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National Debt Increases by About $100 Million During the State of the Union Address

Yet President Obama offered no serious proposals for reducing spending or debt.

by
Jeffrey H. Anderson

Bio

January 26, 2011 - 12:13 pm
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Moreover, none of these deficit-spending figures take into account the colossal spending that would occur under ObamaCare, if it isn’t repealed. At a time when we are $14 trillion in debt, ObamaCare would raise taxes, raid from (already unsustainable) Medicare, and usher in $2 trillion in new spending in its real first decade (from 2014 to 2023) alone.

In contrast, in the Republican response, Rep. Paul Ryan (R., Wis.) offered a straightforward appraisal of where we’re at, and what we need to do about it.  And Ryan’s message didn’t stop at spending alone but also made the broader case for upholding our nation’s ideals. As Ryan succinctly put it, “We believe, as our Founders did, that the pursuit of happiness depends on individual liberty, and individual liberty requires limited government.”

As chairman of the House Budget Committee, Ryan will be the Republicans’ point man during the upcoming budget battles with President Obama. It will be refreshing to have microphones put in front of an articulate Republican who actually knows how to make the case for policies that promote fiscal responsibility and prosperity — which, as the Post notes, also involves making the case for change.

Ultimately, that change should include a constitutional limit on federal spending, in the form of a Limited Government Amendment. By providing a long-overdue check on Congress’s power to spend, while also permitting sufficient flexibility to satisfy what Hamilton called the full “extent and variety of national exigencies,” such an amendment would re-limit government, reestablish fiscal responsibility, and — over time — profoundly reduce federal spending as a percentage of GDP.

With the Limited Government Amendment in effect, perhaps one day in the not-so-distant future the national debt will decline by $98 million during the State of the Union address.

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Jeffrey H. Anderson, an independent writer, was the senior speechwriter for Secretary Mike Leavitt at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
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