Deficit, shmeficit

On the news the other night, President Obama claimed that the U.S. could possibly go bankrupt. I knew that the U.S. was 12.13 trillion in debt, but I thought, hey, no biggie. Everyone’s in debt. Plus, other countries know we’re good for it, right? But…

I can fix this. And I didn’t even finish college (college is hard!). I’m only a few credits short. BUT. I can fix this.

NASA announced a $17.6 billion budget for fiscal year 2009. Don’t do this. Even if we do find water on the moon, that’s only going to create competition for Mount Olympus (a nice American-based company and not some “moon-based company”). Let’s fix things down here before we look to galaxies far, far, away. Boom! 17 billion saved!

I’ve noticed that people like to get high. I’m not judging, but congress hates this. We even have a “war on drugs” so we can stop Joe the Plummer from getting high. The U.S., this year, has spent $19,279,628 on the federal level and $29,594,230 on the state level. Is it working? It’s bumped the price of a dime bag of pot a few bucks, but really, that’s about it. If you want to go about things legally, you can get a prescription for almost anything. Pfizer, has annual sales of about $48 billion. Why? PEOPLE LIKE TO GET HIGH. Drop the war on drugs and tax legalized marijuana? 48+ millions saved!

You know what else people like? Their cars. Former General Motors Corp. Chairman and CEO Rick Wagoner retired Aug. 1 with a pension and benefit package the automaker valued at more than $10 million. So when you ask the salesmen why that Chevy Surburban is so much, he’s likely to say, “Hey, our CEOs hafta eat!” And if GM can’t afford to pay this man his $10 million? We bail them out with your income tax. Considering the $3.9 trillion bailout is about 25% of the U.S. economy, I think bailouts are necessary, because if we wouldn’t have bailed them out? Poor Rick would only get something in the hundreds of thousands.

And what do our cars run on? Gas. Mostly. I read that ExxonMobil CEO Lee Raymond received a $400 million retirement package. I think there may be a slight mark-up in oil. I buy Japanese because, well, their CEO’s don’t require a retirement package, thus passing the savings on to moi. And screw GM. We didn’t bail out Honda, yet they’re still doing okay.

Where else can we save some coin?

Education. Education is being touted as “Necessary to today’s youth.” All told, we’ve spent more than $480 billion on public education. Have you talked with some of the kids in Utah? They think “sa-um” and “mou-uns” are actual words. I say, save the money and let the kids learn from their parents. Their parents are smart. They buy American! Call a spade a spade and drop education budget? 480 billion saved!

I was going to go back to work at the golf course this year until I found out that the government will pay you NOT to grow certain crops. It’s a no-brainer! I’m just going to stay home and not grow some crap and collect the paycheck. And if they drag their feet on my funds? I’ll threaten them!

“Pay me, or I’ll grow beets! I’m not kidding! I’ll do it!” Then, I’ll sit back, not grow beets and count my government money.

Wars.

I have to be honest. I really don’t care about the Afghan people. Or the Iraqi people. I barely care about people I know, let alone people across the globe in a desert where I’m not going to be headed for Spring Break. We could pull out now and save about $234 trillion in Afghanistan and $709 trillion in Iraq. Have families home for Christmas? 934 billion saved. You’re welcome.

So who votes on and approves all of these great ideas? Senators and politicians. Senators and politicians who are voting on a health care plan that won’t affect them. They’re already covered. They try to fix Social Security, which is not applicable to them. They’re already covered. The annual base salary of each senator, as of 2009, is $174,000. The annual base salary for each congressman is the same. During the Constitutional Convention, Benjamin Franklin considered proposing that elected government officials not be paid for their service. Other Founding Fathers, however, decided otherwise. Phew!

So we have this debt, I guess. How can we spend more money than we have? China has bought more than $1 trillion of American debt. We owe other countries as well as China, which we directly owe 800 billion dollars. (Although China said we can’t have any more money until all of our chores are done. ALL of them!)

If I were to base my personal finances on the U.S.’s example, I’d take $100 and spend it on a bottle of Glenfiddich, a new Callaway driver, a car, a Gibson Les Paul, commission a portrait of myself, buy nicer rugs, get a Shammy™, buy some 8-12 count shrimp, get some more Ray Ban®s, get some Heineken for visiting company, and have Brad and Angelina over for my New Years party, even if it’s more than $50 for an appearance fee (it’s worth it!). If that comes to a little over $100, I’ll just start a deficit.

That’s what you do right? I'm just saying.