Even as the GOP Congress vowed to restore fiscal sanity to D.C., history would tell us that not much would change. Over the Memorial Day weekend, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy and President Joe Biden agreed to (once again) raise the debt ceiling. It’s a good deal for the entrenched powerbrokers in Washington while We the People get stuck holding the bill.
The faces may change, but it’s the same old story. In effect, there is no ceiling on Washington’s lavish appetite for squandering taxpayer dollars at the expense of future generations.
Since 1975 the national debt has increased from $500 billion to $32 trillion, and the debt-to-GDP ratio has quadrupled, from 32 to 123 percent. About 13% of federal spending now goes toward interest on the debt. This isn’t just bad fiscal policy. It’s immoral for the aging establishment to force the rising generation into paying for the long-forgotten pet projects of yesteryear’s self-serving career politicians.
The tired “elect better people” non-solution has proven not to work. Regardless of which party holds the reins of power, the debt goes up, more power is centralized in Washington, and real income remains stagnant. D.C. operates as a uni-party, and frustrations in the citizenry over our systems of governance are inflamed, or worse: people lose hope for the future.
But there is hope.
At the Philadelphia Convention in 1787, Virginia delegate Col. George Mason wisely anticipated a day that the federal government might someday get out of control. He insisted on adding a convention of states process to Article V. His fellow delegates unanimously agreed.
Under the Convention of States Action approach, proposed amendments fall under three specific topics: fiscal restraints, limits on federal power, and term limits for Congress and bureaucrats. This is a solution as big as the problem.
Americans stuck with outrageous bill (again) after Speaker Kevin McCarthy's disastrous debt deal
Published in Blog on June 06, 2023 by Garrett Humbertson
