey Graham" [1] documents the shift nicely, with Graham going from a senator who believed in democracy and inter-party comity to one who says Democrats "hate us" and "want to destroy us", claiming "there’s nothing they won’t do". Or look at Trump calling for the "termination of all rules, regulations, and articles, even those found in the Constitution".

In that context, political actors can claim and might even believe that saving America from the boogeymen might require making things worse before they step in to put things right.

[1] https://specialto.thebulwark.com/p/the-corruption-of-lindsey...

Yes? And?

Do you ever wonder why it is that politicians that are, at least nominally, ultimately responsible for signing $6.3 trillion in checks every year only manage to enrich themselves to the tune of a few dozen millions at best? The fry cook at McDonalds gets a larger share of the overall take.

I have two possible explanations. 1) Our politicians are remarkably morally virtuous, and there is virtually no graft and corruption whatsoever. 2) Our politicians are front-men for the actual powers that be and are compensated on a model similar to WWE superstars. In the latter case it's the financial interests of the PTB that will control, not those of the politicians.

Thought experiment: If you were running things would you A) Put your face and name on the power structure or B) Hire goons to do that?

> you were running things would you A) Put your face and name on the power structure or B) Hire goons to do that

Power withers in secret. The history of leaders who tried to do this is getting stabbed by their Janissary.

Care to elaborate? What would the effect on the stock market be and why?

Bonds are basically like high-denomination dollar bills with a small "coupon" interest payment stapled to them. The interest can be ignored and then we just treat them like money. As all big financial institutions do. They're the "risk free" place to store money. Which is why Circle (via Blackrock) are holding so many in the first place.

Now, what happens if the US defaults, even technically-defaults (missing just one payment) and all this "money" held by financial institutions is suddenly "not money"? Or "maybe not money"?

I would expect a majority of US banks to be in FDIC resolution the next day. As bank stocks fall off a cliff, they start taking the rest of the economy with them. Things would rapidly outstrip the existing ability of the system to absorb small crises. It would look like Cyprus in 2008.

good explanation

> Both republicans and democrats are heavily invested in the US stock market which would collapse if US defaults

The effects of a technical default will be more insidious. It's unlikely to prompt a sustained pullback in prices. But it will work its way into funding costs in the long term. (We've already seen that over the last decade from the last time the GOP did this.)