Venezuelan Hyperinflation Means Money No Longer Fits Wallets

David Holt/Wikimedia

The crashing Venezuelan economy has put consumers between a rock and a hard place. Shortages have caused prices to increase dramatically while, at the same time, the value of the Venezuelan currency has plummeted. The result is that wallets are no longer large enough to contain the wad of banknotes that are necessary to buy even small, everyday items.

According to the Washington Post, the exchange rate is so bad that the largest Venezuelan banknote, a 100 bolivar bill, is worth only about 5 US cents on the black market, far less than the official exchange rate of 10 bolivars to the dollar. That means that common items are increasingly out of reach for Venezuelans. A pack of cigarettes currently sells for about 2,000 bolivars, the current equivalent of $1 US.  This transaction alone would require the exchange of 20 of the 100 bolivar bills.

The large number of banknotes required for a typical shopping trip makes it difficult to carry enough money in a wallet or purse. Many Venezuelans are increasingly turning to electronic transactions to avoid carrying large amounts of cash. For others, the large quantity of paper money means using larger plastic bags or backpacks to transport their bankroll.

  

Shortages have caused the price of food to skyrocket even as the money lost its value. As food riots rocked the country in August, CNN reported that staples such as flour, milk and pasta can cost a month’s pay… if you can find them at all.

In Venezuela, there are three ways to buy products. First, there are official government stores where the price is subsidized and kept low. Economic law dictates that artificially low prices cause abnormally high demand. The result is that people flock to the government stores and rapidly clear their shelves. Products disappear quickly even with rationing. Customers at government stores can only shop on certain days of the week. There are long lines and, when you get to the front, there are no guarantees that there will be anything left to buy.

Venezuela also has private stores. Since these stores are not subsidized by the government, prices are higher. Private stores still have to contend with the shortages as well.

“I've been waiting in line since 3 a.m. and have only managed to get two tubes of toothpaste, so, I guess I'm going to have to eat toothpaste tonight,” Monica Savaleta, a 19-year-old dancer, told CNN.

There is a third option, the black market. Buying and selling on the black market is illegal and can be dangerous. It is also very expensive compared to the legal stores.

“I make between 12,000 and 15,000 bolivars a month,” Savaleta said. “If I buy from the [black market] bachaqueros, my whole salary is blown on three kilos [6.6 pounds] of rice.”

Business Insider listed several black market prices for common grocery items. Fresh milk is impossible to find, so many used powdered milk which costs $700 US for a 2.2-pound box. A dozen eggs fetch $150 US. A box of pasta costs more than $300 US. Watermelons are $40 US each. A one-pound bag of coffee is $200 US. To put this in perspective, the Venezuelan minimum wage is about 15,000 bolivars per month, about $1,500 US. More than three-quarters of Venezuelans live in poverty according to the Wall Street Journal.

Venezuela’s situation is known as “hyperinflation,” a condition typically defined by economists as monthly inflation of greater than 50 percent. At that level, an item that costs $1 on January 1 would cost $130 a year later. The Venezuelan inflation rate has been estimated at between 720 percent and 2,200 percent.

There have been 55 other cases of hyperinflation, all of them since the onset of the 20^th century. The most famous was in the German Weimar Republic in the 1920s that eventually led to the rise of Adolf Hitler. As with many cases of hyperinflation, war and financial mismanagement led to the onset of the Weimar crisis. Germany had financed its war effort with debt, which was compounded after the war with reparations payments to the Allies. The Reichsbank began monetizing the debt, a process by which the central bank issued bonds to cover its debt which were then purchased by the same central bank. Using this process, the government could borrow money without having to repay it. The German government also began printing more marks to finance domestic spending.

In Venezuela, the economic crisis is primarily due to government policy and the oil slump. Former president, Hugo Chavez, a protégé of Fidel Castro, nationalized large swaths of Venezuela’s economy and funded much of the country’s consumption with foreign debt according to The Guardian. When the price of oil crashed, so did Venezuela’s revenues. As a result, Nicolas Maduro, Chavez’s successor, was forced to use the country’s gold reserves to service the national debt.

The Maduro government also printed more money, which contributed to the devaluation of the currency. Another basic economic law says that when there is more of something, it is valued less. More bolivars on the market made each individual bolivar less valuable.

Also contributing to the problem is corruption. Transparency International rates Venezuela as the ninth most corrupt country in the world. While ordinary Venezuelans suffer, Maduro and his cronies are doing well. The NY Post noted last spring that an estimated $2 billion has been exported from the country to private banks. The Maduro government is accused of bribery, money laundering, siphoning funds from the state-owned oil company and even drug smuggling.

In 1923, the Weimar hyperinflation ended when the German Reichsbank stopped monetizing the national debt and stopped printing new money. The Reichsbank pegged the value of the Papermark at 4.2 trillion to $1 US according to the Mises Institute. A new currency, the Rentenmark, was introduced with a value of 1 trillion Papermarks to 1 Rentenmark.

At this point, there is no end in sight to the Venezuelan crisis. A resolution will require a change in government policy and may require a change in the government itself. Dissatisfaction and food riots may eventually turn into a revolution or coup against the country’s ruling class. Until reforms are made, the best the government can do to deal with the crisis is to print money in ever larger denominations. 

Originally published on The Resurgent

Evan McMullin on the issues

EvanMcMullin.com

This is the second of a two-part series in which we present Evan McMullin's platform in his own words, drawn from a series of interviews. The interview sources are linked in part one, which we published yesterday. Today we present Evan McMullin on the issues and focus on domestic policy.

On the Second Amendment: On Now This, McMullin said, “I am a supporter of the Second Amendment. I think it is important to our freedoms and liberties here in the United States. I am a gun owner. I believe in responsible gun ownership. I think to own a weapon is to assume some very serious responsibilities I believe that we have to have a better, more constructive dialogue on this issue. I’m a supporter of the Second Amendment. I would like to decrease gun violence. I think there are many ways to do that while we still protect our rights.”

On judicial appointments: Louise Mensch of Heat Street asked whether McMullin would appoint Ted Cruz to the Supreme Court. “I’m not making any commitments about who I would or would not appoint,” McMullin replied, “but I will tell you that I will appoint originalists. In the question that involves what I think about Roe v. Wade, I will appoint pro-life justices.

On entitlements: “Entitlements are pushing us further and further into debt,” he said on Bloomberg. “Our debts are larger and larger. Our deficits are larger and larger. We have to do something to get them on a sustainable path. We have to keep our commitments to our elderly, our seniors today, but we have to phase in some reforms for future retirees.”

On religious freedom: “I believe in libertarian ideas in a sense that individuals need to be more empowered in our country. The power needs to be shifted back closer to the people. Those are consistent with libertarian ideas, but part of that is religious liberty. Our country was founded in part on that and we can’t have a president who doesn’t understand that, especially in this time when we really need to, I think, ensure that religious liberties are protected.”

When asked about his stance against religious persecution, McMullin said, “This is a driving principle for me. We’re a nation of 330 million people and geographically we are also very large. A lot of people have different ideas, they come from different countries, themselves or past generations. We are a diverse, pluralistic country and you must have tolerance as a result of that. E pluribus Unum. This was our original, unofficial motto until, I think, the ‘50s, that conveyed the idea that there are many of us with many differences among us, [but] that we are together still as one country. We need to go back to that and realize that we are not going to agree on everything, all of us on the right and left and center, but we need to respect everybody’s ability to live the way they want to live and to be one, united, in defense of those freedoms.”

On why people should vote for him: “I’ve spent my life avoiding the limelight and seeking opportunities to serve. Donald Trump has spent his life avoiding opportunities to serve and seeking the limelight.”

Can America be saved?

During the Obama Administration, a frequent rallying cry among conservatives has been the need to “take our country back.” The Obama era has brought the fundamental change that the future president promised in 2008, but has left many Americans feeling that the country is on the wrong track.

Much of the focus on restoring America is centered on restoring Republicans –constitutional conservatives in particular – to the White House. Winning the election of 2016, however, will prove much easier than reversing American decline. Many of the problems faced by the United States are in reality merely symptoms of deeper problems that may well prove impossible to fix, even with committed conservative Republicans in control of both houses of Congress and the presidency.

The national debt

The most obvious of long term problems is the mounting federal debt. The debt, which has been increasing for years under both Republicans and Democrats, almost doubled under President Obama and now stands at more than $18 trillion. If this were not bad enough, the figure is incomplete because it does not include unfunded liabilities for items such as entitlement programs and federal pensions. The true debt is more than $100 trillion according to Forbes, an amount that the government will almost certainly never be able to repay.

Republicans under John Boehner deserve credit for attacking this problem, but their efforts have been woefully inadequate, due in no small part to President Obama. The sequester led to the first real cuts in the federal budget since the 1950s. At this point, federal spending has declined for three consecutive years for the first time since the 1920s, but while the deficit has been reduced, it has not been eliminated. The federal debt continues to increase, albeit at a slower rate.

Federal borrowing has also been aided by historically low interest rates over the past decade, but this cannot be expected to continue indefinitely. Currently, interest payments make up seven percent of the federal budget according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. As the debt continues to grow and interest rates rise, payments on interest will crowd out other budget items. At some point, Americans will have to choose between national defense and entitlements.

The destruction of the family

Hidden behind many symptoms of American decline is the decline of the family. Statistics show that half a century ago, almost all children were born to intact families. Divorce was uncommon and most kids grew up with two parents. Today, almost half of first babies are born to unmarried mothers. Two things caused the change: birth control and the welfare programs of the Great Society.

Birth control eliminated the big reason that women had for abstaining from sex until marriage. The increased availability of sex outside of marriage eliminated a big reason for men to get married. Accordingly, marriage rates have dropped since birth control became widely available.

Complementary to birth control was the fact that, if a woman did get pregnant outside of marriage, the government would now subsidize the costs of raising children for single parents. Men need no longer feel the pressure to marry a woman that they had “knocked up.” Dad wasn’t needed because Uncle Sam would fill the void.

The problem is that a government check is not as effective a parent as an actual, flesh and blood father. Studies have shown that children of single-parent households are more at risk for juvenile delinquency and drug abuse than their peers and are more likely to live in poverty. They also tend to have more children outside of marriage, requiring more government financial assistance, in a vicious cycle that perpetuates itself and that will be harder and harder to break.

Executive usurpation of Congress

A less obvious threat to the future of the United States is the damage that President Obama has done to the balance of power between the presidency and Congress. After the 2010 elections, President Obama learned that he could bypass Congress to enact difficult-to-pass items of legislation through the administrative rulemaking process of executive agencies. Net neutrality and new carbon regulations by the Environmental Protection Agency are two examples of this.

When the Republicans took control of the House and then the Senate, Obama increasingly relied on Executive Orders and administrative rulemaking to advance his agenda. A well-known example is the president’s 2012 directive on immigration. Two more recent examples are the agreement with Iran, which Obama refuses to call a treaty because that would require ratification by the Senate, and this week’s revelation, reported by Maggie Gallagher in The Pulse, that the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission unilaterally criminalized workplace discrimination based on sexual orientation under the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The law, as written, does not include sexual orientation as a protected class.

Republicans have made attempts to rein in the president, but, all too often, these attempts fall victim to Democratic filibusters or the president’s veto pen. The Constitution is inadequate to deal with a president who has no respect for the rule of law. This was noted by framer John Adams who said, “Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”

It is unlikely that future presidents will not remember President Obama’s success at circumventing Congress with executive actions. It will be very tempting for Obama’s successors to adopt the same strategy of legislation by “a pen and a phone.”

The failure of the courts

Closely related to President Obama’s usurpation of congressional authority is the failure of the courts to adequately provide a check to unconstitutional laws and executive regulations. The appointment of liberal judicial activists for decades has eviscerated the judicial branch as a check to Congress and the president. The problem is not limited to the Supreme Court, but includes federal and state courts around the country, as evidenced by the plethora of state judicial decisions striking down definition of marriage of laws.

Likewise, the problem is not new. There have been many bad Supreme Court decisions throughout our history, notably the Dred Scott decision of 1857, but the idea of justices creating law rather than interpreting it stems back at least 80 years to the New Deal. In Wickard v. Filburn (1942), the Court ruled that the interstate commerce clause could be interpreted to mean that Congress could regulate commerce within a state, the opposite of what the Constitution says. Griswold v. Connecticut (1965) created the heretofore unknown “right to privacy” that led to other bad decisions such as Roe v. Wade (1973).

These earlier bad decisions are the direct lineage of more recent bad decisions like King v. Burwell (2015), in which a majority ruled that an “Exchange established by the State” can also mean “exchange set up by the federal government,” NFIB v. Sebelius (2012), where the Court ruled that Congress can tax people for not doing things it wants them to do, and Obergefell v. Hodges (2015), where a majority found that the dignity of homosexuals required the justices take defining marriage out of the hands of the states and place it into their own hands, the will of the people and the Constitution be damned. As Justice Scalia lamented in his King v. Burwell dissent, a judicial philosophy that allows judges to make “interpretive distortions… ignores the American people’s decision to give Congress ‘all legislative Powers’ enumerated in the Constitution.”

A constitutional republic requires the rule of law to exist. When judges rewrite laws based on their own desires, the rule of law is in peril. Judicial activism is a problem, but judicial restraint in the face of unconstitutional laws is just as threatening.

America’s core problems are deeply rooted in decades of progressive policies and social tinkering as well as a changing culture. The left has been very successful at shifting culture away from the liberty-focused, hardworking culture of our forefathers to an attitude of dependence on government. Top down policy changes cannot correct cultural issues. Conservatives must focus on changing the culture of America from the grass roots as well.

No one can say for sure how long America will continue to struggle along under the weight of these four possibly insurmountable obstacles. It might take decades for them to take their toll on the country. We might follow in the footsteps of Europe’s social democracies with a generation or more of stagnation and decline.

Or, just the opposite, our core problems might never run their full course. Outside influences – from ISIS to Iran to China – might hasten our decline since weakness is an invitation to adversaries. As Lenin said, “Probe with a bayonet: if you meet steel, stop. If you meet mush, then push.”

Read the full article on Examiner.com

Save America: Take your family to church

Recent polls now show that almost three quarters of Americans believe the nation is on the wrong track. The reality is that regardless of whether Republicans win control of the Senate this year and the presidency in 2016, it will be very difficult to solve the problems facing America today. Many of the most serious issues facing the country stem from cultural changes that cannot be solved solely by changes to government policies. Americans who are serious about changing the direction of the country should begin by taking their families to church. To save America, it will take a moral revolution that can only come from God, not government.

Even though some polls show that church attendance is still strong in the US, ChurchLeaders.com reports that counts by denominations and local churches show that church attendance is down and still declining. Although about 40 percent of the population reports that they attend church, the real number is probably less than 20 percent and not keeping pace with population growth.

It is likely that the decline in church attendance can be connected with many of America’s social and economic ills. Movement away from traditional Judeo-Christian morality may be responsible for a change in social mores that has led to an expansion of government and a growth in entitlement spending.

While there is no hard data or studies establishing a causal relationship between church attendance and fundamental shifts in American society, it is easy to see a correlation between the two. The movement away from traditional religion has occurred at the same time as a sharp decline in marriage. According to Census data, the share of unmarried couples cohabiting has risen from one percent in 1960 to more than 11 percent today. At the same time, the marriage rate has declined from 90 percent in 1950 to 36 percent. Both men and women are delaying marriage until later in life.

Unsurprisingly, the decline of marriage has led to an increase in the share of children living in single-parent homes. Two-parent families have declined from almost 90 percent in 1960 to less than 70 percent today. Put another way, according to The Atlantic, at 31 percent of U.S. households, “single parents have more than tripled as a share of American households since 1960.”

The change is even pronounced in black families where more than two-thirds of children belong to single-parent families. Many children who do live in two-parent families are not with both biological parents. The trend is not limited to black families. Nationwide, one out of every three children live in homes where the biological father is absent.

Given the enormous costs of raising children, it should come as no surprise that with the growth of single parent families has come a similar growth in federal entitlement spending. As more children grow up within broken families, the federal government has borne an ever larger financial share of the burden of parenthood. Federal entitlement spending has grown from less than one percent to approximately 13 percent of GDP with no sign of slowing.

The effects of single-parent families on children are well documented. According to the National Father Initiative, growing up in single-parent families, particularly families where the father is absent, puts children at risk for a variety of negative outcomes. Such families are more likely to live in poverty due to the fact that a single mother often cannot work a full-time job and care for her children. Children of absent fathers are more at risk for emotional and behavioral problems, juvenile delinquency, drug and alcohol abuse, sexual activity and teen pregnancy, and even bad grades.

The problem of single-parent families is a vicious cycle. Statistics show that children who grow up in single-parent families are more likely to experience divorce themselves as well as being less likely to marry in the first place. In many cases, children of single parents grow up to head their own single-parent families, which in turn require more government help.

Due to the unintended consequences of entitlements, such programs would be problematic even if the federal government could afford them. In reality, entitlements are unaffordable. The Heritage Foundation points out that 61 percent of federal spending is on mandatory items such as entitlements. Further, 31 cents of every federal dollar spent is borrowed. This has led to a federal debt of more than $17 trillion. When unfunded liabilities such as Social Security and Medicare are included, the total debt comes to $127 trillion, according to Forbes.

The problem of the growth of government deficit spending on entitlements is not merely an economic issue. It is also a moral issue. Growth in government is largely a response to the decline of the family and entitlements fill the vacuum of money and stability in single-parent families. Because a government check cannot fully replace a missing mother or father, these entitlement payments make the problem worse in the end by making marriage and traditional families seem optional.

The destruction of the family causes other problems as well. The problem of out-of-wedlock pregnancy is undoubtedly related to the abortion issue as well. According to the Centers for Disease Control, more than 85 percent of women who abort their babies are unmarried. The Guttmacher Institute notes that 75 percent say that they cannot afford a child, a problem that is often associated with single-parent, single-income families. Half specifically cite their desire to not be a single parent or problems with their husband or partner. While the rate of abortions in the U.S. is declining somewhat, more than 1 million abortions still occur in the U.S. each year.

Another possible, but less conclusive, result of the destruction of the family is increased homosexuality. Accurate statistics on the rate of homosexuality are hard to find (due to small sample size and self selection), but the theory that homosexuality in some people is related to domineering mothers has been around for decades, such as a paper by Dr. Marvin Siegelman from 1974 and several books by Dr. Joseph Nicolosi, author of “A Parent’s Guide to Preventing Homosexuality.” While the left disputes this view, little is definitely known about the root causes of homosexuality.

Some psychologists and psychiatrists have advanced therapies based on these theories of environmental causes for homosexuality. In spite of being attacked by gay activists and leftists, there is evidence that these therapies can help some homosexuals. In some cases, liberals have sought bans against gay reparative therapy, even though such bans violate the freedom of speech of doctors and the freedom of choice of families. If homosexuality is a result of strong mother figures for some gays, then the rate of homosexuality should increase as the rate of single-parent families increases.

The negative effects of homosexuality are less disputed. Dr. Timothy Dailey of the Center for Marriage and Family Studies summarized the risks of homosexuality. These include an increased risk of suicide, domestic violence, and substance abuse in addition to greater risk for a variety of sexually transmitted diseases. Lesbians also have a higher risk for a variety of cancers.

Today, the United States resembles the Israel of the Bible in many ways. As Isaiah described, in spite of the blessings that God has bestowed upon America, the nation increasingly produces “bad fruit.”Americans increasingly revel in pleasure and immorality and our moral compasses are so distorted that we frequently “call evil good and good evil.” In America today, religion is being from the public square and people who follow the teachings of the Bible are increasingly in conflict with laws enforcing the new morality. Ancient Israel was destroyed by God’s judgment and some, such as Rabbi Jonathan Cahn, believe that America is already undergoing the early stages of judgment as well.

When viewed in context, it is apparent that a change in governmental policy is not sufficient to reverse the decline of the American family and the budget-busting entitlements that go along with it. What is needed is a national revival and a return to traditional family models.

The only way to reverse the trend of ever-increasing government entitlements is to reduce the need for those entitlements in the first place. By returning to a traditional family model where two parents share the responsibility for raising children, there will be less need for government intervention and support. Changes in policy without attacking the underlying problems will be doomed to failure.

The government cannot force Americans to return to traditional and time-proven methods of bearing and raising children, but a true revival and voluntary return to the Biblical teachings has the capability to change the course of American society and culture. Such a cultural shift will be necessary for the long term prosperity – and even survival – of the United States.

A revival has to start somewhere. If you want to save America, take your family to church. Teach your kids the value of the traditional family. Show them that when spouses fight, it doesn’t mean that the marriage has to end. If you love your children, try to make your marriage work. You can start this process by taking your family to church to learn about God’s forgiveness. You might save your country as well as your soul.

Read the full article on Examiner.com

Poll: Americans still like Obama. His policies? Not so much.

A new poll by AP-GfK released on Jan. 23 reveals that even though most Americans like Barack Obama personally, many think that he is a poor president. The poll found that while Obama’s image has rebounded in the months since the government shutdown, people are still pessimistic about the economy and the direction of the country.

The poll showed that President Obama’s likability had increased by nine percent since the end of the government shutdown in October. Fifty-eight percent of Americans now view the president as very or somewhat likeable.

The good news for the president does not extend to his policies however. The poll shows that the view of the president is slipping even among Democrats and liberals. The percentage of Americans who view Obama as outstanding or above average has declined by six points since he was reelected in November 2012. Thirty-one percent now view Obama’s presidency as outstanding or above average while 42 percent see it as below average or poor.

Even though the president’s approval rating is relatively stable, the current Real Clear Politics average shows him with 43 percent approval and 52 percent disapproval, other trends look bad for Democrats. Polls asking about the direction of the country consistently show that two-thirds of Americans believe the country is on the wrong track. A Bloomberg poll also released on Jan. 23 found that 58 percent disapprove of Obama’s handling of the economy, his worst showing since September 2011.

In spite of Obama’s personal popularity, his policies provide an opening for Republicans in this year’s midterm elections. A Fox News poll from earlier this week showed that Americans view the economy as the most important problem for Congress and the president to face. More than three times as many voters chose the economy as the next most serious problems, health care and the federal deficit. Jobs/unemployment and federal spending were the most important economic issues. President Obama scored poorly on all of these issues.

The poll numbers suggest that personal attacks on President Obama, who will not face reelection, will fare poorly with voters. Criticism of Democratic handling of the economy, health care and government spending is likely to be much better received by voters.

The current view of President Obama seems best described by Joshua Parker, a 37-year-old small businessman from Smyrna, Tenn. who is quoted in the AP-GfK poll. “He would probably be a guy I would like to hang out with if he wasn’t president,” Parker says, “but I like a lot of people who are not qualified to be president.”

Originally published on National Elections Examiner

Comparing Obama and Bush on debt and spending

A common liberal answer to conservative complaints about the size of government and the federal debt is that George W. Bush also grew government and ran deficits. Rather than taking these claims at face value, conservatives should present liberals with counterarguments that delve deeper into the issues at hand.

First, examine the details of the growth of government under George W. Bush. According to the Office of Personnel Management, in 2000 there were 4,129,000 federal workers. By 2008, there were 4,206,000 federal workers, a total increase of 77,000 employees. Executive branch employees increased by 53,000 and military personnel increased by 24,000.

Much of this increase in the federal workforce is explained by the fact that the nation went to war on George W. Bush’s watch. Bipartisan votes in congress authorized the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq after the United States was attacked on September 11, 2001. The increase in military personnel was needed to fight these wars.

The jump in executive branch employees is also a result of the wars against terrorists. The increase is almost totally accounted for by the creation of the Department of Homeland Security. According to CNN, the Transportation Security Administration, which is part of DHS, employs approximately 60,000 federal workers. The TSA employs screeners, air marshals, inspectors, explosives detection teams, and, of course, bureaucrats.

For Obama’s part, federal employment also increased from 2008 through 2011, the last year for which statistics were available. In 2011, there were 4,403,000 federal workers, an increase of 197,000 from 2008. The 2011 total was slightly lower than 2010, due to the inclusion of temporary census workers in 2010. Under Obama, executive branch employees increased by 64,000 and uniformed military personnel increased by 133,000.

With respect to spending, President Bush inherited a surplus according to historical data from the White House Office of Management and Budget. There was a federal surplus of $128 billion in 2001. The recession and the new war combined to create a $158 billion deficit in 2002 as revenues fell and spending increased.

During the Bush Administration, total outlays increased every year from $1.8 trillion in 2001 to $2.9 trillion in 2008. The average deficit during the Bush years was $250 billion. As a percentage of GDP, the average deficit was two percent. President Bush’s largest deficit was $458 billion in 2008 when the financial crisis led to the creation of the Troubled Asset Relief Program and several corporate bailouts.

During President Obama’s first term, federal outlays increased from $3.5 trillion in 2009 to $3.6 trillion in 2011. The estimated total outlays for 2012 are estimated to be $3.8 trillion. In Obama’s first year, the deficit increased by almost a trillion dollars from 2008. Obama has not had a single year in which the deficit was less than a trillion dollars. Obama’s average deficit was $1.3 trillion during his first three years. This translates into an average deficit that is 9.2 percent of GDP.

Under President Obama, spending dramatically increased at the same time that tax revenues dropped sharply due to the Great Recession. By 2012, revenues were almost recovered to pre-2008 levels, but spending had risen even faster. Even three years in to the recovery, deficit levels remain above eight percent of GDP.

Some liberals might prefer to use 2009 numbers rather than 2008, but that would let Obama escape responsibility for the stimulus spending that he initiated. In reality, President Obama’s “emergency” stimulus spending never went away and the increased spending levels have now become permanent.

It is true that Bush left office in 2009, but he served less than a month. President Bush submitted the proposed budget for the 2009 fiscal year to Congress, but it was President Obama who signed it into law. In either case, the average deficit under Obama is more than four times greater than that of President Bush.

Both presidents increased the national debt according to statistical data from the U.S. Treasury. On January 20, 2001 when President Bush took office, the total national debt stood at $5.7 trillion. Eight years later on January 20, 2009 the debt had risen to $10.6 trillion.

During President Obama’s first term the debt increased to $16.4 trillion on January 20, 2013. This means that under Obama, the debt had increased by $5.8 trillion in four years as opposed to President Bush’s increase of $4.9 trillion over eight years.

In the final analysis, both presidents grew government and spent and borrowed far too much. President Obama’s spending and borrowing is in a league by itself, however. Obama is the only president in U.S. history to preside over trillion dollar deficits and one has occurred each year of his presidency.

The only other period in American history in which spending levels matched those under Obama was when the country mobilized to fight the Axis during World War II. In the 1940s, government spending decreased at the end of the war. So far President Obama has shown no signs of ever slowing his spending.

Originally published on Examiner.com:

http://www.examiner.com/article/obama-v-bush-on-spending-debt-and-growth-of-government?cid=db_articles

Fiscal cliff deal pushes U.S. toward Obama recession

The fiscal cliff deal that House Republicans and President Obama agreed to on New Year’s Day means that a return to recession is almost inevitable. The House voted Tuesday night to approve the deal, officially named the American Taxpayer Relief Act of 2012, which essentially gives President Obama and the Democrats everything that they wanted.

The Wall Street Journal notes that the deal, the biggest tax increase in 20 years, is being cynically spun as a tax cut for the middle class. Nothing could be further from the truth. Even though income tax rates only increase on income above $400,000 ($450,000 for joint filers) there are no tax cuts for anyone and all Americans will pay more in taxes in 2013. Additionally, because joint filers can only earn $250,000 each before the higher rates take effect, the marriage penalty is being returned.

According the Journal’s analysis of the deal, there are a multitude of tax increases that will affect every American, not just the wealthy. The death (estate) tax, which affects many family farms and businesses, will increase from 35 to 40 percent. The capital gains and dividends taxes will rise from 15 percent to 23.8 percent. This includes a 3.8 percent Obamacare investment income surtax. While often associated with the wealthy, the capital gains and dividends taxes affect anyone with a 401(k), an IRA, or any other type of investment. Many countries that compete with the U.S. for international business do not have capital gains taxes at all.

There are also other tax increases associated with Obamacare that will now take effect. The medical device tax is a new 2.3 percent excise tax on medical equipment. There is also an additional Obamacare payroll surtax on incomes above $200,000 ($250,000 for joint filers) of 0.9 percent.

Finally, the payroll tax holiday is expiring. This means that taxes on income up to $113,700 will increase by two points to 6.2 percent. According to an analysis by CBS, this means that a worker earning $50,000 would pay almost $1,000 more in payroll taxes in 2013. According to the Tax Policy Center, the average taxpayer will see an increase of $1,257.

The total cost of the tax increases in the deal is $620 billion over ten years according to Forbes. This represents money that will not be available to small business owners to expand or hire new workers, that families will not be able to spend or save for their own needs, and that will be diverted from wealth-building projects into tax shelters to avoid the new Obama tax increases. As $620 billion exits from the fragile U.S. economy, there will almost certainly be a contraction that will lead to another recession.

New tax increases were unavoidable given President Obama’s reelection and would have been more palatable if they had been accompanied by meaningful spending cuts. Under President Obama, the federal government has run deficits in excess of $1 trillion every year. The so-called emergency stimulus spending has become permanent. Erskine Bowles, Bill Clinton’s chief of staff and head of Obama’s own deficit commission, recently was quoted by the Wall Street Journal saying, “If we're going to raise revenue and if we're going to raise it in any form, then we darn well better cut spending, because spending is the biggest part of this problem.”

So how did the fiscal cliff deal handle the deficit spending issue? Spending and the associated borrowing actually increase under the compromise. According to the Congressional Budget Office, the deal will increase federal spending by $332 billion over 10 years. Deficits are projected to rise by $3.9 trillion. This means that the ballooning federal debt will continue to crowd out private investment and act as a drag on the economy.

The fiscal cliff deal is a clear victory for President Obama and the Democrats and presents the country with the worst of both worlds. Taxpayers and businesses will be faced with massive tax increases in an already weak economy paired with still more increases in federal spending, borrowing and growth of government.

Originally published on Examiner.com:

http://www.examiner.com/article/fiscal-cliff-deal-will-lead-to-the-obama-recession?cid=db_articles

Reasons to NOT vote for Obama

Early voting has already started in many states for this year’s elections. In the rest, Election Day is now only two weeks away. The number of undecided voters is dwindling as most have already decided on which presidential candidate to vote for. This column is directed toward these undecided voters as well those who lean toward President Obama.

The most obvious reason not to vote for President Obama’s reelection is the economy. Even though the economy has officially been recovering for the recession for more than three years, most Americans still do not feel the recovery. Unemployment remains high. The poverty level is higher than it was when President Obama took office. Despite an increase in the U.S. population, fewer Americans are working today than when President Obama was inaugurated. In August, twice as many Americans went on food stamps as found jobs according to Forbes.

Much of the blame for the lagging recovery belongs to President Obama. In spite of his 2008 campaign promises, President Obama has passed a bundle of tax increases for the middle class as well as the wealthy. The most infamous of these is the individual mandate, which was ruled by the Supreme Court to be a tax, but Forbes lists seven additional taxes that hit the middle class. Obamacare itself contains a bevy of new taxes in addition to the individual mandate. Investor’s Business Daily found 20 more taxes totaling more than $675 billion.

In addition to taxes, President Obama has also dramatically increased the number of expensive regulations with which businesses must comply. The American Action Forum estimates that Obama’s regulations, including Obamacare and the Dodd-Frank financial regulation law, cost the economy more than $488 billion. The paperwork required to comply with these regulations is equal to what it would take to build 220 Empire State Buildings.

These factors combine with the federal debt that has increased by more than 40 percent under President Obama and the looming fiscal cliff, which is comprised of even more tax increases coming at the end of this year, to create uncertainty for businesses. This uncertainty and the cost of the tax increases that Obama has promised if he is reelected make businesses hesitant to expand and hire and consumers reluctant to spend.

An additional factor in the country’s economic difficulty is President Obama’s hostility to oil-based energy. As Examiner noted last spring, approvals for drilling permits under President Obama have fallen from 73 percent to 23 percent. Time for approving a permit has increased from 60 days to more than 90. Obama has canceled oil leases issued by the Bush Administration, issued new regulations to discourage fracking, and rejected the Keystone XL pipeline that would bring Canadian oil to U.S. refineries. The cumulative effect of these policies is to drive up the prices of oil and gasoline. High energy prices contribute to the poor state of the economy.

On foreign policy, Obama has had one big success, the killing of Osama bin Laden. His failures are only now becoming apparent. The fiasco and subsequent cover-up surrounding the al Qaeda attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi is only the tip of the iceberg. More serious and far-reaching are Obama’s policies regarding Israel and Iran.

President Obama claims to be a friend of Israel, but his actions tell a different story. President Obama seems to see a moral equivalence between Israeli soldiers and Palestinian terrorists. He is the only president to ever propose that Israel go back to its pre-1967 borders. This would leave Israel with an indefensible and narrow frontier. More recently Obama declined to meet with Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel’s prime minister, and his administration has reportedly pressured Israel not to attack Iranian nuclear facilities.

With respect to Iran, President Obama is fond of pointing to the tough sanctions in place on the rogue regime. What he fails to mention is that congress passed those sanctions over his objection. President Obama also issued 20 waivers to the sanctions. Countries receiving waivers include China, Iran’s largest trading partner. Yahoo News notes that Obama will have to decide whether to renew the sanctions after the election.

Iran is not intimidated by President Obama and or the sanctions. It has scarcely been a year since Iranian agents attempted to assassinate the Saudi ambassador with a terrorist attack in Washington, D.C. In the Jerusalem Post, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is gleeful that America’s debt is weakening the country. “How long can a government with a $16 trillion foreign debt remain a world power?” he asks.

President Obama’s term has also seen the erosion of personal freedom. The freedom not to buy a government mandated product is only the most obvious loss. Freedom of religion has also been disregarded by the administration, most notably in the Health and Human Services mandate that requires all insurance policies to cover contraceptive and abortifacient drugs.

Most disturbing, during and after the September 11 attacks on U.S. diplomatic facilities in the Middle East, the Obama Administration was openly critical of the freedom of speech. Even before the Benghazi consulate was attacked, the U.S. Embassy in Cairo, Egypt released a statement condemning the anti-Islamic film that allegedly sparked the attacks. The text of the statement, available on Politifact, says, “We firmly reject the actions by those who abuse the universal right of free speech to hurt the religious beliefs of others.” Fox News reports that when he spoke to the United Nations later in the month, President Obama said that the “future must not belong to those who slander the prophet of Islam.” The man responsible for the film was arrested in California on charges that he violated his probation.

If Obama’s record so far is disturbing, even scarier is what might lie ahead. Reuters reported last March that President Obama told Russian President Dmitry Medvedev that “This is my last election ... After my election I have more flexibility.” The exchange evidently related to missile defense, but the same logic applies to every controversial issue from abortion to gun control to taxes.

Given that Obama has shown that he is willing to circumvent congress with executive orders, there is no practical limit to what he can do as long as congress does not override his veto. The president has used executive orders or rulemaking by executive branch agencies to change U.S. immigration law, implement net neutrality, and implement a cap-and-trade carbon regulation system. Further, the president unilaterally launched a war in Libya without informing congress and made several recess appointments while congress was still in session.

Some leftists have opined that a benevolent dictator might be what the United States needs to break the gridlock in Washington and get things done. Such an executive, who does not blanch at using his autocratic powers, might very well be what we get in a second Obama term. The problem with this idea is that the American economy is simply too complex to be micromanaged. And a benevolent dictator is still a dictator.

Next:  Reasons to vote FOR Mitt Romney

This article was first published on Examiner.com

http://www.examiner.com/article/reasons-to-not-vote-for-obama

Democrats must love the poor, they make so many of them

As American voters move steadily toward the presidential election, the fundamental question that they must answer is whether Barack Obama deserves a second term as president. To answer this question, voters must look at the state of the nation as well as their own lives.

One of the most obvious statistics to examine is the unemployment rate. Although nationwide unemployment is down from its October 2009 high of ten percent, Politifact acknowledged earlier this month that under President Obama the unemployment rate has remained above eight percent for 43 consecutive months. This is the longest sustained period of high unemployment since the Great Depression.

The numbers behind the unemployment rate are even worse. The economy is creating jobs, but not enough to keep pace with the growing labor pool and population. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the percentage of Americans employed has fallen from 65.7 percent in January 2009 to 63.5 percent in August 2012. This means that in spite of President Obama’s claims that he has created jobs, the actual number of Americans working has decreased sharply since he took office.

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the U.S. population in August 2012 was 314 million. In January 2009 when President Obama took office the population was 305 million, an increase of more than 8 million people. According to the BLS figures, this means that 206 million people were working in 2009. There are currently only 194 million Americans working. In spite of an increase in the population of more than 8 million people during President Obama’s tenure, there are 12 million fewer Americans working.

The situation is not good for Americans who have not lost their jobs either. According to the Financial Times, the U.S. median income has fallen to 1995 levels. The decline started with the onset of the recession in 2008, but has continued to decline throughout Obama’s presidency, long after the recession officially ended and the recovery began.

The problems of unemployment and income have led to an increase in poverty. A year ago the New York Times reported that the U.S. poverty rate was at its highest level since 1993. In raw numbers, more Americans are living in poverty that at any time in the more than half century that the U.S. Census Bureau has been publishing figures on poverty.

The increase in poverty means that the government is spending more money on social safety net programs. Bloomberg notes that food stamp use is at an all time high. Spending on food stamps has more than doubled during Obama’s tenure with more than 46 million Americans now receiving the entitlement.

The increase in safety net spending is straining popular programs such as Medicare and Social Security. According to the Medicare Trustees report, Medicare’s hospital fund has been spending more than it takes in since the onset of the recession. The trust fund will be depleted by 2024. The situation is similar for Social Security. According to the trustees report, Social Security is also spending more than it takes in, a problem made worse by President Obama’s payroll tax holiday. The Social Security trust fund is estimated to run out in 2035. The insolvency of both programs has been accelerated by the recession and slow recovery.

The result of Obama’s spending binge is that the United States has run deficits of more than a trillion dollars in each year of his administration. These deficits have increased the federal debt by 40 percent according to the New York Times. The massive federal debt and the prospect of tax increases to pay for it have contributed to the slow recovery.

Perhaps what is most disturbing about these statistics is that even though President Obama often cites the economic difficulties that he inherited as an excuse for his administration’s difficulties, the Great Recession officially ended in June 2009, less than six months into President Obama’s term. Even though he has annually proclaimed “summers of recovery” since then most Americans are not feeling that the economic situation is improving. The Obama recovery has been in full swing for three years. It doesn’t get any better under the current policies.

The Democrats claim to love the poor and it must be so. Their policies have created millions more poor people. The choice that voters have this fall is between more of these policies that provide the poor with subsistence but little else or pro-growth policies that will revive the economy through freer markets and trimming government.

Originally published on Examiner.com

Polls: Obama changed America for worse

Barack Obama promised change in 2008. In 2012, it seems that many Americans are realizing that change is not always positive. Change can be for the better or for worse.

Unfortunately for voters, while he was campaigning, Barack Obama did not get into many specifics on how he would change America. His slogan, “Change we can believe in,” left people to fill in the blanks for themselves. For many voters, that seems to have led to a giant case of buyer’s remorse.

According to a new poll commissioned by The Hill, a political news site, 66 percent of likely voters agree that Barack Obama has kept his promise of “fundamentally transforming the United States of America.” The bad news for Obama is that 56 percent of those polled believe that Obama’s changes have been negative. Only 35 percent believe that Obama has had a positive impact on the country.

This is easy to understand when you consider some of the changes that Obama has wrought. He changed the unemployment rate from 7.8 percent in January 2009 to 8.2 percent today according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. This change was the result of spending spree that changed the federal debt from $10.6 trillion in January 2009 to $15.8 trillion today according to Treasury Direct. When stymied by Congress, he changed the constitutional requirement that Congress make the laws by having agencies of the executive branch circumvent Congress and unilaterally enact new legislation. In launching a war in Libya, Obama changed from the traditional policy notifying Congress and seeking approval when going to war. Most notably, President Obama became the first president to change taxes from a source of revenue to a means of forcing American citizens to buy a private product. Obamacare also represented a change from his promise of no individual mandate and lower premiums according to CBS News.

The numbers in the Hill poll are similar to Rasmussen’s Right Direction or Wrong Track poll. In the most recent sampling, Rasmussen found that 62 percent believed the country was on the wrong track. Thirty-two percent disagreed. These polls are troubling for a president who is five months away from re-election and reflect a deep discontent with the president’s job performance even though his personal approval rating is higher.

Obama’s promise can seen as a promise kept, but Americans seem to have learned that not all change is for the better and that things can get worse. Perhaps this fall voters will seek more specifics from candidates and be less willing to accept generalities. Let the voter beware.

 

Read this article on Examiner.com:

http://www.examiner.com/article/poll-obama-changed-country-for-worse

Answering the religious left

The religious left, while still small, has grown somewhat over the last decade. While often perceived as hostile to religion, particularly Christianity, Democrats are somewhat tolerant of religious leftists. As an example, black voters are both heavily religious and heavily Democratic.

The signature issues of the religious left are war, the environment, and poverty. As the American involvement in Afghanistan and Iraq winds down and concerns about global warming abate, the major point of contention between the religious right and left concerns how to address poverty.

A passage frequently cited by religious leftists is Matthew 25:40, “The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’” The theme of charity occurs throughout the Bible. Religious conservatives don’t dispute Jesus’ command to help the poor. The question is how best to do so.

Religious leftists advocate government anti-poverty programs. These programs are notoriously expensive, inefficient and prone to fraud. According to the Cato Institute, the state and federal governments spend more than $1 trillion annually on anti-poverty programs. This translates to $20,610 for every poor person in America, yet the poverty rate is still almost unchanged from 1964 when Lyndon Johnson declared war on poverty. As Ronald Reagan put it, “Some years ago the federal government declared war on poverty - and poverty won.”

The left is also fond of pointing to Matthew 22:21 where Jesus tells the Pharisees to “render therefore unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's….” Often the second part of the verse, “and unto God the things that are God's” is not quoted. Christians should pay taxes, but they are also commanded to support their local churches and charities. Ironically, statistics from the book “Who really cares?” by Arthur Brooks show that although liberals tend to earn more than conservatives, they give less in terms of money, time and even blood.

The fallacy with unquestioningly rendering to Caesar is that we do not (at least not yet) live under an authoritarian regime. As participants in a republican democracy, it is our duty to make sure that our tax money is spent wisely. In fact the Bible commands it. Since voters are responsible for their government in a republic, they must ensure that the government is a good steward of tax money.

According to Jesus in Luke 16:1-2, a good steward is not wasteful. A good steward works diligently for his money (Proverbs 28:20, Colossians 3:23-24). A good steward invests wisely and diversifies (Ecclesiastes 11:2). Good stewards provide for their own families (1 Timothy 5:8). Even though a good steward pays taxes (Romans 13:6-7), that does not alleviate the responsibility of personally helping the poor and doing so cheerfully (2 Corinthians 9:6-8, Acts 20:35).

Government-enforced charity runs afoul of Biblical doctrines in several areas. First and most obvious, the Bible calls for voluntary and cheerful giving. This is not consistent with mandates and taxes that are enforced by the government at the point of a gun.

Second, the Bible clearly values honest work. People who are legitimately in need should be helped, but those who are capable of working should support themselves and their families. In 2 Thessalonians 3:10 Paul wrote, “For even when we were with you, we gave you this rule: ‘The one who is unwilling to work shall not eat.’” Charity should not go to people who could be working to support themselves. Many government programs actually encourage people not to work because they lose their benefits if they do.

Third, government is wasteful. No one seriously doubts that much of the money that the government confiscates to help the needy is wasted. The waste is two-fold. First, the money flows through bureaucracies at both the state and federal levels. These bureaucracies have high overhead due to expensive buildings and pay and benefits for employees that are substantially higher than their private sector counterparts according to the Congressional Budget Office.

Second, fraud is rampant in government entitlement programs. Untold billions of dollars are lost to fraud every year. Bureaucratic caseworkers with scant contact with their charges are often unable to tell when they are being duped. As entitlement programs grow, the propensity for fraud becomes more likely due to the sheer numbers of people involved.

Finally, government programs ignore the Bible’s warnings against incurring debt. Proverbs 22:7 warns that “The rich rule over the poor, and the borrower is slave to the lender.” Psalm 37:21 says, “The wicked borrow and do not repay, but the righteous give generously.” Paul writes in Romans 13:8, “Let no debt remain outstanding, except the continuing debt to love one another….” and admonishes “You were bought at a price; do not become slaves of human beings” (1 Corinthians 7:23).
What, then, would God think about borrowing 40 cents on the dollar and confiscating money from workers trying to feed their families to pay for a wasteful and inefficient system that encourages the poor not to work? It is hard to imagine that he would be pleased.

The religious left also lacks Biblical support for two other prominent issues. First, with respect to abortion, it is clear from numerous Bible passages such as Matthew 19:14 that Jesus loved little children. In Matthew 18:6, Jesus said that it would be better for a person to have a “great millstone fastened around his neck and to be drowned in the depth of the sea” than to cause a child to sin. How much worse would it be to physically harm a child than to cause one to sin?

The Old Testament was even more specific saying, “Cursed be anyone who takes a bribe to shed innocent blood” (Deuteronomy 27:25). In Exodus 21:22-23, there was something akin to a personhood law: “When men strive together and hit a pregnant woman, so that her children come out, but there is no harm, the one who hit her shall surely be fined, as the woman's husband shall impose on him, and he shall pay as the judges determine. But if there is harm, then you shall pay life for life…. ” Jeremiah 1:5 indicates that a baby in the womb is already a person known to God.

The Bible is also clear on same-sex marriage. Most people are familiar with the Old Testament laws concerning homosexuality in Leviticus 18:22 and 20:13. There are also hints that homosexuality was one of the sins that led to the destruction of Sodom (from which we get the word “sodomy”) and Gomorrah in Genesis 19. Christians are not bound by Old Testament law (Galatians 5:18). Neither is the United States a theocracy (nor should it be). Old Testament laws do provide clues to right and wrong however.

Less commonly known is the New Testament’s condemnation of homosexuality. In Romans 1:24-27, homosexuality is described as God’s judgment on people who “exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator….” In 1 Timothy 1:9-11, homosexuals are listed with other sinners including the sexually immoral, slave traders, liars and perjurers. Jude 7 confirms that homosexuality was one of the sins for which Sodom and Gomorrah were destroyed.

Nowhere does God command Christians to hate homosexuals, but it is clear that God considers homosexuality to be a sinful act that should not be encouraged. Especially when the welfare of children and God’s prohibition against leading children astray (Matthew 18:6) are considered, it becomes clear that same-sex marriage should not be considered for societal as well as religious reasons. The New Family Structures Study by Mark Regnerus, associate professor of sociology at the University of Texas at Austin, offers compelling evidence that children of same-sex couples do not fare nearly as well as children of traditional families.

Members of the religious left are free to vote for whoever they choose and upon whatever basis they choose. If they believe that their political views are aligned with their religious views, however, they should seek to learn what Jesus and the Bible say about the issues at hand.

 

Read this article on Examiner.com:

http://www.examiner.com/article/answering-the-religious-left

Happy Government Dependence Day

This is the most dismal Independence Day in memory.

I’m sure that there have been more dreary Fourths of July in our nation’s history. The first few were under British rule and it seemed that the young nation might not survive to celebrate the anniversary of its birth in peace. In 1826, two American heroes, Thomas Jefferson and John Adams both died on July 4. In 1863, although most Americans did not know it yet, almost 8,000 Americans had just died in battle at Gettysburg. In 1942, Pearl Harbor was a recent memory but the American victory at Midway had lessened the sting of the surprise attack. On several Independence Days it seemed that the country might not be around to celebrate another.

There have been other Independence Days when the celebrations must have felt hollow. Rarely has that been due to the actions of our own government, however.

This year the celebrations come less than a week after the Supreme Court upheld the largest expansion of federal power since the New Deal. The federal government exercised unprecedented control over every American citizen and almost 20 percent of the U.S. economy. The founders, proponents of weak and limited central government, are undoubtedly spinning in their graves.

The passage of the health care law was a betrayal on many levels. Most obviously, the Democrats who voted for the bill betrayed their constituents. A strong majority opposed the bill when it was passed. Rather than persuading people to support their legislation, the Democrats, led by an elitist minority, rammed the bill through Congress using the parliamentary trick of budget reconciliation to avoid a Republican filibuster. They betrayed their oath of office by passing a law that was clearly unconstitutional (Chief Justice Roberts’ opinion notwithstanding).

The Democrats also betrayed the ideals of the founders of the United States. The founder of their own party, Thomas Jefferson said, “A wise and frugal Government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, which shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government, and this is necessary to close the circlue of our felicities.”

Jefferson would have been appalled at Obamacare, which is the antithesis of his goals for America. Our government, $17 trillion in debt, cannot be called frugal. It is increasingly involved in even the most trivial aspects of our lives. It takes bread from the mouths of labor to give to those who do not work. By Jefferson’s definition, our government is not good.

Jefferson, who authored the Virginia Act for Establishing Religious Freedom would oppose the government forcing religious groups and believers to purchase contraceptive and abortifacient drugs. He would likely oppose abortion, having penned the phrase “right to life” in the Declaration of Independence. He would also oppose the attempts to silence those oppose abortion and same-sex marriage. “No man,” Jefferson wrote, shall “suffer on account of his religious opinions or belief; but that all men shall be free to profess, and by argument to maintain, their opinions in matters of religion, and that the same shall in nowise diminish, enlarge, or affect their civil capacities.”

As the author of the Declaration of Independence, Jefferson would rebuke the authoritarian tendencies of our current president, a man who is only too willing to circumvent the will of the people and their elected representatives in Congress by legislating with federal agencies and Executive Orders. The Revolutionary War was fought to rid Americans of a king. Jefferson would not want a president who acts like one.

Jefferson, who warned that “the banks and corporations that will grow up around [the banks] will deprive the people of all property until their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered,” would be angry at the collusion between government and business that birthed Obamacare. Democrats in Congress attacked insurance and pharmaceutical companies as profiteers in the media, but secretly worked with them to craft and pass the bill. The loser in this “crony capitalism” is the American people.

The courts, whose judges swear to “faithfully and impartially discharge and perform all the duties incumbent upon me under the Constitution” “without respect to persons, and do equal right to the poor and to the rich,” ignored critical aspects of the Constitution, U.S. law, and American history. Justice Roberts rewrote the ACA and changed the mandate from a penalty to a tax. Thomas Jefferson would say, “Taxation without representation is tyranny!”

Much has been written about the failings of Obamacare, how it will result in a lower quality of health care in the United States, higher prices, and, ultimately, shortages and rationing. Economically, all of these outcomes are extremely likely.

Perhaps more importantly, however, Obamacare might be the undoing of the entire country. For a nation with $17 trillion in debt and a debt-to-GDP ratio that is greater than 100 percent, the last thing that is needed is another multi-trillion dollar entitlement, complete with tax increases, that will suck money out of the private sector and further slow growth. Even worse, the mounting debt load brings the nation even closer to a complete financial collapse.

As the Democrats systematically destroy the aspects of this country that made it great, the current economic morass is increasingly likely to indeed be the “new normal.” Emulating Europe’s welfare state means that the U.S. will also have Europe’s chronically high unemployment, lower income and wages, higher poverty, slower growth, and higher taxes.

By financing entitlements with debt to be repaid in the future, we are mortgaging our children’s lives and making them slaves to the countries and corporations that buy our debt. We are selling their future just as surely as if we blew their inheritance in the casinos of Las Vegas. In the end there will be nothing left: No money and nothing to show for it. We are impoverishing ourselves. As Rep. Paul Ryan said, “This is the most predictable crisis we have ever had.”

The Democrats have no solution to the crisis. Their only answer is to spend more and hope the economy recovers. Most do not even acknowledge the problem.

Lest anyone accuse me of favoritism, the Republicans have contributed to the problem as well. The Republican spending spree under George W. Bush was exceeded only by that of Barack Obama and Franklin Roosevelt. Republicans expanded government through the Medicare prescription drug entitlement (which at least did consider market realities) and the No Child Left Behind Act. On the plus side, the Republicans may have learned their lesson.

The Republicans are our last hope in government. We have already been failed by one political party that is now ideologically closer to Marx and Engels than Washington, Jefferson, Hamilton, and Madison. We have been failed by the president and failed by Congress. We have been failed by the courts, all the way up to the Supreme Court. Some Catholics already see the need for civil disobedience in resisting Obamacare’s anti-religious mandates. If Republicans are elected and fail to change the direction of the country, civil disobedience will be our only recourse.

As Abraham Lincoln said, “We shall nobly save, or meanly lose, the last best hope of earth.” America isn’t dead, but she is critically ill. It is up to the people to save her.

This Independence Day, let us vow that it will be our last Government Dependence Day.