Chattanooga's Congressman Chuck Fleischmann had a serious message for everyone Thursday when he spoke at the Chattanooga Rotary Club. He warned about the enormous spending that Congress approves year after year.
It has led to a national debt of $14.6 trillion -- on which we have to pay massive taxes to cover the interest.
And, Fleischmann said, even if we "eliminated all discretionary spending, we would still run up the debt."
That suggests there will also have to be reform of entitlement programs to get our fiscal house in order.
As Fleischmann said, with such huge debt, "we need to change the culture in Washington, D.C."
At present, that culture is one in which spending money we don't have is considered normal.
Unfortunately, neither President Barack Obama nor Congress -- and perhaps not a majority of American voters -- seems willing to cut enough spending to keep us from going deeper into debt.