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Our National Debt Is Our Biggest National Security Threat
Since 1980, the national debt of USA skyrocketed from less than $1 trillion to nearly $33 trillion!

"Our national debt is our biggest national security threat," said Admiral Michael Mullen, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, under President Barack Obama, at a "Tribute to the Troops" breakfast” in June 2010.
TOPLINE
Just weeks ago, U.S. debt was downgraded to AA+ from AAA by Fitch Ratings. It shook Wall Street with an intermediate market sell off. In Fitch’s view, “there has been a steady deterioration in the standards of governance over the last 20 years, including on fiscal and debt matters…”
Fitch continued…
Over the next decade, higher interest rates and the rising debt stock will increase the interest service burden, while an aging population and rising healthcare costs will raise spending on the elderly absent fiscal policy reforms
In 1980, the U.S. national debt was less than $1 trillion and today the national debt tops $32.5 trillion. This out-of-control, bipartisan spending now threatens the long-term foundational underpinnings of the country.
THE CRITICS
“Democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There was never a democracy yet that did not commit suicide.” – John Adams
In 2012, the legendary U.S. Senator, the late Dr. Tom Coburn, wrote the book, The Debt Bomb:
“In a nation whose debt has outgrown the size of its entire economy, the greatest threat comes not from any foreign force but from Washington politicians who refuse to relinquish the intoxicating power to borrow and spend.”
THE BIPARTISAN SPENDING PROBLEM
Our national debt has exploded under each president since 1980. From Ronald Reagan, George Bush, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Barack Obama, Donald Trump, and Joe Biden, our national debt is as large as our economic output (GDP).
In 1980, the national debt was $908 billion and $2.6 trillion when Reagan left office in 1988.
Under four years of Bush, the debt rose to $4 trillion and then $5.7 trillion under the eight years of Clinton.
With W. Bush, over two terms the debt rose to $10 trillion and then $19.6 trillion after eight years under Obama.
When Trump left office after one term the debt was $27.8 trillion.
Today, after two years under Biden, our national debt pushed $32.5 trillion.
INTEREST PAYMENTS VS. CORE SERVICES
In 2022, the federal government paid $476 billion just in interest on our national debt with the projection by the Congressional Budget Office to $640 billion this year. Net outlays for interest nearly double over the period in CBO’s projections, rising from $739 billion in 2024 to $1.4 trillion in 2033.
Here’s how that compares to the budgets of defense, social security and education.
In FY2023, the Department of Defense spent $773 billion. Social Security had outlays of $1.3 trillion. Education spending at the local, state, and federal levels amounted to $837 billion as of FY2021.
VALUE OF A U.S. DOLLAR
When the federal government adds to the national debt by spending more money than it takes in, it devalues the dollars. For example, today’s dollar would be worth 14 cents in 1972. Because of inflation, you need over $7 today for the equivalent spending power of $1 in 1972.
Unfortunately, our federal government’s spending is not slowing down. Our national debt will exceed 225% of GDP by 2050, according to the Penn Wharton budget model.
SUMMARY
On the world stage, the Chinese are taking every step to undermine the U.S. as the world’s reserve currency. These threats are not a new phenomenon.
However, as the Fitch downgrade of U.S. debt shows, American policy makers are not taking our fiscal condition seriously.
Great Britain with the pound took over as the world’s reserve currency in 1815. Then, in 1944 at the Bretton Woods Conference the U.S. dollar replaced the pound. Now, it has only been 80 years.
America needs a bold plan to stop Washington from bankrupting the country. Unfortunately, the long-term trend is aggressively moving in the wrong direction.
Breaking down the Fitch downgrade of U.S. debt on The National Desk. August 2023
ABOUT US:
OpenTheBooks.com – We believe transparency is transformational. Using forensic auditing and open records, we hold government accountable.
In the years 2021 and 2022, we filed 100,000+ FOIA requests and successfully captured $19 trillion government expenditures: nearly all federal spending; 50 state checkbooks; and 25 million public employee salary and pension records from 50,000 public bodies across America.
Our works have been featured at the BBC, Good Morning America, ABC World News Tonight, The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, C-SPAN, Stay Free With Russell Brand, The New York Times, NBC News, FOX News, Forbes, National Public Radio (NPR), Sinclair Broadcast Group, Chicago Tribune & many others.
Our organization accepts no government funding and was founded by CEO Adam Andrzejewski. Our federal oversight work was cited twice in the President's Budget To Congress FY2021. Andrzejewski's presentation, The Depth of the Swamp, at the Hillsdale College National Leadership Seminar 2020 in Naples, Florida posted on YouTube received 3.8+ million views.
NOTICE: We reserve the right to remove comments that deemed offensive to our organization, staff, and audience.
Our National Debt Is Our Biggest National Security Threat
Who is able to loan these trillions of dollars to the US government?!
I have to disagree. Getting murdered by your own government rates higher on the list for me. Everyone needs to understand that a documented $21 Trillion (+) has been stolen from federal agency budgets over the last 30 years. That's why The Pentagon and The Federal Reserve cannot be audited.
Read: "Follow the Missing Money," Vol 1 & 2 from Solari.com. Catherine Austin Fitts's team explains how it was (and is) being done. That money goes to the global financial elite and they need to give it back.
FYI - The non-profit "Committee for a Responsible Budget" is a JOKE. Leon Panetta is on their exec team - and he's part of The Carlyle Group (big military thieves). The do not return calls or answer e-mails that ask the hard questions:
Greetings Mr. Towner,
The e-mail below really surprised me. The question I kept asking myself was: Why would anyone spend the time to make pretend discretionary budgets - when the entire federal budget system is fundamentally broken and on it's knees?
Are you all aware of Federal Accounting Standards Advisory Board (FASAB) SFFAS 56 and the fact that this 2018 ruling, classified domestic, non-military federal agency budgets black and no longer available for external audit?
Are you aware that over $21 Trillion has been identified by the team at Solari.com as having been stolen from the federal budgets since the 1990's? Purchase their two excellent reports "Follow The Missing Money" Part 1 & Part 2 and learn how the US military intelligence complex and the parasitic, 1/2 European owned, 'federal' Reserve (central) Bank and the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) created the conduit for trillions of taxpayer's dollars to be systematically removed from agency budgets.
Are you aware that the pace of the budget theft accelerated after the European-owned parasitic private "federal" Reserve central bank cartel purchased shares in the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) in 1994?
Wouldn't the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget be more effective if it directed it's resources towards:
*Getting FASAB's SFFAS 56 ruling rescinded to restore external audits of federal agency budgets.
*Removing all binding rule-making ability organizations that are extremely external to the legislative process (FASAB, UCC, etc.). Citizens have no way of controlling or even influencing these organizations. So it follows that in a Constitutional Republic, these organizations have no business making rules that impact taxpayers or systemic transparency / integrity.
*Becoming a frontline organization in the fight to stop:
- the financial hemorrhage at the US DoD and intelligence agency communities who are currently engaged in a global mass atrocity against humanity.
- the FEDNOW payment processing system rolling out in two months that will move US Treasury payments to a parasitic foreign-owned private central bank for the first time in history. CRFB will lose all visibility for affected agencies if this is allowed to go forward.
- the Central Bank Digital Currency that will remove our transactional freedom and reduce us to slaves of the global central bankers.
- IF the parasitic "federal" Reserve Bank cartel wants to call itself a federal agency in any form - it needs to be externally audited financially and operationally. Former fed chair Alan Greenspan threw it in everyone's faces years ago that no one could control the fed and that the fed answers to no one.
How this could have continued for over 100 years in a Constitutional Republic speaks volumes about the fed's level of corruption.
* * * *
:)) I'm sure if I sit here long enough, I'll think of more things... but I am really not here to insult you or the CRFB. I managed a non-profit in DC for a couple of years. I understand how things go in that world.
I just want to see your organization in the fight, over the target, helping the citizens of this Constitutional Republic restore the government that is supposed to serve and not subjugate.
Best Regards,