That's the scary headline for this AP article.
The national debt — the total accumulation of annual budget deficits — is up from $5.7 trillion when President Bush took office in January 2001 and it will top $10 trillion sometime right before or right after he leaves in January 2009...
Over the next 25 years, the number of Americans aged 65 and up is expected to almost double. The work population will shrink and more and more baby boomers will be drawing Social Security and Medicare benefits, putting new demands on the government's resources.
These guaranteed retirement and health benefit programs now make up the largest component of federal spending. Defense is next. And moving up fast in third place is interest on the national debt, which totaled $430 billion last year.
Aggravating the debt picture: the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, which the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimates could cost $2.4 trillion over the next decade.
Oddly, while the story talks about the contributions the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan make to the national debt, and even discuss the looming problems of Social Security, there's no mention of the earmarks Democrats have tried to stuff into every piece of legislation they've passed. Nor does the article point out that war requisitions are temporary, unlike, say funding for the hippie museum or the money Congressmen send home to their districts just to make them happy.
Selective outrage? Could be.
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