How was Congress able to come up with $2 trillion so quickly? Where is the money coming from? On Friday, the House of Representatives, led by Speaker Nancy Pelosi ... waved away that question, preparing to rubber-stamp a $2 trillion Senate package aimed at staving off economic collapse. The details of the legislation - particularly the $500 billion, strings-optional corporate slush fund - may be shameful ... but the moment is instructive ... as it became clear that concerns about deficits and revenue had evaporated. Congress has ignored millions of people who have existed in a state of crisis for decades. The people of Flint, Michigan, (and elsewhere) still do not have safe drinking water. Millions of kids go hungry each day. There has been no multitrillion-dollar spending bill to combat these and other domestic emergencies. Instead, lawmakers have deprived communities of critical investments that could have attenuated their emergencies, often hiding behind the excuse that there isn't enough money in the budget to deal with problems like these. Congress is doing now what it could always have done. Uncle Sam can't run out of dollars. The U.S. government is the issuer of our currency - the U.S. dollar - which means that ... it can never find itself in a situation in which it has bills coming due that it can't afford to pay. If the votes are there, the money can always be made available. When all of this is behind us, to the extent that it ever can be, let's not forget what we've learned.