Given our national debt of more than $14 trillion – and a current federal budget that is expected to add $1.5 trillion in red ink – the president’s new proposal to raise already too-high taxes and impose too-small spending reductions offers no realistic solution.
In a speech Wednesday at George Washington University, the president said, “We have to live within our means, reduce our deficit and get back on a path that will allow us to pay down our debt.”
Right! But Obama won’t get us on that path with his plan to raise taxes. And he would reduce out-of-control spending far less than a competing GOP plan would.
While Obama did not cause all our financial problems, he has contributed to them. Too many presidents and members of Congress have created the huge debt. There is no quick or easy solution, or even alleviation. But the Obama plan to raise taxes would surely make our problems much worse by removing more money from the job-producing private sector – in a time when unemployment is already nearly 9 percent!
Obama went along with cutting spending by $38 billion this year, to avoid a government shutdown. But later analysis has shown even those undersized cuts are largely budget gimmicks.