The Largest Spending Plan in History

Saturday found me standing in line with thousands of people in front of the local high school. As I stood on the side of the road, hoping not to get splashed by the passing cars, I listened to the buzz of the conversations around me. There was definite excitement in the air as the line began to move forward. The President is coming to Elkhart, Indiana to talk about the economy and how he is hoping to stimulate it. Well, it’s not every day that the President of the United States comes to your little town, so naturally I went to stand in line and try to get a free ticket to see him. Problem was, everyone in the city had that same idea. At any rate, after standing there for an hour and getting pretty close to the door, I could see the Fire Marshall walking down the line, stopping at intevals to speak to people. As he got closer I could hear what he was saying… “No more tickets. If you want to put your name on a list, they may call you, but don’t hold your breath.” So close! Oh well, I guess I will have to settle for watching it on the news.

I am curious what he is going to say about this ridiculous spendiing bill (also incorrectly referred to as a stimulus package) because I have read some of the stuff that is in this thing, and you know, I don’t see how many of these projects will have any affect on stimulating the economy. Check out this link to a CNN article and see some of the projects that were cut completely or cut back from the current bill. It is absolutely crazy. I don’t think that this plan is the answer at all. To me it is merely an excuse for people and organizations in Washington to get their little projects done now that there is a Democrat President and Congress. If these people were seriously interested in the good of the country and stimulating the ecomony, they would use discretion and wisdom in choosing projects that would truly create jobs, that would inject immediate relief into the economic structure, all while getting rid of the massive debt that is looming over us. The debt problem is what started everything in the first place! And now, we as a country are on the brink of approving a spending bill that is the largest spending in history. And it is all DEBT. I found the graphic on this site and it seriously blows me away. The WisdomJournal gives some sobering persective on how much a trillion dollars actually is. For example: “One trillion seconds is longer than recorded history, about 32,000 years and One trillion dollar bills laid end-to-end would stretch from the earth to the sun … and back … with a lot of miles to spare.” It’s scary.

It’s just hard for me to believe that the leaders of this country, with all our resources and brain power, can not just lay aside their silly politics and games and do something for the good of the country without going into debt. If President Obama could manage that, then I think I would be impressed with the guy. Until then, I don’t expect much more than rhetoric as usual from today’s speech.