National Debt: reason to vote out irresponsible incumbents.

In October, our national debt moved past the 8 Trillion dollar mark. Scary part is, it was just in Dec. of 2003, less than 2 years ago, that it moved past the 7 Trillion dollar mark.

And the current laws requiring spending already on the books, will put the national debt near 11 Trillion dollars by the end of Bush's 2nd term.

Bush came into office with a 5.65 Trillion dollar national debt. Only 1 Trillion spent can be traced to Iraq, 9/11, the hurricanes, and homeland defense. That leaves 1.5 Trillion spent so far on other things.

The Whitehouse which puts forth the budget, and the Congress which allocates the spending and revenues, are both completely out of control.

Tax and spend, cut taxes and spend, barrow and spend.
Tax and spend some more, cut taxes and spend some more, barrow and spend some more.
It's a never ending cycle. We just cann't afford to keep this up. If it's not stopped soon we're going to have a depression that's going to make the Great Depression of the 30's look like a mild recession.
While I'm not all the crazy about increasing taxes, it's beginnig to look like a tax increase will be necessary. But along with that tax increase we need spending cuts. We also need to quit barrowing every time we turn around.
If you or me ran our personal finances the way the politicians run this country's finances we'd be either bankrupted in very short order, or in jail, or both.

What's really scary, is how long it will take to pay down the $8 Trillion National Debt.

If we started 01-Jan-2006 to:
[1] stop borrowing $1 billion per day (used to pay the $1 billion per day for interest alone on the National Debt),
[2] and, started paying $1.003 billion per day (i.e. the payments must must exceed the daily interest, or the debt grows ever larger forever), it would take this long to pay down the $8 Trillion National Debt:

_____127 YEARS____ .

Look at the years column in the chart (i.e. click on 127 YEARS above). It would take until the YEAR: 2133 .

And, check out the accumalative interest on the Debt. It's a staggering $38 Trillion (in 2005 dollars). And, that's only if the interest rate doesn't increase. If it jumps a point (from 4.5% to 5.5%), the Debt payments must increase, and the total interest will increase, and the time to pay it off could increase.

Hell, that's not just dumping debt on our children, but their children, and their childrens' children, and their childrens' childrens' children.

So, just based on track record, who thinks our fiscally and morally bankrupt government has the discipline to even attempt to do that, much less actually ever do it (consistently, for 127 years)?

Countries and others investing in the National Debt may soon (if not already) start becoming a little nervous about that much debt, when you consider the fiscal irresponsibility of the federal government that continues to grow government to nightmare proportions, and has also grown the National Debt for 45 consecutive years (and almost every year for the last 60 years).

What if those investing in the National Debt start getting nervous, and stop loaning the U.$. $1 billion per day?
What if the nervous investors start dumping U.$. currency for other more stable currencies?
The U.$. can not default on the loan.
That would be more disastrous.
What will the federal government do?
They will do the only thing they can do.
They will print more money.
That's historically, what many fiscally troubled governments do. If the worst happens, you may need a wheel-barrow full of U.$. currency to just buy a loaf of bread, or a truck load for a gallon of gasoline.

Many economists think we can grow enough, immigrate enough tax payers, tax more, and print enough money to slightly bump up inflation, to shrink the debt. But, with globalization, increasing competition overseas, continuously falling manufacturing in the U.S., the falling dollar, a U.S. population with $40 Trillion in personal debt already, and an aging population (77 million baby boomers earning less, paying less taxes, spending less) drawing upon already troubled Social Security and Medicare systems, that type of growth, like seen after World War II is unlikely.

We need fiscal responsibility now, before the consequences of so much fiscal and moral bankruptcy, and our many pressing problems, combined, and growing worse every day, culminate to create a significant economic down-turn (or worse).

The federal government will not reform itself.
The People must now become responsible, and do their part, and do the one simple thing voters should have been doing all along, that is simple, easy, inexpensive, non-partisan, and provides the peaceful force required to incent government to be responsible too.

Vote Out Incumbents,
Repeatedly,
Every Election,
Until they become transparent, responsible, and accountable, and begin to address the serious problems that threaten the future and security of the nation.

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Based on your chart I wonder if our Great great great grandclildren will even be albe to pay it off of the intrest rate goes up. as it most likely will.

Incumbents control the purse strings. Incumbents are the problem. Getting VOID's message out is one thing we can all do. We must all look for opportunities to sell our idea in our daily activities. I spent a half hour on an operating table for minor surgery talking to the doctor and technician all about VOID.

The Dr. said "you, know, that makes a lot of sense". The technician said, "I didn't vote last time, but I will next time. I know who to vote for now." (meaning the challenger).

The scary thing for me is listening to how these incumbents talk about the debt. To them: It's no big deal. We can handle it.

It's time we send our government to fiscal rehab!

Stephanie,
Ain't that the truth!
That's because incumbents, that excel at some things, all failed Economics 101.
And Arithmetic too.
They don't even know how many zeroes are in $8 Trillion ( $8,000,000,000,000.00)
And, that will soon make a sudden jump ot $10 Trillion, due to looming shortfalls in the annaul bugdet, Medicare, prescription drugs, etc.
If they did know how many zeroes are in $8 Trillion, and how many centuries it would take to pay off that much debt, they'd probably all have a heart attack.

Hmmmmm....come to think of it. Maybe...that's an interesting plan.

Naahh. They won't be the ones to suffer the consequences. They've already got theirs (paid for by the tax payers). Many have become wealthy by virtue of only a few terms in Congress (from various sources, if you know what I mean). And, what about all those special perk$ and benefit$ , superior to other American citizens ?
And, when that's not enough, hell...just vote yourself a rai$e.
It's a hell of a deal ain't it. No wonder those incumbents seats are so coveted and why it's so hard to get rid of irresponsible incumbents. They're bought and paid for, and their big money donors want to keep them. 98% of the House incumbents retained their seats in 2002. 85% of Senators retainned their seats. The cost to unseat one of them is astronomical. I wonder how much money is spent annually keeping incumbents in office ? That would be an interesting study.

If they did know how many zeroes are in $8 Trillion, and how many centuries it would take to pay off that much debt, they'd probably all have a heart attack.

Hmmmmm....come to think of it. Maybe...that's an interesting plan.

It would definitely solve our incumbent problem wouldn't it?

Yeah, unfortunately it wouldn't solve the problem of rotten ethics in our government.