On the path to economic suicide

James L. Lambert - Guest Columnist - 11/3/2009 9:30:00 AM

As a former college teacher in financial management, I simply cannot fathom any justification for Washington's current level of deficits. It is simply appalling that the leadership in Congress and the White House continue to spend record federal deficits that now total in excess of $1.4 trillion annually. I don't like to be a doomsayer -- however, if we do not dramatically reverse this trend quickly, we will create within the next three years a financial meltdown of monumental proportions.

Americans – please wake up!  Our national debt is growing by $1 million every 20 seconds. I was alarmed when President Bush allowed staggering deficits during his eight years in office (then averaging $1 million in new debt every minute.) Bush should have exercised his veto pen to counter this problem. Now we are at the stage that, unless leadership in Washington ceases this wasteful spending immediately, unprecedented financial chaos will result. Ultimately every American citizen will be affected.
 
You need look no farther than the government's own figures and graphs to see how much trouble we are in. (See USDebtClock.org)
 

 
In just the past few months, the U.S. money supply has grown by $1 trillion as the federal government prints money at an insane rate.  Simple economic principles are in play -- the value of the dollar will inflate, making our money worth significantly less, not only here in the U.S. but throughout the world.
 
At the same time, our trade imbalance is exacerbated because Democrats in places like Washington and Sacramento would rather send billions of dollars abroad (to places like Saudi Arabia, Iran, Venezuela, and Mexico) to pay for energy instead of developing proven reserves here in the United States (i.e., offshore California, in the Gulf of Mexico, and in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge). Tapping into these known resources would also bring vital jobs to America as well as keep our dollars from leaving the U.S., which would significantly help our trade imbalance.
 
Taxpayer-funded waste is rampant. In California, for example, the state political leaders continue to ignore the overly generous liberal pension programs that legislators and the governor have given state employees through the years. These same leaders would rather cater to the wishes of government employee unions than listen to the taxpayers who foot the bills. This form of government generosity is completely unsustainable. How can any entity, whether public or private, afford to pay their retired employees 70 percent of their gross income annually for years after they have left their jobs? They can't!
 
Meanwhile, fraud and waste continue to fester in many federal and state programs. It is estimated that the U.S. Postal Service will lose more than $4 billion this fiscal year. Medicare fraud is reported to be in the tens of billions of dollars. Politicians continue to tolerate immigrants who are here illegally, benefiting from America's generous social and educational privilege benefits. Once again, taxpayers are footing the bill for all of this waste and social engineering. Yet Nancy Pelosi, Barack Obama, and Harry Reid now expect us to trust the government to run a "public option" healthcare program?  I think not!
 
Politicians are making the same mistake even at the local level. In my hometown of San Diego, the city government is proposing an expenditure of $450 million for a new city hall. This is money the city simply does not have. All this has occurred while the city staggers under a current $200-million budgetary deficit.

Typically, government bureaucracies are slow, cumbersome, and inefficient. That is why each one of us must demand that our elected officials -- local, state, and federal -- must stop this excessive spending and growth of government. We can no longer afford it!
 
Yesterday I talked to a young man who was holding down four part-time jobs in order to support his modest family of three. During the severe recession we're now in, this young man couldn't even find one full-time job. Consequently he, like millions of other people across the country, has had to cut back and trim his own family budget. It's time we demand the federal, state, and local governments do the same. Our financial future depends upon it!

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