U.S. finances are in such a mess that those we've elected to manage the public purse have given up and instead just keep spending.
So, when the Senate and House approved, and President Bush signed, $70 billion in tax cuts largely favoring the very wealthy, that number alongside the nation's intolerable debt and deficits looked paltry.
The most appalling quote to emerge from the joyous, bipartisan back-slapping bill-signing ceremony was President Bush's perspective: "We're sending the American people a clear message about our policy: we're going to continue to trust the American people with their own money."
"Their own money"? What Congress and the president were doing was handing the American public more debt disguised as a free lunch.
And bad news keeps coming.
Trustees for Social Security report the once robust fund will be depleted by 2040 (a year earlier than expected) and Medicare will be busted 12 years from now. More borrowing is just ahead, folks.
The war in Iraq is now estimated to eventually cost $1 trillion if -- and that's a big if -- all troops come home by 2010. Remember promises that Iraqi oil would pay for the war and the White House estimated it would only cost $100 billion? The larger cost will not only be on the battlefield, but horrific residual expenses -- lifetime care for thousands of permanently maimed veterans, insurance for survivors of the dead.
No one has calculated the costs of erecting a fence on the U.S.-Mexico border, stationing National Guard troops there and posting exotic high-tech surveillance systems to catch illegal immigrants.
Trade deficit? How about $800 billion?
Here's where it gets ugly -- the national debt.
As of Wednesday, May 17, according to the U.S. Treasury, the total debt totaled $8,337,013,432,029.90 -- that's trillions.
The interest payment on the debt for the first seven months of fiscal 2006 has totaled $213,190,707,981.16 -- that's billions.
And debt is growing faster than the principal or the interest can be paid.
Worse, foreign countries hold 43 percent, Communist China being one of the largest lenders, which continue feeding the American appetite for more debt to spend on more programs that cost more in interest to finance.
So, when the Communist rulers in Beijing and the Saudi Arabian princes come asking for repayment on Washington IOUs, will American politicians have to plead poverty and play "Let's Make a Deal"?
Washington will no longer be the super power calling the shots, but a broke debtor nation, perhaps bargaining to cancel debt with foreign policy accommodations not to our liking.
That bequest to our grandchildren will be worse than the bills themselves.
