Prof David Skeel of Penn on Federal lawlessness and state bankruptcy

When California, Illinois and probably New York go belly up the Federal government will once again break law after law on the basis of 'necessity' to bail out its profligate, corrupt deep blue outposts.  After all, it will be an 'emergency'.

With the presidential election just two years away, the pressure to bail out California, Illinois, and perhaps other states is about to become irresistible. As we learned in 2008 and 2009, it is impossible to stop a bailout once the government decides to go this route. The rescue of Bear –Stearns in 2008 was achieved through a “lockup” of its sale to JPMorgan Chase that flagrantly violated corporate merger law. To bail out Chrysler and General Motors, the government used funds that were only authorized for “financial institutions,” and illegally commandeered the bankruptcy process to give the car companies a helping hand. There is, in short, no law that will stop the federal government from bailing out profligate state governments like those in California or Illinois if it chooses to do so.

Once the state becomes central to everything, then the crises it creates justify any expedient to 'solve' them.  Of course they never really get 'solved' because the state remains in control, provoking crisis after crisis in a self perpetuating spiral downward until the whole rotten edifice collapses.  

Which isn't really that far away.