Posted on 02/13/2018 10:37:13 AM PST by Kaslin
In "Hamlet," Shakespeare pens one of the most familiar lines -- and best advice -- ever written. Before Laertes leaves for Paris, his father, Polonius, tells him: "Neither a borrower nor a lender be..."
We have ignored that advice for far too long, which is why the U.S. national debt is $20 trillion with more to come, thanks to the Republican Congress, which has passed a two-year spending bill that calls for $300 billion in new spending and removes caps applied by the Budget Control Act of 2011.
It's being sold to the public with the highest and purist motives. We need to support our "brave" men and women in uniform and repair our roads and bridges.
As Politico first reported, an audit revealed a Defense Department agency can't account for $800 million targeted for building projects. Worse, if that's possible, the Defense Logistics Agency has no paper trail and can't tell auditors where the money went. And Congress is going to give them more.
As for infrastructure, wasn't the Obama "stimulus," otherwise known as the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, supposed to have fixed roads and bridges? It was more like a down payment because government never has enough of our money.
Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), spoke the truth when he held up passage of the budget bill. As reported by The New York Times, Paul said: "I want people to feel uncomfortable. I want them to have to answer people at home who said, 'How come you were against President Obama's deficits and then how come you're for Republican deficits?'"
Paul was the only Republican senator to vote against the measure which is expected to increase the debt to $30 trillion over the next decade, when probably all of those in the Senate will be dead or gone and won't have to take responsibility for it.
In addition to providing more money for the military, some Republicans are claiming with a straight face that this massive new spending is needed to finish repeal of Obamacare. No one can seriously believe that, especially with all of the additional pork that is undoubtedly added on to this bill in order to gain "bipartisan" support. So if it's bipartisan, it must be good, right? Spending may be the last bipartisan act in Washington.
President Trump says if there were more Republicans in Congress the new spending and increased debt would not have happened. Maybe.
It's helpful to remind these free-spending Republicans what our Founders warned about the dangers of debt.
James Madison said: "Debts and taxes are the known instrument for bringing the many under the domination of the few" and "I go on the principle that a public debt is a public curse."
Thomas Jefferson spoke to the dangers of a government drunk on out-of-control spending that leads to increasing debt: "To preserve our independence, we must not let our rulers load us with perpetual debt. We must make our election between economy and liberty, or profusion and servitude."
Among the reasons empires and great nations have collapsed is public debt. Seeking to pacify the masses by never saying "no" to anything, politicians mortgage the future while preserving their current careers. Maybe America should change its initials from USA to ATM.
To invoke singer/songwriter Don McLean in a different context and applying it to modern politicians: "They would not listen they're not listening still; perhaps they never will."
It never ends well for any nation or culture that habitually consumes more than it produces.
Worse, if that’s possible, the Defense Logistics Agency has no paper trail and can’t tell auditors where the money went.
I remember #NeverTrump Cal Thomas and his blather:
In January 2016, Thomas criticized Donald Trump during an interview with Alan Colmes: “He’s on his third marriage. He’s a phony, he doesn’t have substantive answers to any of the problems we have.”
And this in the NRO AGAINST TRUMP issue ...
“I once compared Trump to Lonesome Rhodes, the character played by Andy Griffith in the 1957 film A Face in the Crowd. Trump might also be compared to Elmer Gantry, the fictional evangelist who used religion to mask his dark side.”
Cal Thomas - dead to me ...
GOP: If only we could get the House, we could stop this Democrat tax and spend cycle.
They got the House.
GOP: If only we could get the Senate, we could stop this out of control Democrat President.
The got the Senate.
GOP: If only we could get the White House, we could right this nation.
They didn’t get the White House on their terms, so now they still use the “if” excuse for being worthless to conservatives as they go hand in hand down the yellow brick road with the rest of the progressives, destroying the Republic.
If our federal government is not subject to bankruptcy and can keep printing money at will and forever it will never drown. But this unlimited printing could produce many results worse than drowning.
We have a monetary system that is based on debt and completely unbacked paper money, with manipulated, centrally-controlled interest rates - courtesy of the Federal Reserve. No politician can ever resist it. Our debt will go to $30 Trillion, certainly within the next 7-8 years.
This monetary system is the bedrock foundation of the progressive/left state and their politics. There is always more money for social engineering and political schemes.
I mostly remember the Harold Hecuba musical version.
“Neither a bo’wrer nor a lender be.
Do not forget, stay out of debt...”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bXId5jOTxdg
Try another line. “Me thinks, thou doth protest too much.”
I hate to say it and know for sure I will be hammered here but if Trump wishes to lower spending and the deficit, throw the democrats the biggest bomb. Hire Rendell, he cut government down big big time in Philly because he had no choice they were now as then, then going bankrupt. You may even be able to flip Rendell to be a Republican. Why do you think the PAs voted him too as governor? Even though he’s always been Dem through and though for Obola and Hilda he’s I think 1 of the only responsible Dems out there.
If we got Rendell to switch just WOW
There DEFINITELY be the lender (payday) because it is now LEGAL to charge more interest than the USURY rates were of old!!
https://www.indystar.com/story/news/2017/02/06/loan-sharks-circling-statehouse----again/97447572/
Trump - Oct 2017 thru Jan 2018 - $175.7 Billion
Obama - Oct 2016 thru Jan 2017 - $158.6 Billion
Source:
https://www.fiscal.treasury.gov/fsreports/rpt/mthTreasStmt/mts0118.pdf
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