Winning? US Budget Deficits Breaks November Record

WASHINGTON, D.C. – The collective call for smashing the status quo in the Swamp apparently did not resonate with the branch that controls the nation’s purse strings. While tax cuts and slashing regulations moved in the right direction, on the other side of the ledger lawmakers and bureaucrats have been spending money at a record pace.

In fact, the budget deficit for the month of November was a mind-blowing $204.9 Billion. Put another way, the US Government spent so much of our and future generations’ money that the red ink alone for ONE MONTH represents more than the fortune of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, the richest dude on the planet.

From AP:

“For the first two months of this budget year, the deficit totals $305.4 billion, up 51.4 percent from the same period last year. The Trump administration is projecting that this year’s deficit will top $1 trillion, reflecting increased government spending and the loss of revenue from a big tax cut.

The new report showed that the higher tariffs from President Donald Trump’s get-tough trade policies are showing up in the budget totals. Customs duties totaled $6 billion in November, up 99 percent from November 2017.

Trump has imposed penalty tariffs on steel and aluminum imports from a number of countries and on $250 billion of Chinese imports as the administration seeks to apply pressure to other countries to reduce their barriers to American exports. However, China and other nations have retaliated by imposing penalty tariffs on U.S. exports, sparking a tit-for-tat trade war.”

Spending more than $1 trillion we do not have is not a winning formula. The dramatic increase in customs duties is a pittance compared to the size of the budgets, not to mention that the negative economic effects of such policies dwarf any increases in Uncle Sam’s take. Remember, that 99 percent increase in customs duties was ultimately paid by all of us, too.

More importantly, though, is the fact that congress has the constitutional power and moral duty to mitigate such insane amounts of spending. Huge deficits were cause enough during the Obama years for Republicans in congress to hyperventilate about national debt levels and putting our grandchildren (and their children) in debt. Well, we’re just ending 2 years of Republicans controlling the White House, US Senate, and US House, and NOTHING has changed with with respect to profligate spending.

The Left likes to point to tax cuts as a reason revenues sink, and thus exacerbate deficits, but that point is positively asinine. Beyond the important distinction between spending other people’s money versus letting those people keep more of their it, federal tax revenues have been hitting records as well.

The keystone to reducing deficits is – SURPRISE! – cutting spending. Logic anyone that operates a family budget can understand apparently is too profound for our nation’s leaders to grasp. Two years of giving Republicans a chance to do what they said they would do over the last eight years, and where do we find ourselves? Last time we checked, this thing has not reversed.

There are a lot of demands that warrant being made of our political leaders – border security, repealing healthcare policy debacles, passing market-based solutions across multiple industry sectors, and fortifying our God-given rights – but one of them sticks out for being so grave, but also seemingly ignored. Stop. Spending. Our. Money.