Obama Has Added $6 Trillion in Debt in One Term

Hi, I’m Senator John Thune from the great state of South Dakota.

With the recently passed fiscal cliff legislation, Congress enacted tax relief for 99 percent of Americans.

Now that the tax part of the fiscal cliff issue has been dealt with, it’s time to address the real cause of Washington’s fiscal mess— out-of-control spending.

Washington is addicted to spending your money.

Over the past four years, our country has added nearly $6 trillion to the national debt. At $16.4 trillion, our nation’s total debt is now larger than our entire economy.

This means that every man, woman, and child owes a $53,000 share of this debt. That level of spending is unsustainable. We cannot afford to keep adding over a trillion dollars to the debt every year, as we have for the past four years.

A major credit rating agency has already downgraded our nation’s credit once, and, if we don’t start making some real progress on spending reforms, more downgrades are likely in the near future.

What does that mean, practically speaking?

Well if you or I as citizens had a bad credit rating, banks would charge a higher interest rate when we approached them to borrow money.

It works the same way with nations. If the United States’ credit rating is further downgraded, our country will pay higher interest rates. This will mean trillions of borrowing in order for America to pay its bills.

Needless to say, we can’t go on like this forever. Eventually, we are simply going to run out of money. And no tax increase, no matter how high, will be enough to save us.

The only way—the only way—to dig ourselves out of this hole and put our country on a sound financial footing is to get spending under control.

Reducing our spending and debt will jump-start our economy and create jobs and opportunities for American families and workers.

And the way to start is by passing a budget.

I think most American families would agree that having a budget is essential to keeping their spending under control.

And if a budget is essential when you’re running a family, it’s even more essential when you’re running an entity the size of the federal government.

Congress’ first priority every year should be coming up with a spending plan. In fact, the law requires Congress to do just that. Yet, it’s been almost four years since the Democrat-led Senate passed a formal budget.