Life is Not a Highway, it's a Turnpike

...and every day, you get to pay the toll.

The American Congress has, for decades, spent the country into oblivion. We stagger on the brink of national bankruptcy today because the federal government spends more and more money every year. Our Congress has become a fixed political class; entrenched elites unaccountable for their graft, greed and corruption.
The American government takes in record amounts of tax revenue, yet every budget our Congress passes puts us farther and farther in the hole. You can blame Bush and his Wars. You can blame Bush for never vetoing any Congressional spending package. You can blame the Congressional spenders who wrote the budgets. You can blame the American electorate who voted themselves into this mess. You can blame anyone you like, but we are where we are.

So where are we?

Well, we are at a place where we spend over 400 billion dollars every year just to pay interest on our debt. Thats 1.1 Billion dollars per day. Add that to Bush's two Wars at a cool average of maybe 150 billion per year or roughly 400 million per day and you get, well you get pretty mad. Taking a more personal angle, every single day of our lives; each and every one of us, regardless of age (and actually the youngest of us will end up paying even more as our debt continues to climb)--all 300 million of us, will pay the federal government about 3 dollars and 60 cents--every day, now--just to cover the interest on our national disgrace, I mean national debt. Add to that the buck and a half we each have to chip in every single day for the Wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, that's like 5 bucks per day from each of America's 300 million citizens.

So every day, all 365 of them per year and for every year onto the forseeable horizon, a single mom with her two year old will be robbed of 10 dollars. A husband and wife with two jobs and two kids? That's 20 dollars, every day, out of their budget, just for interest on our Country's debt and the financial front end of two wars. Imagine a nursing home, and every day some crazy Uncle shows up and steals 5 bucks from every widow, widower, grandmother and grandfather in the place, plus he snags 5 to 20 dollars from each of the nurses and custodians on his way out. Then he makes his rounds, through the offices and homes of America. Sort of like Santa Claus, or Robin Hood, except in reverse; and our Crazy Uncle does this every damn day.

Five dollars per day, 35 dollars per week, 150 dollars per month, $1,825.00 per year from every single American. Almost $7,500.00 per year out of a family of four's pocket, just to pay for interest on our debt and to fund the wars. The five bucks a day from each and every one of us does NOT include any of the remaining taxes we all pay, it's just the cover charge at Club America.

When is enough, enough? Isn't it time we had an intervention with our Crazy Uncle? When he shows up tomorrow and hits each of us up for our 5 bucks, maybe we should finally listen to Nancy Reagan, and just say no.