House faces tough vote on $1.9 trillion more debt

[The Northerner]

Source: Associated Press

WASHINGTON – Facing a politically excruciating vote, House Democratic leaders are counting on new budget deficit curbs to help smooth the way for a bill allowing the government to go $1.9 trillion deeper into debt over the next year — or about $6,000 more for every U.S. resident.

The debt measure set for a House vote on Thursday would raise the cap on federal borrowing to $14.3 trillion. That's enough to keep Congress from having to vote again before the November elections on an issue that is feeding a sense among voters that the government is spending too much and putting future generations under a mountain of debt to do it.

Already, the accumulated debt amounts to $40,000 per person. And the debt is increasingly held by foreign nations such as China.

Passage of the bill would send it to President Barack Obama, who will sign it to avoid a first-ever, market-rattling default on U.S. obligations. Democrats barely passed it through the Senate last week over a unanimous "no" vote from GOP members present.

Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100204/ap_on_go_co/us_congress_debt_limit

[DCBob]

1. This is a huge problem that is not going to go away easily..

and nobody has a solution.

[Vinnie From Indy]

3. At some point, the Endless War criminal enterprise will have to end

The elephant in the room is the gargantuan amount of money being STOLEN from Americans by the military/industrial complex in the fictional War on Terror. At some point, Americans will be too poor to sustain the current level of military spending.

[DCBob]

4. Yes, that would help but we also need to get a handle on entitlements..

[Vinnie From Indy]

7. It seems obvious that both entitlements and military spending are the biggest problems

It must also be said in the same breath that the REASON both areas are grwoing into unsustainable monsters is the private sector feeding off a political system it now owns completely. The train rushing toward us in BOTH tunnels is the "Corporate Plutocracy Special". With entitlements it is the drug companies, insurance companies, medical device manufacturers and doctors that are driving the costs sky-high. The military spending is driven by the private interests that have always fed at this well. Enemies are created to justify the awesome amount of money stolen each year from the American public.

Single payer and a foreign policy not driven by manufactured fear and extreme partisan politics would solve much of these problems. But, as any observer of history will conclude, it will be the poor and powerless that take it on the chin again. There has never been a statement so true as the Golden Rule - "those with the gold...rule"!

[Yupster]

5. And waid till interest rates

start rising.

We can't handle the interest payments at 3 %. Wait till they hit 6 % -- then 9 %.

[WCGreen]

2. They should call the republicans bluff and let the cap stay where it is..

then ask them where they would like to cut.

The Wars? Because the defense budget eats up more than anything else.

I know it's not feasible but come on, the interest accumulated over the last eight years because of deliberate mismanagement by the last GOP administration handling of the budget is just making it all the more worse.

[Yupster]

6. You can see why Obama works on healthcare because

medicare and medicaid are the ones that are chewing up the budget year by year.