$10.1-trillion national debt? Let's cut taxes!
Even when trying to save the economy, Congress can't resist its pork addiction.
Even before the current financial crisis, a federal budget deficit of nearly $500 billion was projected for next year. Now an additional $700 billion has been committed to bailing out Wall Street, not to mention as much as $200 billion for mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
So what do our friends in Washington do? They cut taxes to the tune of about $110 billion for everyone from companies that make wooden arrows for kids to Caribbean rum distillers.
Yeah, I get it: Those profiles in courage running Congress couldn't find the political backbone to do the right thing for the country unless they sweetened the deal with a bunch of pork-barrel gimmes for their constituents.
But these bozos took a lousy situation and made it exponentially worse by running up the nation's credit card bill at a time when fiscal prudence is the order of the day.
Not only have taxpayers been made responsible for the excesses of big banks. Our kids and grandkids will now be on the hook for trillions of dollars in debt that we owe the Japanese, the Chinese and a number of less savory lenders.
"The national debt is like a fat guy in a small boat," said Robert E. Wright, an economics professor at New York University and author of "One Nation Under Debt: Hamilton, Jefferson and the History of What We Owe."
"The more debt you load on, the closer to the water line you get. Pretty soon, it takes only a small wave to sink you."
Thanks to the bailout bill approved by the House and Senate last week, the nation's borrowing limit has been raised to $11.3 trillion from $10.6 trillion. As of Friday, the national debt stood at $10.1 trillion -- about $33,500 owed by every man, woman and child.
To put some perspective on how out of control our borrowing has become, it took the country about 200 years to run up its first trillion dollars in debt. Then President Reagan took office in 1981 and the national debt started to soar, quadrupling to $4 trillion by the time the first President Bush exited the White House.
Under President Clinton, the national debt grew to $5.7 trillion, and has since nearly doubled on Bush Jr.'s watch.
Put another way, the country's debt load represented just a third of gross domestic product when Reagan arrived in Washington. By the time Bush gallops back to Texas in January, our debt will represent about 70% of the overall economy.
