Congress raises the national debt ceiling to 14 trillion dollars and hardly blinks in doing so. This unfathomable act of malcontent toward the American people is reprehensible. It may not matter in 2012 when Obama is up for re-election. Our country may have already been delcared bankrupt by the world.
Kissimmee Examiner had this article online yesterday.
Despite a national debt that already exceeds $12 trillion, Barack Obama is poised to sign a bill currently working its way through Congress that would raise the debt ceiling another $1.8 trillion. This would bring the new debt ceiling to almost $14 trillion.
In addition to increasing the ceiling for national debt, Congress is also in the process of passing an omnibus spending bill that will cost taxpayers $447 billion. Included in this omnibus spending bill are over 5,000 earmarks totaling close to $4 billion.
When will this madness stop?
Just to recap, let’s look at how much we have already spent in little over one year under a Congress lead by Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid.
$141 billion in TARP funds (if Barack Obama decides he would like to spend the $200 billion dollars of TARP money that has been leftover—as he has indicated that he would like to do—the actual cost would increase to $341 billion … so much for trying to reduce the national debt)
$30 billion to bailout auto manufacturers
$410 billion for the first omnibus spending bill of 2009
$787 billion for the Obama stimulus (some economists put the potential 10 year cost of this stimulus at $3.27 trillion)
$3 billion for “cash for clunkers” (or $24,000 per car)
And there’s more to come. If Congress passes health care reform, it will likely cost taxpayers at least another $849 billion.
The amount of spending going on in Washington is staggering. So much so that it is easy to become numb to another $100 billion here or another $1 trillion there. But we must remember all of this spending will have consequences. Even if all of this spending provides a short term boost to our economy, it will almost certainly have long term consequences that will be disastrous—at least for our children and grandchildren, who will be stuck paying our tab.
With our elected officials in Washington again asleep at the wheel, it is up to the American people to alter the course of the nation before we are all driven off of a cliff. Buckle up for a bumpy ride.
Related posts: