There are really more, like how well my baseball team will do this coming season, but we need to focus on a couple of big issues that affect us all and our entire country.
The first issue is our insane national budget deficit.
One would think that since the effects of the pandemic receded more than a year ago, the 2023 budget deficit would plummet as well. Not a bit. The budget deficit is $1.7 trillion, a $320 billion increase over the prior year.
To be fair, some significant increase is due to increased interest expense because of higher interest rates. Our elected officials did not plan for that even though they had to know that interest rates would not stay forever at absurdly low rates. Yet they acted like irresponsible children stuffing Halloween candy in their mouths without regard for how their stomachs would feel the next day.
Republicans are also guilty as the last Republican President, Trump, did little to reduce spending. The Democrats exaggerate Trump’s deficits. Biden’s people stuffed his massive spending bills into Trump’s record as his last fiscal year ended nine months after Trump left office.
At least there are Republicans talking about the need to cut expenditures. The Biden Administration and their flunkey Legacy Media friends call out those Republicans as if simply spouting the idea of cutting some outlays make the Republicans akin to international terrorists. House Minority Leader, Hakeem Jeffries, speaks of spending cuts like someone who keeps kosher finding out he just consumed pork.
President Biden did two things. First, he gave a speech committing $10 billion to a new project as if the money came from his White House money tree. If you have not seen the tree, you can find it just outside the Oval Office. The President can just go out and pick some money off it to pay our government’s bills. And then second, he tells us how the rich are not paying their “fair share” of taxes.
Someone should tell the President that the 2023 national percentage of tax collections were at record levels – 28% of gross domestic product (GDP). That is the highest level since 1965 and up 3% from 2019. Mr. Biden has nothing to complain about.
Where is that money going? If you analyze employment reports, you will see 23% of all new employees work for the government. 50% of new employees work for government, health care or education. None of these positions produce growth in our national wealth. These are not businesses producing goods and services. These figures are indicative of a slowing economy burdened by too much government.
These deficits are just not sustainable.
Then there is the other big issue which happens to help drive the deficit – the deranged number of illegal immigrants entering this country.
If you only watch the Legacy Media or CNN and MSNBC, you may not know about this issue. Despite their ignoring the flood of people from 150 countries entering our country with no recognition of who or why they are here, it exists. The immigrants say the right things, so they don’t immediately get booted. None of them say they have come as spies or terrorists, but we have no clue. Then they are released into the country with return court dates now out to 2031. What could go wrong here?
We already have a housing problem for 650,000 Americans. They are either on illicit drugs or not taking the correct medication for their obvious mental illnesses. Who thought it was a good idea to bring 3.8 million (New York Post figure as of September 2023 for Biden Presidency) into the country when we can’t responsibly manage these 650,000 U.S. citizens.
Major cities are cutting back on services to their residents because they have to pay for housing, clothing, and food for tens of thousands of these immigrants.
Many of these people may be good people and may come here with legitimate claims of being refugees. Having been in more than half the countries from which these people come, I can tell you hundreds of millions of others would love to be in the United States rather than their native land. Almost anyone from the Sudan or South Sudan would love to be in America. The question is how many can we reasonably take in at one time?
Instead of confronting the issue the Democrats say we need comprehensive immigration reform. They don’t want that; it is just a delay tactic. President George W. Bush presented a plan in 2005, and I initially endorsed that plan. Then I realized that the first step to any plan is proper border enforcement. The Dems are not interested.
The Democrats are so against border enforcement they were willing to sacrifice one of their greatest concerns – funding Ukraine. Additionally, they are willing to delay funding Israel to not have border enforcement. Makes no sense to me or anyone I have spoken to on the subject.
These two issues need responsible leadership and fair-minded compromise that first considers the future of American citizens. There must be a stop to this uncontrolled immigration. There must be responsible cuts to expenditures. We simply cannot afford all the government we are getting.
These are the two most pivotal issues facing us as we begin 2024.