President Obama celebrated his 48th birthday yesterday, but instead of being showered with gifts, he handed the American people the biggest present of all: one trillion dollars in new debt. Since Obama was inaugurated in January, the national debt has grown over one trillion dollars to a whopping $11.669 trillion. In contrast, it took 2.5 years to add $1 trillion in debt during the last administration. And this “gift” to the American people doesn’t even include the costs of other legislation Obama would like to pass, such as cap and …
This week’s bloggers’ briefing brought the biggest crowd yet; standing room only. What was the draw? Matthias Shapiro, mastermind of the 10,000 pennies videos that have become a viral sensation, showed the eager bunch how to utilize the overused rhetoric and statistics of the day to instead communicate the numbers coming out of Washington in a way that people can digest. Through his use of visualizations, Shapiro puts real value to seemingly unfathomable amounts of money like millions, billions, and trillions of dollars. We’ve posted these videos before, but they …
Panic seems to be setting in among some Democrats as the economy continues to falter. Important political leaders, such as Majority Leader Stenny Hoyer (D-MD), and economic commentators, such as Laura D’Andrea Tyson, unofficial economic advisor the President, are calling for yet another stimulus bill. Already we have had two stimulus bills, totaling almost a trillion dollars in the last eighteen months. Both were ineffective. House Democrats especially are worried they will be held responsible in the 2010 election for the failure of the recent stimulus bill enacted during the …
Did you ever know anyone that would repeatedly go out to the bar, drink themselves unconscious, and then wake up the next morning and promise never to drink again? That is President Barack Obama when it comes to spending. This February, after signing the largest single-year increase in domestic federal spending since World War II, President Obama held a “fiscal responsibility” summit designed to “send a signal that we are serious” at putting the nation on sounder financial footing. The Washington Post’s Dana Milbank quipped at the time: “Holding a ‘fiscal responsibility …
The national debt is skyrocketing. In 2009 publicly held debt is projected to jump to 54.8 percent of GDP, up from 40.8 percent in 2008. A year-to-year increase of this size hasn’t occurred since World War II. While the main causes of this massive increase – $787 billion economic “stimulus” and the $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) – are sure to be debated for some time, the truly frightening revelation should be not what has already taken place, but what our elected officials have planned. President Obama’s budget, …
Your family’s share of the national debt just got a lot bigger thanks to the recent increases in federal spending. According to an analysis by USA Today, in 2008 an additional $55,000 per household in new federal obligations was added onto the already massive figure, bringing the total to $546,668. USA today does well to illustrate this point, noting, That’s quadruple what the average U.S. household owes for all mortgages, car loans, credit cards and other debt combined.” This increased debt takes an already bad situation and makes it worse. …
President Obama recently said, One hundred days ago, in the midst of the worst economic crisis in half a century, we passed the most sweeping economic recovery act in history…One hundred days later, we are already seeing results.” President Obama is right: In the last one hundred days, the U.S. economy has lost over 2 million jobs. The President inherited a recession and a huge budget deficit. Finding the deficit not yet huge enough, he argued for a lot more, pushing the total toward $2 trillion and putting the United …
Yesterday’s USA Today brought the not so surprising news that federal tax revenue has fallen drastically due to the struggling economy. The 34% decrease represents the largest plunge since the last major recession in 1981. Although revenue is down, the main driver of deficits is spending. Over the long term these deficits will become increasingly difficult to control because of escalating entitlement spending on Social Security and Medicare. As the article notes, The other deficit driver is government spending, which, the [American Institute for Economic Research] report says, is the …
We’re mortgaging our children’s future. We’ve heard that phrase time and time again. President Obama used it just yesterday acknowledging that the U.S. debt load is “unsustainable”, saying, “We can’t keep on just borrowing from China. We have to pay interest on that debt, and that means we are mortgaging our children’s future with more and more debt.” Proponents of cap and trade and any other global warming legislation are quick to argue that Americans’ short-sightedness is superseding the preservation of the planet for future generations. We’re doing it for …
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yREOUxo6Qdc[/youtube] Stop Spending Our Future.
