Catholic Stewardship, Deficit Spending, and "The National Debt Road Trip"

Around this time of year, we hear from our local bishop and our parish priest about the importance of "Stewardship."  Of course, the kind of stewardship they are talking about relates to wise use of our personal financial resources and our responsibility to share in the work of the Church by renewing our annual tithing commitments to the parish and to the annual diocesan appeal.

But the Catholic concept of Stewardship applies as well to our national spending practices, which threaten to bankrupt the nation (quite literally) and leave a mountain of debt and interest payments to our children.  In my nearly complete series on the Obama-Democratic health care legislation, I suggest that the plan is not economically viable and if fully implemented will be disastrous for our country.

My friends on the left side of Mirror of Justice and among its readers invariably protest that it is rather convenient for me to raise the debt alarm now the President Obama is in office.  Or, as the author of this delightful and starkly illustrated YouTube video puts it:  "When arguing against increases in the federal deficit, one of the biggest objections I've heard is 'George W. Bush was spending like Paris Hilton on a bender.'  Why the sudden concern with spending now the President Obama is doing it?"

Keep in mind that this video was produced nearly a year ago, that it was based on the Obama Administration's own projected deficits which already have proven much too low, that this illustration does not include the likely leap upward in deficits to be created by the health care legislation, and that the Congressional Budget Office is now warning (here and here) that the Obama deficits will more than double the national debt from where President Bush left us.  The CBO (which I've been arguing is underestimating the rate of spending on the Democratic Party's stimulus, health care, and other projects) reports that, under President Obama's budget, the national debt will rise to 90 percent of GDP, nearly the level of World War II deficits and moving into the range of such insolvent nations as Greece.

Yikes!  Talk about riding in a car with a stuck accelerator!  Any chance of a recall?

Greg Sisk