Over the last two weeks, I have tried many times to write, but I think I was in mourning. At least three times, I started a Fourth of July post but could never finish it. I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was writing, not a blog post, but a eulogy.
While the president and the House argue over raising the debt limit, the rest of America plods along at 9.2% unemployment. They argue about spending cuts and tax increases, but many Americans are scraping to get by. The economy is not getting any better, but Obama wants to soak it for another one or two trillion dollars.
The problem with all of this is that despite whatever rhetoric they spout, it doesn’t make any sense. If they cut $2 trillion in spending, but raise taxes $2 trillion, neither party is going to take the new revenue and apply it to debt or deficit. It will be allocated to new spending and the out of control cycle that’s rapidly plunging us towards banana republic status will continue unabated. More than spending cuts, tax increases, 5 year, 8 year, or 12 year plans, more than healthcare, Medicare or carbon offsets, what we really need is new government.
Perhaps the most important thing to remember about the Fourth of July is this phrase, “when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security”.
Right now, our government is not guarding our future security. The President and the Congress trample the Constitution at every turn. They spend our money like it grows on trees and then print more to decrease its value. While we have the appearance of freedom, we are not truly free. The government regulates almost every aspect of our lives, from how much water our toilets can flush to what kind of light bulbs we can use. And then they tax everything we do. Think about how many taxes you pay if you go on vacation. You pay taxes on everything that you purchase for the trip, you pay taxes on the fuel for your car, you paid taxes on the car, you pay taxes on the hotel room, you pay taxes on your cell phone service, if you took a flight, you pay taxes that. And in most of those cases, the taxes you paid did not go to cover anything you used (as can be attested by traffic conditions in most cities), but to pay for the pet projects of senior Senators and Congressman, or a war in Libya, or some other nonsense.
Right now, the federal government is spending about $3.8 trillion a year, while bringing in about $2.2 trillion, leaving a deficit of $1.6 trillion. That’s 72% more than the government is taking in. Imagine if you were making $80,000 a year, but spending $137,000 a year. It wouldn’t take long before the hole you were digging caved in on you. Even with the Republicans aggressive proposal of cutting $4 billion in spending over 10 years, you’re still digging a hole, just at a slower pace –that’s only a cut of $400 billion a year which means that we’d still be spending $3.4 trillion a year. It would reduce our yearly deficit, but we’d still be in the whole, every year, but over $1 trillion dollars. And now they’re backing down from the $4 trillion plan to go with a modest $2 trillion cut. As if that will do any good.
What we need now is someone who is really willing to lead – to make drastic cuts in spending, to kill of entitlements that are draining our country’s energy away. Someone who isn’t afraid to do unpopular things to pull this nation back from the brink of absolute financial ruin. And to end the entitlement mentality that so deeply pervades our country. And for we the people to re-embrace the independent spirit that allowed this country to exist in the first place.
Like I said, a eulogy.