Government Will Eat Us All

Clinton hid government growth by farming it out to private contractors and he hid the size of the total debt by restructuring the composition of the bonds supporting it . While it's true that Clinton's spending was quickly surpassed by Bush, the fact is, government spending did increase under Clinton, as you can see in this chart:

http://www.dallasfed.org/research/eclett/2007/images/0704c2.gif

When you factor in the IOU's in Social Security, veteran's benefits, medicare and pension funds, the picture is even worse.

There is so much compound interest wound around the total debt at this point that even shredding current expenditures to the bone would not decrease total debt service. You can see that in this chart:

http://static.seekingalpha.com/uploads/2009/6/11/saupload_slide11.jpg

We are trapped in a spiral of debt.