Monday, February 21, 2011

The Fourteen Trillion Dollar Elephant In The Room

Fun-fact:  It would take you over 31,000 years to count to 1,000,000,000,000 (one trillion).  Our current National Debt as of typing this is more than fourteen times that amount.

The fact that we are here today to debate raising America's debt limit is a sign of leadership failure. It is a sign that the U.S. government can't pay its own bills. It is a sign that we now depend on ongoing financial assistance from foreign countries to finance the government's reckless fiscal policies. - Then Senator Barack Obama in 2006 on the Senate Floor

It's easy to stand on the floor of the Senate spouting rhetoric about debt and not do anything about it when not that many people are looking to you for answers.  When you are the captain of a sinking ship however, and refuse to do anything to help save the lives of your passengers, that's another story entirely.  Our President is spending money with no regard for the average American, which ultimately has to pick up the tab.

Most of today's debt accumulated over the past 6 years.  When George W. Bush was inaugurated on January 20th, 2001 the national debt was $5.7 Trillion.  In January 2005, when President Bush was starting his second term, the national debt stood at $7.6 Trillion.  When President Barack Obama was inaugurated on January 20th, 2009 the national debt stood at $10.6 Trillion.  Today it stands at roughly $14.16 Trillion.

These numbers are almost comical because they are so unbelievable.  Think about this for a moment…the government has added $8.46 Trillion to the national debt in the past 10 years.  This represents a $25,582 increase in what we owe.  That's right, "We The People."  The current debt now stands at $45,582 PER citizen, each and every one of us.  If you count only taxpayers, that's $127,804 per taxpayer!  How is this even possible?  Where does the Federal Government keep getting money to spend?  They get it from the very agency they created in 1913, the Federal Reserve, which prints our US Dollars and then loans them to the Federal Government at interest.

The dollar of 1913 is worth about 2 cents today.  When you create money out of thin air with nothing to back it one concern would be inflation.  Regardless if you are not seeing a tax increase written in black and white, if your dollar of yesterday is worth less tomorrow that is the same thing.  This debt is not sustainable, we should all be outraged at everyone in Washington for allowing this to happen.  They are stealing from us via inflation.

I will leave you with two quotes from Congressman Ron Paul of Texas from his book, End The Fed.   If you haven't had a chance to read it, or are unfamiliar with the power that the Federal Reserve wields at our expense, I highly recommend you read the book.

History will show that Greenspan, during his years as Fed chairman (1987-2006), planted all the seeds of the financial calamity that erupted in 2007 and 2008. For the same reason a disease cannot be cured by more of the germ that caused it, the inflation and debt accumulation of the Obama years will not inflate our way out of it. This depression will likely last and last. If the depression lasts a decade of more, its length cannot be blamed solely on Greenspan. That blame will be placed on the current Federal Reserve Board, Congress, the President, the Treasury, but above all on Keynesian economic policy, the same philosophy that gave us the Great Depression of the 1930s. - Ron Paul, End The Fed, page 94. 

Politicians must justify their existence in managing the affairs of the state. They first create the problems and then they are delighted with all the activity in expanding government and solving the very problems they created. - Ron Paul, End The Fed, page 110.

In the time it has taken you to read this blog, the Federal Government has spent another $7,000,000.

-M

2 comments:

  1. The average american has no concept of how this stuff even works.... Therefore this pyramid scheme will continue play out and the people currently in power will continue to spend our children's money.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Indeed. In today's news: Federal, state and local debt exceeds size of entire economy...

    ReplyDelete