Days
Commentator
First of all, do you have any idea how far behind the 8-Ball your taxes are?
Americans flat out do not understand the national debt. Let me show you the debt that we have to service; it is called "debt owed to the public" ... and it comes in the form of outstanding Treasuries - aka bonds that will be redeemed sooner or later - which your taxes will have to pay for. So, this is the real debt that has to be paid. This fluctuates as we sell new bonds constantly and pay off old bonds constantly, but if you take a snap shot of outstanding bonds at 12 month intervals, you can get an idea of the kind of trend we are on and the kind of pressure the US Treasury is under.
Now, look at how it escalated year by year:
DATE .............. OUTSTANDING .............. CHANGE OVER PREVIOUS YEAR
02/14/2006 ... $4,745,514,767,056.19
02/14/2007 ... $4,928,311,563,667.16 ... + $182,797 million
02/14/2008 ... $5,195,943,354,136.82 ... + $267,632 million
02/13/2009 ... $6,453,497,486,531.27 ... + $1,257,554 million
02/12/2010 ... $7,847,910,569,671.71 ... + $1,394,413 million
02/14/2011 ... $9,453,956,356,386.45 ... + $1,606,046 million
02/14/2012 ... $10,596,773,910,422.08 ... + $1,142,817 million
That's the bottom line, that's where the rubber meets the road.
Quantitative easing was a program by the Federal Reserve to buy 30 year bonds... it didn't increase or decrease our national debt, it just "restructured" it ... IOW those bonds won't be redeemed for 30 years, so we are not under the same pressure from them as we were/still are from all those two, three, and five year bonds that the Bush admin left outstanding for the current admin to pay off.
I listen to political arguments and frankly, both sides are just trying to say their side is doing a better job and yet neither side seems to make any sense. The GOP screams that the debt is escalating out of control without reckoning in that Bernanke stretched over a trillion of it out over 30 years, but they still have a valid point because outstanding Treasuries have double in the previous five years... and yet, the sensible solution then would be to raise taxes (its the only solution within the framework of the Federal Reserve system) and yet, while still screaming at the runaway debt, they scream even louder not to raise taxes. So that makes no sense. And then there's the Democrats who keep advocating more spending to bring in larger receipts (federal revenue) without reckoning in the global repositioning of capital investment that is limiting our private sector growth. Bailing out the banks and GM does produce results, but what will all that money spent on healthcare get back? nothing. So they waste too much money trying to fix the economy and it ends up making the debt worse. But at least they are trying to raise taxes on the rich, but you don't get any revenue from effort, so the bottom line is, revenues have not increased as much as spending. Arguing that we are headed in the right direction is fine and dandy, but it doesn't eliminate the Treasury bubble, only revenue does that. Does anyone think that next Valentines Day outstanding Treasuries won't have increased another Trillion? Trust me, they will.
So, when Romney says we will increase Defense spending even more... you should ask him, (as I was screaming at Bush this time in 2003) how are you going to pay for that? The answer is ... with your taxes. and in this day and age, that translates into an even higher deficit which will grow the Treasury bubble even larger. Santorum is talking to the Detroit economic club tonight. He will make lots of promises to business and he has some good ideas... but won't you won't hear is a single word about the Treasury bubble... so tell us, Rick, how will you balance the budget? And be realistic, the federal budget is out of whack with the economy, so this debt is going to keep growing, no matter what... good government will keep a lid on it ... bad government will lose all control and set us up for a default.
Americans flat out do not understand the national debt. Let me show you the debt that we have to service; it is called "debt owed to the public" ... and it comes in the form of outstanding Treasuries - aka bonds that will be redeemed sooner or later - which your taxes will have to pay for. So, this is the real debt that has to be paid. This fluctuates as we sell new bonds constantly and pay off old bonds constantly, but if you take a snap shot of outstanding bonds at 12 month intervals, you can get an idea of the kind of trend we are on and the kind of pressure the US Treasury is under.
Now, look at how it escalated year by year:
DATE .............. OUTSTANDING .............. CHANGE OVER PREVIOUS YEAR
02/14/2006 ... $4,745,514,767,056.19
02/14/2007 ... $4,928,311,563,667.16 ... + $182,797 million
02/14/2008 ... $5,195,943,354,136.82 ... + $267,632 million
02/13/2009 ... $6,453,497,486,531.27 ... + $1,257,554 million
02/12/2010 ... $7,847,910,569,671.71 ... + $1,394,413 million
02/14/2011 ... $9,453,956,356,386.45 ... + $1,606,046 million
02/14/2012 ... $10,596,773,910,422.08 ... + $1,142,817 million
That's the bottom line, that's where the rubber meets the road.
Quantitative easing was a program by the Federal Reserve to buy 30 year bonds... it didn't increase or decrease our national debt, it just "restructured" it ... IOW those bonds won't be redeemed for 30 years, so we are not under the same pressure from them as we were/still are from all those two, three, and five year bonds that the Bush admin left outstanding for the current admin to pay off.
I listen to political arguments and frankly, both sides are just trying to say their side is doing a better job and yet neither side seems to make any sense. The GOP screams that the debt is escalating out of control without reckoning in that Bernanke stretched over a trillion of it out over 30 years, but they still have a valid point because outstanding Treasuries have double in the previous five years... and yet, the sensible solution then would be to raise taxes (its the only solution within the framework of the Federal Reserve system) and yet, while still screaming at the runaway debt, they scream even louder not to raise taxes. So that makes no sense. And then there's the Democrats who keep advocating more spending to bring in larger receipts (federal revenue) without reckoning in the global repositioning of capital investment that is limiting our private sector growth. Bailing out the banks and GM does produce results, but what will all that money spent on healthcare get back? nothing. So they waste too much money trying to fix the economy and it ends up making the debt worse. But at least they are trying to raise taxes on the rich, but you don't get any revenue from effort, so the bottom line is, revenues have not increased as much as spending. Arguing that we are headed in the right direction is fine and dandy, but it doesn't eliminate the Treasury bubble, only revenue does that. Does anyone think that next Valentines Day outstanding Treasuries won't have increased another Trillion? Trust me, they will.
So, when Romney says we will increase Defense spending even more... you should ask him, (as I was screaming at Bush this time in 2003) how are you going to pay for that? The answer is ... with your taxes. and in this day and age, that translates into an even higher deficit which will grow the Treasury bubble even larger. Santorum is talking to the Detroit economic club tonight. He will make lots of promises to business and he has some good ideas... but won't you won't hear is a single word about the Treasury bubble... so tell us, Rick, how will you balance the budget? And be realistic, the federal budget is out of whack with the economy, so this debt is going to keep growing, no matter what... good government will keep a lid on it ... bad government will lose all control and set us up for a default.
