$9,000,000,000,000

Dear Taxpayer,

I would like to make a request to raise my credit limit from $8.184 trillion to $9.000 trillion this coming Friday. I am afraid my spending habits and insufficient cash flow will max out my credit limit and I rather not risk a default on my borrowing. It would cause irreparable harm to my credit rating across the planet, and I don't think it would be nice for those foreign central banks to start pitching out clean and crisp U.S. dollar bills out the window.

It would cause interest rates to soar, consumers will stop spending, and a recession may hurt everyone in the good ol' U.S.A. I am sure we can work out any sort of financial arrangement where I can pay the interest rate of at least 15% but of course I will try to pay more than that if the rate is much more favorable. I am sure that when the next period ends in 2008, I am sure I set aside more dough over to paying my debt off. It will piss a lot of people off, but I do not want to burden my children with it after I "depart."

Please approve my request and I will be sure to send you a package of military rations as a gift.

Kind Regards,

The U.S. Government

* * * * *

Christian Monitor - Is rising US public debt sustainable?

Newsday - And deeper in debt

Thursday is more likely the day where Congress will vote to increase the national debt by an additional $781 billion, to $9 trillion. This is the fourth time this has happened since President Bush took office.

Of course, the unhappy alternative is a first-ever default on U.S. financial obligations. Republicans, working on their budget blueprint for next year, have already dropped Bush's plans for tax cuts and curbs to Medicare.

My dear friends, the national debt has increased from $6 trillion to $9 trillion over the last five years, about $30,000 for every man, woman, and child in the United States.

While some conservatives have asserted that the national debt increase have been caused by the previous recession, 9/11, the war in Iraq, and new spending to combat terrorism, the chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, Senator Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, said Bush's tax cuts account for just 30 percent of the debt limit increases required during his presidency.

But the politicians have to be patriotic and grandstanding to say that "it is necessary to preserve the full faith and credit of the federal government." Duh! Isn't that obvious? I wonder how can we do that when we finally hit $9 trillion, or even $10 trillion.

The one good thing is that the debt ceiling increase legislation will be voted on by itself, so every politician's record will show it. Previous times, Republicans had the nerve to insert this "increase" as a rider to major government spending bills.