In your post, you (or whatever fucking moron you quoted) interchangeably used the budget surplus/deficit with the national debt. It's not the fucking same, okay!

8. GWB is running a "borrow-as-you-go" government, exploding the national debt by hundreds and hundreds of billions of dollars compared to Clinton-era surpluses. Given the choice of "tax and spend" or "borrow and spend," he has chosen to pass the bill on to new generations.

Don't know how this fits into the agenda but [link|http://www.publicdebt.treas.gov/opd/opdpenny.htm|http://www.publicdeb.../opd/opdpenny.htm]

If you are willing to do the math, it can be expanded to :

date Percent increase from prev year
9/03/03\t 8.43%
9/30/02 6.76%
9/28/01\t 2.30%
9/29/00\t 0.32%
9/30/99\t 2.30%
9/30/98\t 2.05%
9/30/97 3.48%
9/30/96\t 4.80%
9/29/95\t 5.65%
9/30/94\t 5.99%
9/30/93\t 7.86%
9/30/92\t 9.82%
9/30/91\t 11.79%
9/28/90\t 11.63%
9/29/89\t 8.93%
9/30/88\t 9.69%

Seems to me like number 8. is more like number two. We gave up on the debt in the sixties, the budget surplus/deficit is just a football to kick around for the double digits. Notice one thing? There is never a decrease in the debt, is there? Even at the height of "prosperity" of the late 90's, the debt still increased...

Big pet peave of mine. Please quit throwing out junk like this.

I quote:
"8. GWB is running a "borrow-as-you-go" government, exploding the national debt by hundreds and hundreds of billions of dollars compared to Clinton-era surpluses. Given the choice of "tax and spend" or "borrow and spend," he has chosen to pass the bill on to new generations."

Substitute the word Bill Clinton, GHWB, RR, JC, GF, RN, LBJ, JFK, DDE, etc... for GWB and the first line is true until you get to the "compared to" piece. There were 0 surpluses in the national debt during Clinton's entire two terms nor during any other contemporary president. The entire statement is Bogus with a capital B. It is this kind of self serving juvenile bullshit that causes liberal folks like me to stay away from the polls all together.

Using your analogy, let's say you owe $5,000,000.00 on your credit card and because you didn't need spend $50.00 on a new security fence this year that you have a $50 dollar "surplus". You still owe $5,000,000.00 plus interest... The only positive statement that can be said about the Clinton admin re the national debt is that for 2 years of his admin, the rate of increase from the previous year was lower than it had been for a long time. That's it, folks... Nothing to see here. The rate still increased. Or to substitute, Bill Clinton also chose to "pass the bill on to new generations." As did GHWB, as did RR, as did JC, and so on.

Does this statement have any impact on a thinking person?

The reason this issue becomes such a hot button for me is that the national debt represents the economic collapse (and all the interrelated collapses) of America at some future point. This is the "crazy aunt in the basement" that noone, regardless of idealogy or political affilliation, wants to talk about. The last man who tried, a Republican university professor name Gingrich, had his ass hung out to dry.
[link|http://www.house.gov/house/Contract/CONTRACT.html|http://www.house.gov...act/CONTRACT.html]
I also believe that Al Gore very publicly tried to clean up government waste and those affected cost him the last election.

When politicians try to do the "right thing", it usually means pain and suffering from some group. To really address the national debt would require major pain and suffering for a large group of individuals (ie massive government layoffs, large tax increases, freezing new spending for a great amount of time, etc.). The politicians that do this will be rewarded with not being re-elected. To add further insult, the newly elected group coming in will probably be elected to "fix" the problem that the last group created and "re-fund" the cut programs or entitlements... The passion play continues.

The scary part for me is that we had the opportunity during the nineties to use the "peace dividend" that followed the cold war, the Contract with America, a very reform minded Vice President, a booming economy and... the result for the national debt... The rate of increase lessened. This is a hardly an stellar accomplishment. For a few brief moments in the nineties, our government started to do the right thing, but now we're back to business as usual.

On the Democratic political bright side, there most probably will be a political backlash against the Republicans in the next election. I base this on my own experience. As a lifelong Democrat, my biggest wish was always for the "my party" to hold all three branches of government. I got that wish in '92. By '93 I was extremely dissillusioned and by '94 I voted for the last time - a straight Republican ticket. I thought I was being radical... :-)

The Repubs now have it all and I would assume that thinking Republicans would be getting dissillusioned about now. Who knows what the backlash will be?

I want to see the Democrats take back the House in the next election just as a balance. I think that is more realistic than taking the White House and they should be trying to concentrate their national efforts on that. I watched the first Democratic debate the other night - Bill Patient is right. The Demos don't stand a chance other than with Gebhardt and the cast of characters that are going up against him in the primaries will ensure that he steps all over his dick to get the nod. He will step up to the plate, as did Dole, in an un-winnable election. (We came through 9-11, we fixed the economy, we've made great progress in fighting terrorism, blah, blah, blah).

I guess in a way, the national debt is meaningless, given the system and the "will of the American public", noone wants to be inconvenienced into paying it off.

we could see that some things are possible. The problem with this is (although most US'ers feel Canada and the US are really one entity separated by ones propensity to handle cold climate), because of your brethren to the east who refuse to stop talking that crazy surrender monkey language - we can't pay attention to the rest of your country on many issues other than SCTV (the greatest comedy series ever) and other entertainment/entertainers and fishing.

I thank you for trying to give hope. In all seriousness, I have small children who I hope will grow up with a decent standard of living and a peaceful time period in history. I haven't given up all hope, which is why I'm still bitching and pointing out the problem.