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#US Debt History

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#US Debt Weblog

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US Debt News. United States Debt. American Debt.

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"Q: When did the Debt pass the $8 trillion mark? A: On October 18th 2005, the Outstanding Public Debt rose to $8,003,897,406,911.24 -- the first time it had risen above $8 trillion."

"Q: When did the Debt pass the $7 trillion mark? 
A: On January 15th 2004, the Outstanding Public Debt jumped $13 billion to $7,001,852,607,623.35. This was the first time in history the U.S. National Debt surpassed the $7 trillion mark and came less than two years after the Debt first passed $6 trillion." ... "As a comparison, the National Debt took over six years to rise from $5 trillion to $6 trillion."
-via Brillig's >Debt FAQ

/US_Debt.

20080921
John McCain - Corporate - Government - Disaster - Politics - US_Debt - Healthcare - Social Security - Rights - Book - 2008 Election
"Naomi Klein: Financial crisis part of Bush 'shock doctrine'." ... "The bailout of Wall Street’s largest players by the federal government is another example of the [Republican President] Bush administration pursuing a corporate agenda at the expense of average Americans, a prominent author argued on Friday." ... "In a Friday night interview on HBO's Real Time with Bill Maher, Naomi Klein said President Bush’s $700 billion proposal to rescue the financial sector stems from a profiteering streak that has dominated the last eight years." ... ""The disaster is far from over," Klein said. "The disaster was on Wall Street and they have moved the disaster to Main Street."" ... "Referring to the bailout, Klein said the "bomb has yet to detonate" and that the real crisis will strike when tax payers are overwhelmed when faced with the debt from the bailouts." ... "According to Klein, the bomb will detonate if Sen. John McCain becomes president and "rationalizes" that it is necessary to privatize government programs like social security and healthcare because neither the government nor Americans can afford them." ... ""The real disaster has yet to come; the real disaster is the debt that is going to explode on American tax payers," Klein said." ... "Klein’s book, "The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism," outlines how crises, real or perceived, have been used by governments, especially the United States under George W. Bush, to strong-arm a disoriented citizenry into accepting changes to its rights, and its government, that it wouldn't otherwise accept." -By David Edwards and Andrew McLemore -RawStory.com

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WATCH: Naomi Klein on Republican Bush's "Shock Doctrine"

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20080804
US_Debt - Government - Money - Countrywide Financial Corporation - Real Estate - North Carolina - New York - US - United Kingdom
"Fewest Treasury Traders Since 1960 Hit Taxpayers (Update4)." ... "For the first time since 1960, when it created the network of securities firms obligated to buy and sell Treasury bonds, the U.S. government has the fewest bond traders making markets in its debt and a bigger burden for American taxpayers financing record federal deficits." ... "The number of so-called primary government securities dealers declined to 19 last month when Bank of America Corp., based in Charlotte, North Carolina, acquired the troubled Countrywide Financial Corp. The sale was the climax of dozens of bank failures, triggered by the biggest decline in residential real estate since the Great Depression and the seizing up of credit markets from New York to London [United Kingdom's capital]. The Federal Reserve Bank of New York, the agent of the U.S. Treasury, plans to shrink the dealers again when JPMorgan Chase & Co. completes its takeover of Bear Stearns Cos." ... "The paucity of primary dealers coincides with the largest borrowing requirement in American history and the acknowledgment by the administration of [Republican] President George W. Bush that the U.S. will finance a budget deficit totaling a record $482 billion next year. When the dealer system began 48 years ago with 18 firms, the U.S. had a $300 million surplus. The group has shrunk from a peak of 46 in 1988. " -By Sandra Hernandez -Bloomberg

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20080729
US_Debt - History - Government - Politics - SD - SC
"Bush to leave a record budget deficit of $482 billion: [Republican President Bush] White House officials say the economy and a bipartisan stimulus package caused the worsening picture for 2009, but Democrats blame Bush's tax cuts and fiscal management." ... "Democrats on Capitol Hill blamed the revised deficit figures on Bush's large tax cuts and freewheeling spending." ... ""If we gave Olympic medals for fiscal irresponsibility, President Bush would take the gold, the silver and the bronze, because he's got the three highest record deficits ever," said [South Dakota Democratic Senator] Sen. Kent Conrad (D-S.D.), chairman of the Senate Budget Committee. "He sets records in every single category: 2009 would be the gold; 2004 the silver; 2008 the bronze."" ... "[South Carolina Democratic Representative] Rep. John M. Spratt Jr. (D-S.C.) noted that Bush inherited a budget surplus from his Democratic predecessor, so the blame for the poor fiscal performance rests with him." ... ""Mr. Bush came to office with the biggest surpluses in history and he will leave office with the biggest deficit in history. That's the bottom line," said Spratt, chairman of the House Budget Committee." -By Maura Reynolds -LAtimes

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20080707
Barack Obama - Faith - Civil Liberties - Law - Economics - History - US_Debt - Iraq - Military - US - 2008 Election
"Why some conservatives are backing Obama." ... "The "Obamacans" that [2008 Election Democratic Presidential Candidate and Illinois Senator] Sen. Barack Obama used to joke about - Republican apostates who whispered their support for his candidacy - have morphed into a new phenomenon, or syndrome, as detractors like to call it: the Obamacons." ... "These are conservatives who have publicly endorsed the presumptive Democratic nominee, dissidents from the brain trust of think tanks, ex-officials and policy magazines that have fueled the Republican Party since the 1960s." ... ""The untold story of the [Republican President] Bush administration is the deliberate annihilation of the Reaganite, small-government wing of the Republican Party," said Michael Greve, director of the Federalism Project at the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank. "A lot of people are very bitter about it."" ... "Many conservatives are aghast at the rise in spending and debt under the Bush administration, its expansion of executive power, and what they see as a trampling of civil liberties and a taste for empire." ... "Douglas Kmiec is former chief of the Office of Legal Counsel in the [former Republican Presidents] Reagan and George H.W. Bush administrations, and now a constitutional law professor at Pepperdine University and a devout Catholic. Kmiec endorsed Obama earlier this year, despite his conviction that Obama "believes in a pretty progressive agenda."" ... "Kmiec said his support deepened after meeting with Obama and other faith leaders last month, during which the busy candidate spent 2 1/2 in a freewheeling discussion with people who differed with him." ... ""I think he's the right person at the right time to re-establish principles of constitutional governance that have been ill treated by the current administration, and to free us from the tar paper that we know is Iraq," Kmiec said, adding that many Republicans privately agree. "I think he's a man in the market for every good idea he can find, and he doesn't care what label it comes with."" ... "David Friedman, the son of late conservative icon and Nobel economist Milton Friedman, has also endorsed Obama." ... "[Conservative Bruce Bartlett:] "People don't understand that there has always been a small but very significant element of conservatives who have been against the war from day one and who, like me, also hate George Bush and think he's the most incompetent president in American history," said Bruce Bartlett, a supply-side economist who coined the term Obamacons. "The few people who are slavishly pro-Republican, live or die, slavishly pro-Bush like the Weekly Standard crowd, have gotten lot more publicity than they deserve."" -By Carolyn Lochhead -SFGate.com

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20080611
Barack Obama - John McCain - Money - Politics - Workers - Retirees - Homeowners - Students - Farmers - Families - US_Debt - Law - Illinois -Arizona - 2008 Election
"A Preliminary Analysis of the 2008 Presidential Candidates' Tax Plans." [Full Report PDF] ... "Senator [from Illinois and 2008 Election Democratic Presidential Candidate Barack] Obama would permanently extend certain provisions of the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts primarily affecting taxpayers with incomes under $250,000; increase the maximum rate on capital gains and qualified dividends; and enact new and expanded targeted tax breaks for workers, retirees, homeowners, savers, students, and new farmers. Senator [from Arizona and 2008 Election Republican Presidential Candidate John] McCain proposes to extend permanently the AMT "patch" that has prevented most individuals and families with incomes below $200,000 from being affected by the tax, and in our interpretation of his proposal, Senator Obama would do the same." ... "Although both candidates have at times stressed fiscal responsibility, their specific non-health tax proposals would reduce tax revenues by $3.7 trillion (McCain) and $2.7 trillion (Obama) over the next 10 years, or approximately 10 and 7 percent of the revenues scheduled for collection under current law, respectively. Furthermore, as in the case of [Republican] President Bush's tax cuts, the true cost of McCain's policies may be masked by phase-ins and sunsets (scheduled expiration dates) that reduce the estimated revenue costs. If his policies were fully phased in and permanent, the ten-year cost would rise to $4.1 trillion, or about 11 percent of total revenues." -TaxPolicyCenter.org

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20080523
• John McCain - US_Debt - Money - Politics - Legislator - Military - Families - Housing - Construction - Iraq - Israel - Egypt - Jordan - Arizona - US - 2008 Election - Noteworthy - "McCain's Fantasy War on Earmarks." ... "[2008 Election Republican Presidential Candidate] John McCain boasts that he can save $100 billion a year "immediately" by eliminating the so-called earmarks that legislators attach to spending bills to finance pet projects, usually in their home state. But he has refused to say exactly which projects he would cut, and his estimates of the amount of money that is being spent on earmarks have been challenged by independent experts." ... "The Facts:" ... "The Arizona senator is promising to balance the budget by the end of his first term, while simultaneously extending the [Republican] George W. Bush tax cuts, introducing billions of dollars of new tax cuts of his own, and remaining in Iraq as long as is necessary to stabilize that country. Asked how this miracle will be accomplished, McCain told George Stephanopoulos of ABC News This Week on April 20 that he could come up with $100 billion "tomorrow" by vetoing pork-barrel spending bills." ... "There are a number of problems with this magical budgetary balancing act. First of all, the suspiciously round $100 billion figure is largely a figment of the McCain campaign's imagination. I have not been able to find a single independent budget expert to vouch for it. McCain's economics adviser, Doug Holtz-Eakin, will not say how the campaign arrived at the figure, other than that it is an extrapolation from various studies, including a 2006 study by the Congressional Research Service available here [PDF]." ... "However, much of this money is tied to items such as foreign aid to countries like Israel, Egypt, and Jordan, that McCain says he will not touch." ... "By most definitions of the term, the amount of money spent on earmarks is much lower than the CRS study. The Office for Management and the Budget came up with a figure for $16.9 billion in the 2008 appropriation bills. Taxpayers for Commonsense, an independent watchdog group that focuses on wasteful spending, identified $18.3 billion worth of earmarks in the 2008 bills, a 23 per cent cut from a record $23.6 billion set in 2005 [when Republicans controlled Congress]." ... "The figure includes such items as $4 billion for the [United States] U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, which could not be eliminated without halting hundreds of construction projects around the country. Another big chunk goes to military construction, including housing for servicemen and their families, which McCain has also promised not to touch." ... "McCain's talk about eliminating $100 billion a year in earmarks is largely fantasy." ... "To use a phrase coined by [Republican] George H.W. Bush, this is "voodoo economics," based more on wishful thinking than on hard data or carefully considered policy proposals." [The Washington Post gives McCain's accounting numbers four Pinochio's out of a possible four, calling the statements by Candidate McCain "Whoppers."] -WashingtonPost

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20080418
• John McCain - DEBT - Accounting - Politics - Government - Military - US - Iraq - Afghanistan - 2008 Election - "McCain's $3.3 Trillion Tax Cut, Budget Pledge at Odds (Update3)." ... "[2008 Election Republican Presidential Candidate] John McCain's plan to cut taxes and balance the budget wins praise from fellow Republicans. Economists and nonpartisan analysts say his numbers don't add up." ... "McCain's proposal, outlined April 15, would extend [Republican] President George W. Bush's tax cuts, reduce the top corporate rate, repeal the alternative minimum tax and double exemptions for dependents. Price: $3.3 trillion by the end of a President McCain's second term in 2017, according to figures from his campaign and the Treasury." ... "Robert Bixby, executive director of the Washington-based Concord Coalition, a nonpartisan group that advocates budget restraint, said ``the huge imbalance'' in McCain's plan ``is that the tax cuts are specific and large and the spending cuts are small and vague.''" ... "Once, McCain was a deficit hawk, Bixby said, but ``strange things happen when people run for president.''" ... "McCain's spending cuts, combined with increased revenue from economic growth, total $1.5 trillion over eight years, leaving a $1.8 trillion net increase to the national debt." ... "Two Washington research groups said McCain's plan would cost more. The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities estimated his tax cuts would total $5 trillion over a two-term presidency. The Tax Policy Center , run jointly by the Brookings Institution and Urban Institute, said they would cost at least $5.7 trillion." ... "McCain's plan doesn't address the cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, which now total more than $12 billion a month. [$144 billion per year over eight years is potentially $1.152 trillion of additional US debt.]" -By Ryan J. Donmoyer and Indira Lakshmanan -Bloomberg

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  [TaxPolicyCenter.org "Scoring McCain’s Tax Proposals." ... "Even with the loophole closers, these proposals [made by 2008 Election Republican Presidential Candidate] would reduce federal revenues by about $5.7 trillion over ten years if they could be enacted immediately." ... "Adding the cost of the corporate tax cuts, the total comes to $8 trillion over 10 years ($7.6 trillion starting in FY10). That scenario would reduce federal tax revenues by $780 billion in FY2012—$140 billion more than the entire defense budget in that year." ... "Cuts the size of those he [McCain] proposes will require slashing discretionary spending and entitlements, and probably even reining in defense spending. Small wonder he has backed away from his earlier pledge to balance the budget—meaning that these tax cuts, like the ones signed by President Bush, will be paid for by our children." [Accounting calculations detailed in:]  "Elements of Senator John McCain's Proposed Tax Plans, Impact on Tax Revenue, 2009-18." (.XLS File) -By Len Burman and Greg Leiserson -TaxPolicyCenter.org]

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20080321
• Barack Obama - Hillary Clinton - John McCain - Debt - US - Iraq - Military - Illinois - West Virginia - Indiana - Car - Oil - Household - 2008 Election - "Obama Links Effects of War Costs to Fragility in the Economy." ... "[2008 Election Democratic Presidential Candidate and Illinois] Senator Barack Obama on Thursday blamed the fragile economy on “careless and incompetent execution” of the Iraq war, imploring voters in this swing state [of West Virginia] to consider the trickle-down economic consequences of the war as they choose a successor to [Republican] President Bush." ... "“When you’re spending over $50 to fill up your car because the price of oil is four times what it was before Iraq, you’re paying a price for this war,” Mr. Obama said to an audience at the University of Charleston [in West Virginia]. “When Iraq is costing each household about $100 a month, you’re paying a price for this war.”" ... "“No matter what the costs, no matter what the consequences, [2008 Election Republican Presidential Candidate] John McCain seems determined to carry out a third Bush term,” Mr. Obama said. “That’s an outcome America can’t afford. Because of the Bush-McCain policies, our debt has ballooned.”" ... "[2008 Election Democratic Presidential Candidate Hillary Clinton in Indiana:] “We spend $12 billion a month in Iraq, and that does affect the economy,” Mrs. Clinton said. “That’s one of the reasons we’ve gone into more and more debt. We’ve got to begin not only to withdraw our troops, but bring that money back home. We need to put that money to work here in Indiana.”" -By Jeff Zeleny and Michael Cooper with contributions by Patrick Healy -NYTimes 

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20080222
• John McCain - Corporate - Politics - Lawmaker - Jets - US_Debt - US - Iraq - Military - Children's - Health-Care - Barack Obama - 2008 Election - "Transcript: Howard Dean On John McCain And The Republican 'Culture Of Corruption'." ... "Q: So there is big news about [2008 Election Republican Presidential Candidate] John McCain -- the story that is in the New York Times, raising questions about his relationship with a lobbyist. This is a story the McCain people are saying is unfair and untrue. What do you think?"
"[Democratic National Committee chairman Howard] Dean: I have no idea whether the affair story is true or not, and I don't care. What I do care about is John McCain -- and this has been well-documented -- is talking all the time about being a reformer and a maverick, and in fact, he has taken thousands of dollars from corporations, ridden on their corporate jets, and then turned around and tried to do favors for them and get projects approved. He has tons of lobbyists on his staff. This is a guy who is very close to the lobbyist community, a guy who has been documented again and again by taking contributions and then doing favors for it. This is not a guy who is a reformer. This is a guy who has been in Washington for 25 years and wants to give us four more years of the same, and I don't think we need that."
"Q: So are you saying that McCain, by virtue of what is spelled out in this story, has somehow suffered a hit in terms of his own legitimacy on the campaign finance and ethics issue?"

"Dean: Yes, he certainly has. This goes all the way back to the Keating Five Scandal and the S & L [Savings and Loan] scandals, where he took a hundred thousand donations, rode on corporate jets and then intervened on Charles Keating's behalf -- and again and again we see this. We even saw -- it's so hypocritical -- we even saw that he is trying to harass [2008 Election Democratic Presidential Candidate] Barack Obama about whether he's going to take public financing in the campaign, and he forewent his own public financing in the primaries after getting a loan, based on the idea that he might take public financing." ... "This is not a guy who is a reformer. He talks about change, and he makes a big deal about not being like [Republican President] Bush when in fact he is Bush. He voted for Bush's tax cuts after saying he didn't, and has been responsible for a $6 trillion national debt that our children are going to have to pay. He thinks we ought to stay in Iraq for 100 years. He thought it was great that the president vetoed health care for our kids under 18. This is four more years of George Bush, and I don't think the American people are going to buy it."

 -NationalJournal/OnAir

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20080203
• Poor - Children - Health - Energy - Money - Politics - Government - Debt - "President's Spending Plan Would Rival 2004 Deficit." ... "The more than $3 trillion federal budget for 2009 that [Republican President] Bush will unveil is his final opportunity to shape the priorities of the government before leaving office a year from now." ... "But even in the unlikely event that he were to get his way, the budget deficit would jump sharply, from $163 billion in 2007 to about $400 billion in 2008 and 2009 -- partly the result of the new economic stimulus plan. Such deficits would rival the record deficit of $412 billion of 2004 [under the Republican controlled Congress], though administration allies argue that shortfalls of that size now represent a smaller share of the overall economy and are thus more manageable." ... "Alice M. Rivlin, who served [Democratic] President Bill Clinton as budget director, pointed out that [Republican President] Bush "inherited a very large surplus," but his "legacy from a fiscal point of view is having blown an opportunity to ameliorate the long-run budget deficits."" ... "Among the reductions are more than $1 billion to programs run by the Administration for Children and Families, including a $280 million hit to the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, a block grant program that helps the poor pay heating and air-conditioning bills." ... "The budget plan argues for a $500 million reduction in the Social Services Block Grant program, which helps states protect children from neglect and abuse, and pay for day care, adoption, health services, foster care and other services for children and families." ... "The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention would lose more than $430 million, including $27 million from its efforts to detect and control infectious diseases, and $28 million from chronic disease prevention and health promotion. A $301 million program that trains 4,700 pediatricians and pediatric specialists at children's teaching hospitals also would be eliminated, at a time when pediatric specialties, such as rheumatology and pulmonology, face critical shortages." (1, 2) -By Michael Abramowitz and Jonathan Weisman with contributions by Maria Glod, Spencer Hsu, Christopher Lee, Josh White and Robin Wright -WashingtonPost

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20080123
• US - Iraq - Afghanistan - Military - Politics - US_Debt - Government - "U.S. war costs in Iraq up-budget report." ... "War funding, which averaged about $93 billion a year from 2003 through 2005, rose to $120 billion in 2006 and $171 billion in 2007 and [Republican] President George W. Bush has asked for $193 billion in 2008, the nonpartisan office [Congressional Budget Office: CBO] wrote." ... "Since the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States, Congress has written checks for $691 billion to pay for wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and such related activities as Iraq reconstruction, the CBO said." ... "Of the total, the CBO estimated that $440 billion had been spent on fighting in Iraq launched with the goal of ousting President Saddam Hussein from power and securing weapons of mass destruction that were never found." ... "All of the Iraq and Afghanistan war money -- about $11 billion a month -- is effectively being put on a government credit card at a time when U.S. [United States] government debt has skyrocketed to more than $9 trillion, up from around $5.6 trillion when [Republican President] Bush took office in January 2001." ... "Bush has opposed paying the cost of waging war in Iraq and Afghanistan with tax increases or other specific offsets." (1, 2, 3) -By Richard Cowan with contributions by Howard Goller and Doina Chiacu -Reuters 

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