OK, this post has a disclaimer:
I am not an expert, or even an educated observer on the topic of money in general and national money more specifically.
Also, I am a big fan/supporter of President Obama, but I that doesn't keep me from being open and willing to hear a well-formed argument that he's doing something wrong.
Lastly, I highly encourage, even solicit debate on this topic or any other that I blog about.
Now...
As a junior in college who has only taken one course in politics and that was freshman year where I regularly fell asleep in class, I will admit there is a lot I don't know about "the way things are" in America today. But I seem to remember reading in a text book somewhere that the national debt has been steadily rising, never falling, since forever (or maybe since FDR's Reconstruction or something). If this is true, isn't it a little silly of the critics to be freaking out because the President's new economic plan is going to increase the national debt by $2.3 trillion more than they anticipated?
On the flip side of the same argument, what must America do to make more progress toward capping the national debt, or paying it off (who'd have thought)? Is this impossible? Something tells me that it's not because if it were, we wouldn't spend so much time talking about it. It's just harder than people want to work for an abstract number in the sky.
Does anyone have any insight on this? Please share.
Bush didn't include the cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan in the budget. Obama, in the interest of transparency, is including those costs. That accounts for the vast majority of the "increase" in debt.
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