National Debt is now $14 Trillion, the Highest Ever!

By Alan Caruba

On Monday, January 3, 2011 the national debt, as calculated by the U.S. Treasury, topped $14 trillion for the first time. Ever!

In 2010, the Financial Forecast Center, an independent entity, predicted that the Gross Domestic Product, the value of goods and services, would reach $14.834.1 trillion by October of last year and predicted the GDP would reach $14.952 trillion by January 2011.

I’m no mathematical whiz, but it would appear that the U.S. is just barely managing to produce enough income to cover the amount of its National Debt.

A percentage point more or less means nothing as the 112th Congress convenes to tackle the problem of the nation’s debt. It is being discussed in terms of how high to raise the “debt ceiling” so the current administration can borrow and presumably spend more.

In 2008 when Obama was elected, the national debt was about $9 trillion. When the Obama administration began in 2009, it had rocketed passed $10 trillion, then $11 trillion, and, by the time 2010 began, it stood at $12 trillion! A year later, it stands at $14 trillion.

Based on official debt figures published by the U.S. Treasury, on December 27, Terence P. Jeffrey reported on CNSnews.com that “The federal government has accumulated more new debt--$3.22 trillion—during the tenure of the 111th Congress than it did during the first 100 Congresses combined...”

That is terrifying.

It also accounts for the midterm election’s massive transfer of power to Republicans in the House of Representatives as the 112th Congress begins on January 5. Since all spending bills must be initiated in the House, the presumption is that the new Congress is going to get a grip on this nation-killing situation.

That’s not, however, what a January 4 Rasmussen Reports survey suggests. “The new Congress, with Republicans in control of the House, isn’t even seated yet, and voters are already expressing more likely disappointment than they did around Election Day.”

A Rasmussen telephone survey found that “67% of likely U.S. voters—two out of three—think it is at least somewhat likely that most voters will be disappointed with Republicans in Congress before the 2012 elections. This includes 32% who say it is Very Likely.”

That is terrifying.

Bear in mind that there is still no National Budget. The government is operating under what are called continuing resolutions. Not only did the Obama administration run up the national debt to historic heights, but it just could not find time last year to structure a budget to guide the nation through its remaining two years in office.

In the same fashion former Speaker Nancy Pelosi managed to oversee and implement that crazed spending while she held power, incoming Speaker John Boehner is going to be expected to somehow reverse that madness at the same time Obama administration policies keep pushing the nation over the edge of financial disaster.

What policies you ask? Having failed to get the Cap-and-Trade bill enacted, a huge tax on all energy use, the administration’s Environmental Protection Agency is hell-bent on ignoring the will of Congress with an end-run of regulatory insanity. It has announced it will regulate carbon dioxide and other “greenhouse gas” emission to avoid a “global warming” that is not happening.

China is not doing this. India is not doing this. Japan withdrew last year from the UN Kyoto Protocols setting emissions limits. Europe is likely to follow. But! The EPA insists that the USA, virtually alone in the world, must save it from “global warming.”

On virtually the same day it is asserting this totally unauthorized power, The New York Times announced that the Chicago Climate Exchange, “the nation’s first experiment in carbon emissions cap and trade has come to an end…” Created to buy and sell “Carbon Financial Instruments”, the collapse reflected “the legitimacy of the system itself.”

It’s about as legitimate as the “clean coal” scam in which companies sequester carbon dioxide, burying it, to save the world from “global warming” which, I repeat myself, is not happening.

At the same time oil and gas prices are inching upward, the Obama administration has virtually shut down any further exploration or extraction of the USA’s own vast reserves of oil. Since oil is a global commodity whose price is set by the marketplace, the rule of supply and demand will drive up the price still further as China continues to buy more for its fast-growing economy.

In the interest of length, I will not enumerate other nation-killing Obama policies.

Pay no attention to Obama’s claims that he will focus on creating jobs. We are deep in historic debt from the first two year’s of such alleged efforts. If the new Congress can find a way to get out of the way, we might survive.

Will the Republicans find a backbone? A lot of likely voters have their doubts. Stay tuned.

© Alan Caruba, 2011