You're not exempt from the math

This is a very simple and unemotional explanation on why Obamacare sucks.  Dave Ramsey does a great job explaining that regardless of how people may want there to be some kind of magic that will allow this monstrosity of a law to work as we were promised it would...you can't escape the simple math of the situation.

Retire the Debt Overnight?

For another way to look at the Federal debt, I thought it would be helpful to do a little thought experiment:

If the Federal debt of $16.2 Trillion were divided among all Americans, each of our more than 314 million citizens would owe in excess of  $51,000 to retire it.  Let's say that there was a way, through great effort and sacrifice by all of the patriotic people of the country, to collect this amount from every citizen and retire the debt ...maybe some would pay more than others...corporations would also contribute.  What if we could do this and erase the debt overnight?  Would you be in favor of this?

Think about it, all the problems that arise from such a large debt that I and others have chronicled...gone over night.  No more indebtedness to China...no more credit problems.  This would be great, right?  Well, the problem is that Federal spending exceeds revenue every year by about $1.1 Trillion at today's spending levels. This would mean that one year after the country went to extraordinary measures and sacrifice to retire the debt, each citizen would already owe an additional  $3,500 above their normal tax burden..that's every citizen, children, old, sick, handicapped, ...everyone. Additionally, with current programs and rates, there are future, unfunded liabilities for spending on things like Social Security and Medicare in excess of $61 Trillion...or more than $500,000 per household.   Of course this is not current debt, but gives a view of future debt.

What does this all mean?  Well, it's as I've said again and again, we don't have a revenue problem, we have a spending problem. Even if we got the revenue to retire the debt overnight, the government would be back in debt in no time.  With current spending, there's no way to get things in check.  Government is like an out-of-control teen with credit cards.  Even if they consolidate all of their cards,  they will just run them up again.  We have to take away the cards.  We must return to small, decentralized and limited central government as as was intended by our founders and is in fact law through the Constitution.  We must return our States to a place of prominence, where they can apply checks on the power if the Federal body.  We cannot sustain...cannot long endure...under the current, corrupted system.

This does not, regardless of what the desperate central planners would have you believe, mean that the poor would be left to live or die on  their own.  It does not mean old people would be forced to eat cat food to survive.  States could look after their own citizens as they see fit, without the burden of overhead caused by the huge Federal bureaucracy.  Each State, according to the wishes of their own electorate, can deal with these problems on their own terms.  If some states wish to pursue a "socialist-like" solution, they are able to...but with no bailouts from the Federal government if it fails.

With this arrangement, I believe States will quickly find viable solutions.  They will have to balance policies that keep and attract business for full employment with the needs of their less fortunate citizens.  They will have to compete for services and opportunity to keep people from moving to states that better meet their needs and expectations.  To do this with no bail-outs means they will have to do what works, and not engage in wild,  Utopian experiments.  They will only be able to provide safety nets to the "truly needy," as they define it in their own States.  In short, they will have to run their affairs like responsible adults and not spoiled kids.  This is the Utility of Federalism that I have posted about in the past.

Ask yourself, would you trust your money to an investment that created ever-increasing, crushing debt, no matter how much money you contributed?  An investment with huge overhead and red tape?  Of course not.  Why would you then trust our current government?  This may go against what you have always believed, but it is what the founders intended.  As for myself, I would rather stand with the learned, patriotic statesmen of the founding than the power-hungry, corrupt politicians of today.

How Do We Balance The Budget?

Regardless of who wins the upcoming Presidential election, there are hard decisions to be made to avoid a financial disaster in our country.  Federal spending is out of control with no apparent end in site. At the time of this posting the Federal debt exceeds $16 Trillion.  That's:

$16,000,000,000,000

In past posts I have put this kind of debt in perspective (and that was in 2011 when the debt was only $14 Trillion)...I have shown that it is not a revenue problem, but a spending problem.  Raising taxes can't fix it, because you could tax corporations and everyone who is considered rich at 100% and still not have enough money to feed the government's spending habit.

Though everyone knows that we have an unsustainable debt problem...that our deficits continue to grow, government continues to expand programs...and therefore spending.  Not only that, but the government has been actively advertising and recruiting to get more people on the roles of programs like food stamps.  Today the Washington Times reported that "Overall, welfare spending as measured by obligations has grown from $563 billion in fiscal 2008 to $746 billion in fiscal 2011, or a jump of 32 percent."  While welfare programs were cut during the Clinton administration, the Obama administration has been redoubling their efforts to increase this spending.

We are headed in the wrong direction.   I agree with then candidate Obama when he said of the much smaller debt under Bush, "That's irresponsible.  It's unpatriotic." We must first stop the bleeding, and then begin to return to fiscal responsibility and prudence.  This can only happen through a return to the principles of limited and decentralized government.  Come on folks, let's get patriotic again.

Professor Antony Davies has another great video on the issue:

The Sin of Redistribution

Professor Walter E. Williams makes the case that redistribution of wealth by government is theft, and therefore a sin.