U.S. debt jumps $300 billion — tops $17 trillion for first time

U.S. debt jumped more than $300 billion on Thursday, the first day the federal government was able to borrow money under the deal President Obama and Congress sealed this week.

The debt now equals $17.075 trillion, according to figures the Treasury Department posted online on Friday. The $328 billion increase is an all-time record, shattering the previous high of $238 billion set two years ago.
Read more at the Washington Times Read More......

Byron York: GOP may use debt ceiling to force Harry Reid to pass budget

Tuesday marks the 1,350th day since the Senate passed a budget. The law requires Congress to pass a budget every year, on the grounds that Americans deserve to know how the government plans to spend the trillions of taxpayer dollars it collects, along with dollars it borrows at the taxpayers' expense. But Majority Leader Harry Reid, who last allowed a budget through the Senate in April 2009, has ignored the law since then.

There's no mystery why. The budget passed by large Democratic majorities in the first months of the Obama administration had hugely elevated levels of spending in it. By not passing a new spending plan since, Reid has in effect made those levels the new budgetary baseline.

Read more at the Washington Examiner Read More......

George Will: Our decadent democracy

WASHINGTON POST, 1/2/2013 by George Will (Hat tip: John H. Detweiler, who writes, "Sooner or later we will drown in debt.") - Connoisseurs of democratic decadence can savor a variety of contemporary dystopias. Because familiarity breeds banality, Greece has become a boring horror. Japan, however, in its second generation of stagnation is fascinating. Once, Japan bestrode the world, jauntily buying Rockefeller Center and Pebble Beach. Now Japanese buy more adult diapers than those for infants.

America has its lowest birth rate since at least 1920 — family formation and workforce participation (which hit a 30-year low last year) have declined in tandem. But it has an energy surplus, the government-produced overhang of housing inventory is shrinking and the average age of Americans’ cars is an astonishing 10.8 years. Such promising economic indicators, however, mask the country’s democratic decadence, as explained by the Hudson Institute’s Christopher DeMuth in the Dec. 24 Weekly Standard: Read more at WP... Read More......

WaPo: Republicans should stand and fight

12/10/2012 by Marc A. Thiessen (Hat tip: John H. Detweiler) - When the 1st Marine Regiment was encircled by communist forces at the Battle of Chosin Reservoir, Marine Col. Lewis “Chesty” Puller was said to have declared: “We’re surrounded. Good! Now we can fire in any direction.” ✧ It’s time for congressional Republicans to adopt some of Puller’s courage — and strategy — when it comes to their fiscal stand-off with Barack Obama. Read Thiessen's three part plan... Read More......

House votes against debt ceiling increase

The House of Representatives voted Wednesday to reject a request by President Obama to raise the debt ceiling -- a largely symbolic vote, since the Senate is expected to allow the debt ceiling hike. ✧ The House voted, 239-176, in support of a measure that voices opposition to the increase. Six Democrats voted along with Republicans to oppose the debt ceiling increase. House Republicans had only one defection -- California Rep. David Dreier. Read more at Fox News... Read More......

Obama’s efforts to woo independents derailed by debt-ceiling agreement

THE HILL, 8/24/2011 by Ian Swanson - The unpopular debt-ceiling deal has significantly hampered President Obama’s effort to win over independent voters. ✧ Since Democrats were thumped in the 2010 midterm elections, Obama repeatedly has sought to burnish his reputation with independents, often at the sake of his Democratic base. ✧ Yet a Gallup poll this week found Obama trailing not only the two leading GOP candidates — former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and Texas Gov. Rick Perry — among independent voters, but long-shot candidate Rep. Ron Paul (Texas) as well. The poll found that Obama leads Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.), but only by a 6-point margin, 48 percent to 42 percent. Read more at The Hill... Read More......

WSJ: Moody’s Lowers Economic Growth Outlook

By Tess Stynes
Moody’s Analytics said its near-term outlook for the U.S. economy has fallen significantly in the past month [in the] wake of the debate over the U.S. debt ceiling and the downgrade of the nation’s credit ratings by Standard & Poor’s. Read more at the Wall Street Journal... Read More......

Rasmussen: 29% Say Tea Party Members Are Terrorists, 55% Disagree

Several prominent Democrats and their media friends have charged the Tea Party with being economic terrorists during the congressional budget debates, but most voters don’t see it that way. Read more at Rasmussen Reports...

Also at Rasmussen Reports, 8/7/2011 - New Low: 17% Say U.S. Government Has Consent of the Governed Read More......

Obama signs debt deal

With just hours to spare before the deadline, President Obama signs the deficit reduction bill into law to raise the nation's debt ceiling after the Senate approved the measure by a 74-26 vote.

Debt Ceiling: Budget Experts See Deal as 'Spit in the Ocean' - [Excerpt] "This package claims to reduce about $2.5 trillion from what the debt otherwise would have been; but the discretionary spending caps I discussed are just slowed growth. ... When we think about how big the problem is, with the retirement of the Baby Boom (generation), with low revenue coming in as a result of the financial crisis and the economic slowdown, we've got a much bigger problem than $3 trillion of vague cuts can address." Read more at Fox News... Read More......

The End is Not Nigh!

CASCADE POLICY INSTITUTE/INSIDER, by Joseph Cox (guest) - Why not increasing the U.S. debt ceiling may not be the end of the world. “The end of days is nigh,” or at least that’s what you hear from President Obama when he says, “We would risk sparking a deep economic crisis….For the first time in our history, our country’s triple-A credit rating would be downgraded. Interest rates would skyrocket on credit cards, on mortgages and on car loans, which amounts to a huge tax hike on the American people.” ∴ In fact, nobody knows the consequences of a debt deal – or of the absence of one. But maybe not raising the debt ceiling actually would benefit the economy. There are three reasons for this:

1. Treasury rates are not necessarily the lowest rates
   
2. A rise in inflation may release productive money
   
3. A drop in government support could reintroduce healthy moral hazard into financing and investment

Let’s go through these in detail: Read more at Cascade Policy Institute Read More......

What is the "LEADER" trying to tell us?

Via email (Hat tip: Jerry & Cruz Jackson)

“The fact that we are here today to debate raising America’s debt limit is a sign of leadership failure. It is a sign that the US Government can not pay its own bills. It is a sign that we now depend on ongoing financial assistance from foreign countries to finance our Government’s reckless fiscal policies. Increasing America ’s debt weakens us domestically and internationally. Leadership means that ‘the buck stops here.' Instead, Washington is shifting the burden of bad choices today onto the backs of our children and grandchildren. America has a debt problem and a failure of leadership. Americans deserve better.”
-- Senator Barack H. Obama, March 2006
Say one thing and do the other --bc

See video: President Obama's Leadership Failure Read More......

Buffett: I could end the deficit in 5 minutes

“I could end the deficit in 5 minutes. You just pass a law that says that anytime there is a deficit of more than 3% of GDP all sitting members of congress are ineligible for reelection.” --Warren Buffett

Doug Powers at Michelle Malkin writes,

I like it, Mr. Buffett, but you might have more than a little trouble getting both chambers of Congress to pass a law that castrates their power and would ultimately send them looking for private sector work in this economy.

Read More......

Congress stands its ground

By George F. Will
Between 6 p.m. Friday and 4 p.m. Sunday, the nation began a constitutional course-correction. The current occupant’s vanity and naivete — a dangerous amalgam — are causing the modern presidency to buckle beneath the weight of its pretenses. And Congress is reasserting its responsibilities. Read more at the Washington Post...

(Hat tip: John H. Detweiler) Read More......

Democrats fail to credit Americans with courage regarding debt ceiling

FOX NEWS,7/15/2011 OP-ED by Thaddeus McCotter - In the Debt Ceiling Mess Americans Have More Courage Than Obama and Democrats Think They Do

Amidst this debt ceiling debate, this president and his Democratic minions’ arguments have descended from “straw men” to “bogeymen” in their attempts to scare Americans. Read more at Fox...

Republican Rep. Thaddeus McCotter represents Michigan's 11th district in the U.S. House of Representatives. He is currently a candidate for the Republican presidential nomination. Read More......

WSJ: Hitting the Debt Limit

President Obama and eight congressional leaders, including Speaker Boehner, are scheduled to meet at the White House tonight to determine how big a deal they can achieve. ∴ News that the unemployment rate rose to 9.2% in June, its highest level this year, pushed members of both parties further into their rhetorical corners Friday. ∴ Mr. Boehner, under pressure from Republicans to reject any tax increases, said the jobs data were a sign negotiators face a "dire" situation and "tax hikes on families and job creators would only make things worse." ∴ Still, Mr. Boehner has opened the door to a compromise on the thorniest tax issue by entertaining the idea of linking a broad rewrite of the tax code to allowing tax cuts for upper-income people to expire. Read more at WSJ... Read More......

Republicans consider short-term debt-ceiling deal if Biden talks fail

THE HILL, 6/7/2011 by Erik Wasson - Republicans want a short-term increase to the debt ceiling if the talks led by Vice President Biden do not produce sufficient spending cuts, Senate Minority Whip Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) said Tuesday. Read more at The Hill... Read More......

Moore: Obama Is Just Wrong on Debt Ceiling

VISION2AMERICA, 6/4/2011, Re: Stephen Moore, Economist - The U.S. economy could cave in under a “mountain of debt” if Republican lawmakers “blink first” and agree to raise the government debt ceiling without taking concrete steps to reduce the ballooning deficit, a top economic reporter told Newsmax.TV. ∴ Stephen Moore, senior economics correspondent for The Wall Street Journal, said members of Congress and the American people need to realize the seriousness of the potential crisis as an Aug. 2 deadline looms for the government to raise its debt limit or default on its obligations. “I think the first thing people need to understand is this is not a fire drill — this is a real financial emergency,” Moore said. ∴ His comments came as credit ratings agency Moody’s said Thursday that it may cut the United States’ top-notch credit rating if lawmakers don’t make serious progress in their negotiations by mid-July. Read more at Newsmax (includes video)... Read More......