(CNSNews.com) – When Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) gave her inaugural address as speaker of the House in 2007, she vowed there would be “no new deficit spending.” Since that day, the national debt has increased by $5 trillion, according to the U.S. Treasury Department.
“After years of historic deficits, this 110th Congress will commit itself to a higher standard: Pay as you go, no new deficit spending,” Pelosi said in her speech from the speaker’s podium. “Our new America will provide unlimited opportunity for future generations, not burden them with mountains of debt.”
Pelosi has served as speaker in the 110th and 111th Congresses.
At the close of business on Jan. 4, 2007, Pelosi’s first day as speaker, the national debt was $8,670,596,242,973.04 (8.67 trillion), according to the Bureau of the Public Debt, a division of the U.S. Treasury Department. At the close of business on Oct. 22, it stood at $13,667,983,325,978.31 (13.67 trillion), an increase of 4,997,387,083,005.27 (or approximately $5 trillion).
Pelosi, the 60th speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, has added more to the national debt than the first 57 House speakers combined.
Words do have meaning… to some of us.
#33 Thomas
Of course, problems which appear to arise from a lack of quality and security controls in the top tier of the financial sector actually come from government interference, right?
With circular logic anything is possible. Actors in a non-perfect free market commit fraud in order to obtain continued high salaries. Rather sending cops or acting to align the interests of the agent and the customer we should free the, obviously, corrupt agent of painful restraints.
You talk about debt, but direction is more important. After 8 years of being the global idiot now we have pissed away 2 more years because things are too complicated.
That’s crap.
The government built the computer industry by ordering supercomputers for defense. A good civil aviation sector came out of WWII. The cutting edge of medical improvements come out of either the military(trauma) or government funded research.
The government can help create the next big thing. The debt stuff will work itself out if we have a new game.
If we made a serious effort at one of:
*lower healthcare costs by nationalizing the health insurance industry
*a big program to provide jobs tied to creating an improved national energy infrastructure
*do something with tech ip rights so more effort is spent on innovation and less on legal bullshit
#41
Of course, problems which appear to arise from a lack of quality and security controls in the top tier of the financial sector actually come from government interference, right?
Of course, government interference in the market had no hand in the financial crisis right? This is a common ploy. You want to ignore all the bad things that government does and only focus on the bad things that happen as part of the market.
You talk about debt, but direction is more important.
Yes, let’s talk about direction. In the past two years has the debt done up or down? Has the deficit gotten better or worse? Has unemployment gotten better or worse? If you think we’ve pissed away two years (if only) and you support the Democrats, then you have no one to blame but yourself.
The government built the computer industry by ordering supercomputers for defense. A good civil aviation sector came out of WWII. The cutting edge of medical improvements come out of either the military(trauma) or government funded research.
You cannot seem to differentiate research with specific goals and specific stakeholders from wild spending in the vain attempt to stimulate the economy. They are not the same. Assuming we do not go back further than WWII, the computer was designed to help the military crack enemy codes. Developments in aviation primarily came because the military wanted better aircraft. Medical improvements came to help the military fight specific ailments. Do you notice a trend? All of the research you mentioned was funded by the military with very specific goals. Only later (many years later) did that research morph into something that was commercially viable. That type of spending is entirely different than trying to fix a few roads or bridges in a vain attempt to stimulate the economy.
Either you are a hypocrite or you are unlike most on the left that go into conniptions at the first hint of military spending. As many economists have been saying, the types of government spending that actually can translate into new industries can take years or decades (or sometimes never happens). However, the type of spending that the current administration is doing only makes things worse. It’s the difference between spending money on something that appreciates vs something that is disposable.
The debt stuff will work itself out if we have a new game.
Lovely. That’s the ostrich approach. If we don’t look at the steaming pile of crap in the living room, it will all work itself out on its own. After all, “someone” will pay for it. Who cares about future generations, we need to just keep spending money we don’t have, right? Interest sminterest. FFS.
lower healthcare costs by nationalizing the health insurance industry
IMO, we should leave that up to the States to implement before we try something at the Federal level. The risk of screwing it up, especially with this President and Congress, are simply too high are exponentially high given that it has never been tried in this country. There is no reason the States cannot provide universal health care coverage for their constituents.
*a big program to provide jobs tied to creating an improved national energy infrastructure
First, if the government puts money into energy research it will provide researcher jobs. I’m sure you have heard of them. They are people with college degrees. Now, I’m all for doing research but you do realize the number of jobs in question is tiny?
Second, the government needs to find a way of helping small businesses expand so that *they* can hire more people. Right now, the most significant factor that is stopping that is uncertainty with respect to the government. Specifically, the current President is a loose cannon and no one is sure what is going to do next.
*do something with tech ip rights so more effort is spent on innovation and less on legal bullshit
I’m not sure how that relates to the problems of the recession. Besides, politicians are nothing if not made up of legal bullshit.
Thomas: you studied microeconomics and think you know something huh? Our current financial wreck is the result of an unregulated market: the securitization of mortgages and the debt swaps, insurance instruments that flowed therefrom. Dimwits will like to blame the Freddies for “requiring” loans be made to unqualified poor people but even to the degree that is true, that issue is irrelevant to the cause stated above. An unregulated market is a license to steal. Silly to think otherwise. And you studied microeconomics huh?
Ha, ha. Give them books, and they eat the covers.
So, because the problems we face relate to finance and economics, anyone that studied either of those two fields now instantly knows nothing and all theories of those fields should be completely ignored or perhaps you attempting to imply that anyone that studied economics by definition must believe that all markets should be 100% unregulated in any form or fashion? That’s a new level of ostrich. You are akin to the ignorant fools that think that all doctors “know nothing” when new information is discovered that shows that previous diagnoses were incorrect.
There is no question that governments had a direct hand in this financial crisis. This due in some part to lack of regulation but more significantly due to lack of enforcement. Where was the Congressional oversight committee created after Enron? No economist would argue that markets should be 100% unregulated even though they would all argue that over regulation will dampen the output of a market.
Give them books, and they eat the covers.
Written by someone that clearly relishes their ignorance. You must think it a crazy notion that people that read books might know a thing or two.
perhaps you attempting to imply that anyone that studied economics by definition must believe that all markets should be 100% unregulated in any form or fashion? That’s a new level of ostrich.
Ha! Considering that even Hayak, one of the 20th Century’s most important free-market thinkers, was a critic of laissez-faire.