USA Today
Who's spending big now? The 'party of small government'
2/20/2006
http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/editorials/2006-02-20-debate-our-view_x.htmSay you're in a financial hole. You're spending more money than you're taking in — $4,000 this year alone. After much effort, you figure out ways to save $400 in the next five years. Would you then turn around, spend double that amount and put yourself deeper in debt?
Probably not — unless, that is, you were a member of Congress running for re-election this year and you get to spend other people's money. Add eight zeros to the numbers in the example above, and you'll get an idea of the shell game going on in Washington.
The federal budget deficit will be in the range of $400 billion this year. That means roughly $1 in every $6 spent by the government will be borrowed money. So a few weeks ago, with great self-congratulatory fanfare, Congress passed and the president signed what was billed as a $40 billion, five-year deficit reduction. Now Congress is weighing tax-cut packages that would wipe out those projected savings almost twice over.
The overall national debt amounts to nearly $75,000 hanging over every household in the nation. Meanwhile, the cost of servicing the debt rises, squandering $250 billion a year. Only the Pentagon, Social Security and Medicare cost more.