Topher Morrison
Compromise, the predictable spawn of divided government - hailed as progress and a testament to democracy. The nation has been held hostage by the debt crisis over the past month amidst a barrage of countervailing sound bytes from both sides of the isle and obnoxious CNN digital countdowns to default, and for what?
We are being led down a seemingly inevitable path, by our leaders, to credit downgrade, irreversible economic malaise, perpetual political tumult and loss of international leadership. The 2.4 trillion in "cuts" proposed by Washington should return us to 2004 spending levels, albeit in 2021 and if they were real, but they almost immediately could give us the largest debt-limit increase in US history! How can Washington be serious about tightening its belt when it apparently plans to create a bigger one?
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| Like shooting BBs at a battleship, "cutting" 2.4 trillion over a decade wont take down this Leviathan. Graph made by usgovernmentspending.com |
The federal government has doubled its expenditures over the last decade and now the president and Capitol Hill want us to believe they'll reduce spending to 2004 levels? They actually want us to believe that they have flipped the political universe on its head and turned the tide of the past decade. According to Ron Paul (R-Texas) today:
"Why has our budget doubled in 10 years? This country doesn't have double the population, or double the land area, or double anything that would require the federal government to grow by such an obscene amount. In Washington terms, a simple freeze in spending would be a much bigger "cut" than any plan being discussed."
Conservatives decry the compromise over cutting spending on our worldwide police force and not tackling entitlements, while liberals/progressives lament the lost opportunities to saddle the rich with an even higher proportion of tax burden and to incorporate newer environmental regulations.
I'll put it this way, growth in government perpetuated by both parties has led us to this atmosphere of hyper-politicization. When government usurps the lifeblood of a nation in ever-increasing amounts the people have no choice, but to argue over how it is spent. This is not a fight over a specific program, but a clash of reality and the ideologies that grew government for the last 100 years. The palatable national stress is the due to our collective cognitive dissonance! If taxing, rampant spending, printing money out of thin air, and economic oppression continues our republic will fall.
I'll put it this way, growth in government perpetuated by both parties has led us to this atmosphere of hyper-politicization. When government usurps the lifeblood of a nation in ever-increasing amounts the people have no choice, but to argue over how it is spent. This is not a fight over a specific program, but a clash of reality and the ideologies that grew government for the last 100 years. The palatable national stress is the due to our collective cognitive dissonance! If taxing, rampant spending, printing money out of thin air, and economic oppression continues our republic will fall.
Albeit China has decades of economic and democratic growth to undergo before it can claim real international leadership it will nonetheless overtake the Unites States in GDP around 2015. The effect it will have on our politics, the radicalization of both parties, cannot be understated. The far right will attempt to posture and cajole the American public into thinking we are in a new Cold War and the far left’s argument will in some sick way be vindicated, that in fact large government can bread success and growth. Both as history has shown will exacerbate our insecurity of being second place.
...notice how I didn't mention anything about what to cut? Just cut, cap and balance like Americans and people all over the world do everyday.
...notice how I didn't mention anything about what to cut? Just cut, cap and balance like Americans and people all over the world do everyday.
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