August 2, 2011 - A Date That Will Live In Infamy

On this date the Congress finished their arduous work and President Obama signed the legislation adding an additional $2.2 Trillion to the National Debt limit. Conveniently it should keep us solvent until after the elections in 2012, so neither the President nor members of Congress will have to debate this subject during the election process. There is a pledge (worthless in my opinion) to find $2 Trillion in reductions over the next decade. A committee is to be established of 16 members of Congress equally divided between the Republicans and Democrats. It is to be created before the end of this year. No one it seems is anxious to volunteer to serve including our own fearless Senator Kyle. He stated in jest that his bladder could not stand the many hours of sitting to come up with ideas.
This is such an important subject that the exhausted members of Congress immediately adjourned until after Labor Day to recover from the ordeal. President Obama on the other hand immediately got on Air Force I for a campaign stop in Chicago. Regrettably he had to make a huge sacrifice by staying in Washington to deal with the “crisis”. He missed ten fund raising events during that time. It is really a shame that he had to give up the activity he enjoys the most i.e. campaigning and raising money.
There was a time during my lifetime when governing was so important that full attention and total effort was expended to deal with the important issues of the day but no more. This is just a game for these people. They spend most of their time raising money for their re-election, always saying the right words that we want to hear but keep on playing the giveaway game to their benefactors. The Republicans favor the wealthy with tax breaks far in excess of what normal people pay and rewarding Corporations for sending our manufacturing and service jobs overseas. The Democrats keep giving money by any means possible to their base constituency to assure their loyalty at the ballot box.
There are so many obvious steps that could and should be taken right now, not a month from now. I won’t bore you with my thoughts but trust me I have ideas. Instead of going on vacation they should be searching for immediate things to do to stop the hemorrhage. I will share one thought. Without increased tax revenue there is no hope of balancing the budget. The way I would do it is to eliminate the give away for sending jobs overseas and lower the cost of doing business in America. Millions of workers earning paychecks would start increasing the cash flow to the treasury without increasing rates. This is so obvious that my head hurts thinking about it. How does your head feel?


Jack B. Walters
August 4, 2011