Selling America

I think I've mentioned this before, but I think it's important for those who still support the current President to understand a few of the things he's done that completely undermine this country.

Remember when he took office, the Federal budget had been balanced and there was an actual small surplus(*). Remember when he started the war in Iraq, the Administration insisted that the cost of the war to the U.S. would be no more than 3 or 4 billion dollars. Remember that Republicans have always called themselves the party of fiscal responsibility and lambasted Democrats with the words "tax and spend".

Well, it turns out Mr. Bush engages in “borrow and spend” (or maybe in keeping with the prior theme, “tax-cut and spend”). In five years in office, the Bush Administration has spent so much and given so many tax breaks to wealthy individuals that he’s had to borrow money and lots of it. He has, in fact, borrowed more money than every President before him combined, much of it from foreign sources. More than the 42 previous Presidents COMBINED. See this from the House of Representatives website.

With this captain at the helm of the ship of state, we borrow $5 billion dollars every business day.

He has borrowed billions of dollars from the Central Bank of China, viewed by some as the next rising superpower (I mentioned this a day or two ago). Probably not such a good thing to be beholden in huge amounts to a competing superpower.

Me, I think I’d rather have a President getting a little illicit hanky-panky on the side and running an orderly and strong fiscal policy than one who gets to bed every night by 9pm and wouldn’t think of cheating on his wife... but borrows about $15 for every U.S. citizen on a daily basis in order to run the government.

Now, I have a number of pro-Bush readers (or have had in the past), and if any of you can give me a reason why these numbers aren’t as insane as they sound, it would surely help me sleep better at night. For now, I’m just lying awake worrying about what happens when China, with the rest of the world standing behind them, knocks on our door wanting to collect.

Record borrowing. Record debt. And don't tell me that the war on terror and the events of 9/11 justify this level of record. In the last hundred years, we've been through two World Wars. We've had major stock market crashes and natural disasters such as earthquakes and volcanos. And yet in spite of all of that, in five years we've borrowed more than 42 previous Presidents dealing with all of that and more, combined.

Some more quick numbers:

$8,000,000,000,000 (eight trillion dollars) - The current national debt, up 40% since Bush took office.
$27,000 - The amount owed for each American Citizen man, woman and child.

To break down that Eight Trillion just a bit...

When Reagan took office, the national debt was just under a trillion dollars. He increased it by over 1.6 trillion. An average yearly increase of .2 trillion. His first year in office it rose by .1 trillion, and his last by .25 trillion.

Over the next four years, Bush Sr. increased it by another 1.5 trillion. An average yearly increase of .375 trillion. His first year in office it rose by .25 trillion and his last by .4 trillion.

Clinton increased it by another 1.6 during his eight years, but the rate of increase slowed dramatically. In the last three years of his Presidency, the debt rose by a mere .26 trillion. An average yearly increase of .2 trillion. His first year in office, it rose by .35 trillion and his last by a mere .018 trillion. The only President in 25 years to lower the yearly deficit over his term in office.

In the subsequent 5 years of the Bush Administration, it has gone up 2.3 trillion. That's almost half a trillion dollars a year. His first year in office, it rose by .13 trillion (includes 9/11). We have yet to see what his final year will look like.

For a graph of how the debt has gone under every President since Roosevelt, click here. And an interesting graph of National Debt as a percentage of the Gross Domestic Product is here.

Liam.

(* Note, it takes some creative accounting to actually call it a "surplus", but the budget was essentially balanced)