Can the United States Go Bankrupt?

Think about your personal debt: house payment, car payment, credit card
payments. How much debt can you run up before it's too much? At what
point are you unable to make payments and fall into bankruptcy? You'll
know that once it happens.

But what does the federal government do? They borrow from a number of
sources like:

* Government bonds
* Social Security trust fund
* Other countries

Meanwhile that debtload continues, and grows, and the interest alone is
staggering. So then there's Greenspan & congress making noise about
how the Social Security trust fund will go bankrupt in "X" number of
years if we don't do something. WELL DUH ! Why not leave it alone and
stop "borrowing from Peter to pay Paul"?

Then there's the practice of borrowing from other countries. This gets
tied in to trade agreements, and why? Because, as Bill Clinton put it,
you cannot put restrictive/protective trade restrictions on our
'bankers'. WELL DUH ! First we have to stop this out of control debt and
then we can tell our bankers to buzz off, and then cancel trade agreements
that cause the loss of American jobs.

So what it comes down to is the White House and congress have put the
United States in a flat spin and we falling out of control. It's no
wonder there's an increasing disparity between rich and poor, and it's
only going to get worse. Here's some facts:


The gross national debt is over $7 trillion and will rise by $700
billion this year alone. The national debt is comprised of money borrowed
from and owed to: (1) various government trust funds, including Social
Security, and (2) the public, including individuals, corporations, state,
local and foreign governments, and the Federal Reserve, typically in
the form of bonds or other types of securities.

http://zfacts.com/p/461.html

Here is how congress spends your tax dollars. Check out "defense
spending" (are you aware that the United States has about 5% of the world's
population yet maintains 47% of the entire world's defense spending?)
and 'Treasury Dept' (interest just on the debt):


http://www.federalbudget.com/

Now look at how debt has increased since 1987 - sorry if it's hard to
read but sadly when you view numbers in TRLLIONS it gets hard to read:

Current Amount

09/21/2004 $7,355,728,967,314.85


Current
Month

09/20/2004 $7,352,526,313,993.80
09/17/2004 $7,351,169,914,999.47
09/16/2004 $7,347,867,800,168.01
09/15/2004 $7,353,679,708,420.92
09/14/2004 $7,372,477,498,441.96
09/13/2004 $7,371,695,470,163.46
09/10/2004 $7,372,572,002,165.04
09/09/2004 $7,375,299,845,541.56
09/08/2004 $7,376,457,871,529.81
09/07/2004 $7,368,363,360,008.57
09/03/2004 $7,366,776,167,570.79
09/02/2004 $7,365,716,545,609.45
09/01/2004 $7,354,611,427,274.47


Prior
Months

08/31/2004 $7,350,950,234,630.15
07/30/2004 $7,316,567,571,232.89
06/30/2004 $7,274,334,972,199.15
05/28/2004 $7,196,382,805,621.99
04/30/2004 $7,133,789,490,581.43
03/31/2004 $7,131,067,950,647.32
02/27/2004 $7,091,943,110,094.84
01/30/2004 $7,009,234,605,728.06
12/31/2003 $7,001,312,247,818.28
11/28/2003 $6,925,065,499,881.34
10/31/2003 $6,872,675,839,106.67


Prior Fiscal
Years

09/30/2003 $6,783,231,062,743.62
09/30/2002 $6,228,235,965,597.16
09/28/2001 $5,807,463,412,200.06
09/29/2000 $5,674,178,209,886.86
09/30/1999 $5,656,270,901,615.43
09/30/1998 $5,526,193,008,897.62
09/30/1997 $5,413,146,011,397.34
09/30/1996 $5,224,810,939,135.73
09/29/1995 $4,973,982,900,709.39
09/30/1994 $4,692,749,910,013.32
09/30/1993 $4,411,488,883,139.38
09/30/1992 $4,064,620,655,521.66
09/30/1991 $3,665,303,351,697.03
09/28/1990 $3,233,313,451,777.25
09/29/1989 $2,857,430,960,187.32
09/30/1988 $2,602,337,712,041.16
09/30/1987 $2,350,276,890,953.00


SOURCE: BUREAU OF THE PUBLIC DEBT

http://www.publicdebt.treas.gov/opd/opdpenny.htm

So then.... Can the United States go bankrupt? This isn't a board game
or intellectual debate. We need to do something NOW before our
*government* bankrupts the country, which would be far worse than the Great
Depression.

The upcoming November election is our ONLY chance to influence this and
other issues, since clearly, money talks louder than words in
Washington DC. And sadly few if any of us have the money to influence congress.
Please make your vote count.