On September 7, 2003, President Bush asked Con-gress for an additional $87 billion to spend on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Our national debt is now over $7 trillion dollars. That’s thirteen numbers and four commas before you get to the decimal point and the two spaces for the cents.
Quoting facts and figures is fine, but who can really grasp that kind of money? We are common ordinary folk that live paycheck to paycheck, provided we have a job, figuring out the rent or house payment and other bills, and then maybe, if we have a little splurge, perhaps we will plan to go out to eat.
Let’s try to make it at least a little simpler…Just how much is “just” one trillion?
Here’s a little example to try to give you something maybe you can relate to and under-stand better.
If you had gone into business on the day Jesus was born, and your business lost a million dollars a day, day in and day out, 365 days a year, it would have taken you until October 2737 to lose a trillion dollars, or a little over two thousand seven hundred years.
The U.S. Congress has done seven times this damage to their constituents in a little over 18 years!
The United States economy is already ruined. I’m sorry if this sounds negative but there is no place to go but down. Sometimes the truth isn’t very pretty. Call/write your political leaders on all levels and push for an end to these political wars and wasteful government spending.
Jean Stables
Decatur
July 27th, 2006 at 6:21 pm
Jean, You haven’t seen anything YET!
The situation is going to get much worse. Don’t forget the current administration is adding to the debt yearly. Plus, you did not mention the interest on that debt. With interest added on, the total debt obligation will continually become significantly higher.
July 27th, 2006 at 9:40 pm
You are right to be worried, Jean. But, just to sharpen the point: more than half that debt has been added since the year 2000.
July 28th, 2006 at 7:43 am
The main thing to keep in mind is that every expense from now on, along with the huge interest payments, will be passed on to our children, and will have a negative affect on most of their lives in so many ways. The last I heard every man, woman, child and newborn all owe approximately $30,000. Most of this debt is the result of huge increases in the military budget, mostly, as paybacks for campaign contributions from the military-industrial complex, and tax cuts, also, mostly, for paybacks for campaign contributions, with the lion’s share going to the wealthy, since the biginning of the Reagan presidency.
The corporate and moneyed interests who now control all three branches of our government know how to fool most Americans. Consider this from a book by Neil Postman, “Amusing Ourselves to Death”
This is the lesson of all great television commercials: They provide a slogan, a symbol or a focus that creates for viewers a comprehensive and compelling image of themselves. In the shift from party politics to television politics, the same goal is sought. We are not permitted to know who is the best at being President or Governor or Senator, but whose image is best at touching and soothing the deepest reaches of our discontent. We look at the television screen and ask, in the same voracious way as the Queen in “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs”, “Mirror, mirror on the wall, who is the fairest one of all?” We are inclined to vote for those whose personality, family life and style, as imagined on the screen, gives back a better answer than the Queen received. As Xenophanes remarked twenty-five centuries ago, men always make their gods in their own image. But to this, television politics has added a new wrinkle: Those who would be gods refashion themselves into images the viewers would have them be.
July 28th, 2006 at 7:55 am
If you think the corporate and moneyed interests who control our government think any more of you than they do those who work in their factories in third world countries, or illegal immigrants who they exploit in this country, you would be mistaken.
July 28th, 2006 at 1:23 pm
3. Well, you have certainly burst my bubble about TV ads! I just went out and bought a Hummer ’cause Tip says I am not going to get taken up in the rapture and Jeff doesn’t think I know “right” from “wrong!” I was thinking about voting Republican in my newly acquired status, too! You ruin everything!
July 28th, 2006 at 2:35 pm
Suspect, in order to know right from wrong you have to have a conscience and morals. I stand by my original statement.
July 28th, 2006 at 11:01 pm
This adminstrations main goal is to fill as many of their buddies pockets as possible. After they are out of office look for most of Bush’s administration to be put on the Board of Directors for the oil companies, drug companies or insurance companies they made richer while in office. They will be rewarded “for serving their country” by raking in tens of millions of dollars from serving on those Boards of Directors while the future generations of our country will be left with the huge deficit this moron created. Not one person in this administration has an ounce of integrity!!
July 28th, 2006 at 11:24 pm
“I stand by my original statement’-Mr Morality
How tall are you?
I imagine you to be 8 feet tall like Goliath!
You are one imposing fellow!
You never did answer my question ?
Maybe you just overlooked it?
Have you ever made a mistake?
July 30th, 2006 at 2:58 pm
The last “official” act of any failing criminal “Government” is to loot the Treasury!
Where did the money go?
Wake up before it’s too late .
When will we take their matches away.
Will we abdicate our Constitutional duty or let the kids run wild and burn the House down?
We will get what we deserve !
August 1st, 2006 at 6:01 am
#9, the money went to all the government programs for poor Americans but somehow began including illegal immigrants.
August 1st, 2006 at 12:33 pm
10. You made an interesting statement, “the money went to all the government programs for poor Americans”.
Where did you hear that?
August 1st, 2006 at 8:37 pm
Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny delivered all the money to the poor Americans, Dick Nixon was not a crook, Bill did not have sex with that woman, there are weapons of mass dstruction in Iraq, and some day my prince will come…….
August 2nd, 2006 at 1:07 am
#12, thank you. You were my laugh for the day. You just put it all in perspective.
August 2nd, 2006 at 7:41 am
I do what I can to be helpful and brighten a person’s day/lighten their load. And if my prince ever does come, he’ll probably be gay (there’s another one just for you).
August 2nd, 2006 at 9:12 am
IRS Schemes to Undermine Estate Tax
By Megan Tady, The NewStandard. Posted August 2, 2006.
The IRS has announced a drastic cut in staff who audit the tax returns of the super-rich — Bush’s gift to his wealthy supporters.
With a cut to the estate tax looking unlikely in Congress this year, the Bush administration is quietly planning to reduce the number of federal agents who enforce the tax. Critics are calling the move a “backdoor” repeal of the tax on extraordinary inheritances.
Through leaked internal agency documents, the New York Times discovered last week that the government plans to eliminate almost half of the Internal Revenue Service’s 345 lawyers who currently audit the tax returns of those subject to sharing a cut of their estate with the American public upon their deaths. The Times reported the staff reduction will be made within the next few months
The estate tax is levied on the transfer of massive amounts of wealth to heirs upon death. It does not apply to portions of an estate transferred to a spouse or charitable organization.
Cliff note: IRS auditing will be focused upon the middle and working classes. Surprise! Surprise!
http://alternet.org/story/39756/
August 2nd, 2006 at 4:18 pm
#14 Are you talking about George W. Bush?
He is not President but he was born a Prince!