Despite attempts to portray the Biden/Harris administration as friendly toward domestic U.S. energy…
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Image of the Day: Biden/Harris Is NOT the "Drill, Baby, Drill" Administration

Despite attempts to portray the Biden/Harris administration as friendly toward domestic U.S. energy producers, American Enterprise Institute's Benjamin Zycher highlights how that's simply not the case.  Zycher cogently distinguishes the deceptive metric of oil and natural gas production on federal lands - which is a trailing indicator from permits and exploration years old - from new permits granted, which better reflects current friendliness toward U.S. energy producers.  It's not a pretty picture for Biden/Harris apologists or the Harris campaign team:

[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="532"] Biden/Harris Unfriendly Toward U.S. Energy Production[/caption]

 …[more]

October 02, 2024 • 09:21 AM

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Spendaholic Politicians Are Destroying Your Economic Future Print
By Betsy McCaughey
Wednesday, January 25 2023
If Washington's leaders won't rein in government spending, who will?

Most people don't lie awake at night worried about the national debt. Unfortunately, that includes President Joe Biden and the spendaholic Democrats in Congress. 

They should be worried. Frankly, so should you, no matter what your politics. Economics is a science, and numerous studies by world-class economists confirm that when a nation's debt gets too high, it pushes the economy into decline. Inflation soars, jobs become scarcer and mortgage rates to buy a home are unaffordable. Ouch.

The U.S. is heading off that cliff. The national debt is at the highest level since WWII, and is forecast to break that record soon. In 2022, it hit 98% of GDP  everything we all produce going to work every day  and is growing rapidly. The U.S. is in the company of nations such as Mozambique, Bhutan, Angola, Portugal and Greece. We don't want our kids to live in a crumbling economy.

It wasn't always like this. Over the last 50 years, debt to GDP has averaged 46%.

Republicans, who recently won control of the House of Representatives, are withholding the House's approval to raise the debt ceiling  the amount the nation is legally permitted to borrow  until Democrats negotiate a plan to reduce spending and pull the nation back from its dire straits.

Biden, visiting Al Sharpton's National Action Network on Jan. 16, called the House Republicans "fiscally demented." It takes nerve for Biden to call anybody "demented."

Never mind. The Republicans are making a reasonable demand. If Washington's leaders won't rein in government spending, who will?

New York Times columnist Paul Krugman calls the House Republicans' quid pro quo economic terrorism. Nonsense. The real domestic terrorism is Congress' continued spending on borrowed money.

It can only go on so long. Ordinary people who live on credit cards and pay only the monthly minimum can tell you that. Eventually, credit card payments don't pay for any new goods or services, just interest. 

That's what our nation faces if it doesn't change course now. Interest expenses will mount, rates will go up and an increasing proportion of tax revenues will be consumed paying interest. The Congressional Budget Office predicts that over the next 10 years, interest expense will triple. In a decade, interest outlays will exceed defense spending. Yikes. 

Eventually, if fiscal sanity is not restored, government will have to cut services or impose massive tax hikes, or both. 

Worse, as government borrows more, less money is available to make loans to businesses and homebuyers. Jobs dry up and wages decline. The economy spirals downward. It isn't a pretty picture. Ask economists who have examined high-debt countries.

Harvard's Carmen Reinhart and Kenneth Rogoff analyzed 44 countries in their landmark analysis for the American Economic Review. They found that when national debt exceeds 90% of GDP  a benchmark that's already in the U.S.' rearview mirror  the economy falters. 

Thirty-six other studies confirm that excessive government borrowing sabotages economic growth. Washington pols need to stop padding their own political fortunes and look at these scientific facts. 

Sadly, there is no hope Democrats will agree to spending reforms without pressure from House Republicans withholding the debt ceiling hike. 

After all, in December, as a last hurrah before ceding control of the House, Democrats enacted an omnibus spending bill that included 7,200 earmarks  favorite projects of often unnamed legislators bringing pork home to their own district. Earmarks, a symbol of corruption, had been banned for a decade, but in 2021 the Democratic controlled Congress reinstated them in a flourish of political cynicism. Like holding up a middle finger to the unsuspecting public. 

The rhetorical attacks on Republicans for delaying a hike in the debt ceiling are mounting. Bloomberg's editors call the Republican strategy "malpractice." Democratic Sen. Chris Van Hollen (Md.) accuses the Republicans of an "extremist agenda."

There is nothing "extremist" about putting the nation on a responsible fiscal plan. Republicans need to stay unified  a formidable challenge  and hold their ground.

The party of unlimited spending and vote buying must be stopped, before the U.S. economy and our standard of living are destroyed. 


Betsy McCaughey is a former lieutenant governor of New York and chairman of the Committee to Reduce Infection Deaths. 

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Notable Quote   
 
"Vice President Kamala Harris is struggling to maintain support among the key voting blocs of the Democratic coalition as polling data suggests that former President Donald Trump's efforts to win over minority voters are succeeding to some degree.Throughout his political career, Trump has made concerted attempts to flip Hispanic and black voters, traditionally Democratic constituencies, though his…[more]
 
 
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