Free Republic

On July 3, 2008, then-presidential candidate Barack Obama infamously called President George W. Bush “unpatriotic,” and his polices “irresponsible” for adding $4 Trillion to the country's "credit card." This was almost more than all other US presidents combined, he argued, and therefore was putting America on a dangerous path to fiscal insolvency. Less than six years into his own administration, however, the president has failed to reverse the untenable course set by his predecessor; and, indeed, is making America's heavy debt burden even worse. CNS News reports: The total federal debt of the U.S. government has now increased more than...

During last year's budget negotiation meetings, President Barack Obama told House Speaker John Boehner, "We don't have a spending problem." When Boehner responded with "But, Mr. President, we have a very serious spending problem," Obama replied, "I'm getting tired of hearing you say that." In one sense, the president is right. What's being called a spending problem is really a symptom of an unappreciated deep-seated national moral rot. Let's examine it with a few questions. Is it moral for Congress to forcibly use one person to serve the purposes of another? I believe that most Americans would pretend that...

Argentina's president has said that she would refuse to comply with a U.S. judge's order to pay $1.5 billion to winners of a decade-long legal battle over defaulted debt after the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear her government's final appeal. Delivering a nationally broadcast address Monday night, Cristina Fernandez expressed willingness to negotiate with the winners, but said there is simply no way that Argentina can pay the amount in cash, in full, starting just two weeks from now, which is what the U.S. courts have ordered. Under the U.S. court orders, Argentina must hand over $907 million to...

Forty thousand dollars. That’s roughly your share of the U.S. national debt. That’s bad, but it’s nothing compared to the debt the government’s going to be racking up in the years ahead thanks mainly to America’s old-age welfare programs. As the Baby Boomers retire, the bill for Social Security and Medicare will grow fast, setting off a debt tsunami. Economists can estimate the difference between how much government is on track to spend and how much it will raise from taxes. They call this “the fiscal gap.” That number is astronomical: $205 trillion dollars, or more than half a million...

The biggest fallacy in politics is that we need "another Reagan" or more "Tea Partiers" in Congress if we want to save the country. Granted, either would certainly help, but America's structural problems are much bigger than any personnel issues we have in D.C. Even if you're an extremely talented craftsman, you're going to have trouble building a house if the only materials you're allowed to work with are sand and straw. It wouldn't matter if Kobe Bryant, LeBron James, and Kevin Durant were all on the same basketball team if they were only allowed to put three players...

If the news from the past few days hasn't been enough to dampen your fire, try this on for size. Tis the season for budget proposals in Washington. President Obama is the first to reveal what he wants to spend our money on, with Paul Ryan soon to follow. I'll try to take a look at Mr. Ryan's, when he turns it loose, but for now, all we have to go on is what the President has listed as his priorities. My friends, it is not pretty. It's more of the same, really. He wants more infrastructure spending, more education...

(CNSNews.com) - While discussing federal spending and transportation funding last week, Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) said “there is absolutely no way we’re going to cut spending.” Boxer was discussing the Highway Trust Fund with members of the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO) in Washington on Feb. 26, when she addressed various tax increases that may be used to raise money for the program. - See more at: http://cnsnews.com/news/article/eric-scheiner/boxer-absolutely-no-way-were-going-cut-spending#sthash.bgvFVlLs.dpuf

This week's spending-bill fight revealed deepening fractures within the GOP, spelling trouble for 2016. Imagine the ground is splitting open beneath your feet. The rocking plates of earth slowly spread apart, and you're left straddling both sides to keep from falling in. That is how some of the most publicly visible GOP lawmakers are feeling right now. They must choose whose side they're on: establishment Republicans or the far-right flank. Ultraconservative groups are furious over the omnibus appropriations package that coasted through the Republican-led House on Wednesday. The bill, which would fund the government for the rest of the...

WASHINGTON — The House voted overwhelmingly on Wednesday, 359 to 67, to approve a $1.1 trillion spending bill for the current fiscal year, shrugging off the angry threats of Tea Party activists and conservative groups whose power has ebbed as Congress has moved toward fiscal cooperation. The legislation, 1,582 pages in length and unveiled only two nights ago, embodies precisely what many House Republicans have railed against since the Tea Party movement began, a huge bill dropped in the cover of darkness and voted on before lawmakers could possibly have read it. The conservative political action committee Club for Growth...

Since taking office in 2009, it has been tough sledding for the economy. Congress and the administration have increased the federal debt held by the public from $7.5 trillion to $11.2 trillion in 2012. To clarify, in terms of percent of gross domestic product-a measure of the nation's total output-the federal debt has grown from 54 percent of GDP in 2009 to 72 percent of GDP in 2012, according to the Congressional Budget Office. But sector by sector, the administration appears bent on imposing the regulations that thwart entrepreneurial activity and economic growth. ObamaCare, the jewel of Obama presidency, is...

The Day the Dollar Dies America’s financial Pearl Harbor is coming December 6, 2015, 3 p.m. HKT, Hong Kong Twenty-one men representing China’s most powerful institutions file into a conference room atop the ICC Tower looming over Victoria Harbor. The Politburo Standing Committee has mustered the CEOs of China’s four largest banks, Sinopec, and several other state-owned multinationals, plus officers from the Central Military Commission and a pair of academics from China’s top technology universities. The general secretary formally opens the meeting.“As you know, the United States of America continues to manipulate its currency,” he begins. “It is devaluing...

Congress is beginning its new year with a budget deal that busts right through “caps” it was supposed to have on spending. At Heritage, we want to hold Congress accountable for its tax-and-spend ways, even as Members claim there’s no room to cut. A good place to start is understanding the mountain of debt Americans are already under. Check out and share our infographic below that puts it in perspective.

Welcome to the New Year. The usual platitudes for early January include wishes for greater success, greater health and all-around greater prospects. But we all know our nation faces some bleak times. Our constitutional rights are at an all-time low, and our national debt is at an all-time high. The government is spying on its citizens like never before, and anyone who thinks endless spending (such as “QE Infinity”) is the way to handle our economic issues is a blind fool. In short, while I won’t go so far as to make any dire predictions for what 2014 will bring...

WASHINGTON, D.C., December 11, 2013 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Planned Parenthood performed 327,166 abortions last year while collecting more than half-a-billion dollars from U.S. taxpayers, according to its most recent annual report. The numbers represent a modest decrease from 2011 levels, when Planned Parenthood performed a record-setting 333,964 abortions and collected $542.4 million, or 45.2 percent of its total revenue, from government funding. “In 2012, abortions made up 93.8 percent of Planned Parenthood’s pregnancy services, while prenatal care and adoption referrals accounted for only 5.6 percent (19,506) and 0.6 percent (2,197), respectively,” the Susan B. Anthony List noted in a fact sheet....

One of the Obamas' two dozen Christmas trees arrives. You may remember earlier this year that President Obama, in a fit of pique over Congress actually allowing his sequester cuts idea to take effect, had White House public tours canceled to save lunch money. During the later partial government shutdown, he ordered national monuments "closed," even though most are open-air. Now, comes holiday season in the Obama White House. Every president entertains there, though the Obamas showed no shyness about frequent lavish celebrity galas even as millions of fellow Americans struggled during the recession's highest unemployment. Every president decorates...

There are some stories that are just too good to ignore. Time would escape me to write about all the nonsensical lies coming out of liberal land, but this one is really priceless. Thanks to Cry and Howl for pointing me to this piece from a blog that is clearly trying to sell a lie to the American people. It makes the claim that President Obama has reduced the national deficit by 50%. Let me explain why that is nothing but a load of hogwash. The title of the post is "NATIONAL DEFICIT DROPS 50% UNDER OBAMA ADMINISTRATION!". I'll come...

A gift of days with the extended family stretching from Thanksgiving through Cyber Monday inevitably invites reflection on the fields of folly where we find the rising generations at work and play. Youth, beautiful in its blossoming, arrives with predictable attitude, often illustrated by various piercings and tattoos. They're adolescents forever in search of a way to make the "meaningful" statement, as elusive as the maturity that lies ahead. Babies, naturally, are exempt from criticism, gurgling and sucking their thumbs, blissfully unaware that the Brobdingnags around them are blowing their inheritance on big-government deficits. But as the seniors say, leaving...

On Oct. 16, Congress gave President Obama a blank check. That’s right. For the next three months, our chief executive will be able to increase the national debt as much as he wants, and as a practical matter, no one will be able to stop him. A newly enacted law, H.R. 2775, temporarily suspends the U.S. government’s statutory debt limit and shifts Congress‘ borrowing power to the president. This is a radical and unprecedented delegation of power that should trouble every American.

From an Extreme Radical Independent Centrist- By: Larry Walker II -In his 1943 study entitled, The New Philosophy of Public Debt, U.S. economist, founder and 1st president of Brookings Institution (1927-1952), Harold G. Moulton expounded on the two conflicting debt philosophies of that era. First was the traditional view, that “a continuously unbalanced budget and rapidly rising public debt imperil the financial stability of the nation.” And, second, the new conception of the day, that “a huge public debt is a national asset rather than a liability and continuous deficit spending is essential to economic prosperity of the nation.”At...

Since John Boehner became speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives on Jan. 5, 2011, the debt of the federal government has increased by $3,064,063,380,067.72. That is more than the total federal debt accumulated in the first 200 years of the U.S. Congress—during the terms of the first 48 speakers of the House. It also equals about $26,722 for each of the 114,663,000 households the Census Bureau estimates are now in the United States. The $26,722 in new debt per household accumulated under Speaker Boehner would have been more than enough to buy every household in the United States a...