David Walker's Warning


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Posted in * Economics, Politics, Economy, The National Deficit, The U.S. Government

18 comments on “David Walker's Warning

  1. Eric Swensson says:

    When was this aired?

  2. Jeffersonian says:

    I think it was 2006, Eric, as the narrative pointed out the enactment of the Medicare prescription drug benefit three years prior. Things have only gotten worse since.

    I ran for Congress in 1994 with a fiscal message that was almost verbatim what was said in this video clip. I was derided, mocked and denounced as a right-wing madman for my trouble. Well, no one’s laughing now.

  3. Br. Michael says:

    But no one will do anything. You only get elected if you promise to give people money. Look at Bush (bad example) and Obama. The Democrats are past masters at buying votes through largess.

  4. DonGander says:

    People will grow tired of crooked polititians when things get bad enough.

    I pray that it will not be too late.

    Don

  5. John Wilkins says:

    Unfortunately, we had to go invade Iraq. The Pentagon “lost” a trillion dollars.

  6. Jeffersonian says:

    A spit in a river next to the tsunami that are Medicare and Social Security, Johnny-boy. Iraq had a beginning and an end, but these programs bleed hundreds of billions (and soon, trillions) of dollars every year.

  7. Jim the Puritan says:

    The really sad thing is that those Baby Boomers who figured they could only depend upon themselves for their retirement, and who “prudently” put away and invested their money for retirement rather than spend it on flat screen TVs and bloated SUVs, now see much of it gone because of the irresponsibility of others. That too is immoral.

  8. Irenaeus says:

    [i] I ran for Congress in 1994 [/i]

    Now I understand.

  9. Br. Michael says:

    Well, John with your help, maybe we can loose a war. Feel better?

  10. Br. Michael says:

    Elves, that was not nice. Please delete.

  11. John Wilkins says:

    I’ve never cared about winning or losing wars, myself, Br. Michael. But I do know that everyone pays, and it means higher taxes.

    At least that’s how kings usually financed their wars: taxing people. Odd how those who want war, don’t want to pay for them.

  12. TACit says:

    I remember quite clearly listening to David Walker on NPR or is PBS radio (??) in December 2007, driving E/NE from Chicago. It was essentially the same message. I wonder what he is doing now?

  13. Br. Michael says:

    Well, John, I am from the south and we know what it costs to loose a war. It costs more than taxes.

  14. Irenaeus says:

    [i] We know what it costs to lose a war [/i]

    Yes, sir. We had to give up slavery and secession. Well, one thing led to another, if you know what I mean, and we stopped depending on cotton and tobacco. We got light industry, heavy industry. We got a service economy that goes way beyond domestic help. Why, Yankees invested hundreds of billions of dollars here. They got profits; we got jobs a darn sight better than sharecropping. But that’s not two halves of it. Now we’ve got foreigners, Germans and Japanese, paying us to make their cars here. Daimler does Dixie. No telling what’s next. We know what it costs to lose a war!

  15. Br. Michael says:

    Irenaeus, that is beneath contempt. The southern economy was destroyed and a generation killed.

  16. Br. Michael says:

    Cost Of The American Civil War

    The approximately 10,455 military engagements, some devastating to human life and some nearly bloodless, plus naval clashes, accidents, suicides, sicknesses, murders, and executions resulted in total casualties of 1,094,453 during the Civil War. The Federals lost 110,100 killed in action and mortally wounded, and another 224,580 to disease. The Confederates lost approximately 94,000 as a result of battle and another 164,000 to disease. Even if one survived a wound, any projectile that hit bone in either an arm or a leg almost invariably necessitated amputation. The best estimate of Federal army personnel wounded is 275,175; naval personnel wounded, 2,226. Surviving Confederate records indicate 194,026 wounded.
    In dollars and cents, the U.S. government estimated Jan. 1863 that the war was costing $2.5 million daily. A final official estimate in 1879 totaled $6,190,000,000. The Confederacy spent perhaps $2,099,808,707. By 1906 another $3.3 billion already had been spent by the U.S. government on Northerners’ pensions and other veterans’ benefits for former Federal soldiers. Southern states and private philanthropy provided benefits to the Confederate veterans. The amount spent on benefits eventually well exceeded the war’s original cost.
    Inflation affected both Northern and Southern assets but hit those of the Confederacy harder. Northern currency fluctuated in value, and at its lowest point $2.59 in Federal paper money equaled $1 in gold. The Confederate currency so declined in purchasing power that eventually $60-$70 equaled a gold dollar.
    [b] The physical devastation, almost all of it in the South, was enormous: burned or plundered homes, pillaged countryside, untold losses in crops and farm animals, ruined buildings and bridges, devastated college campuses, and neglected roads all left the South in ruins.[/b]
    Detailed studies of Union and Confederate military casualties are found in Numbers and Losses in the Civil War in America 1861-65 by Thomas L. Livermore (I901) and Regimental Losses in the American Civil War, 1867-1865 by William F. Fox (1889).
    Source: “Historical Times Encyclopedia of the Civil War” Edited by Patricial L. Faust

    http://www.civilwarhome.com/warcosts.htm

    Some prosperity. And the South had a much smaller population than the North. So, yes, we lost a war.

  17. Sherri2 says:

    Br. Michael, a slave-based economy *needed* to be destroyed. It is tragic that war was the only way it could be accomplished and that so many had to die for it. But ridding the South of slavery was truly a great benefit of that war.

  18. Irenaeus says:

    [i]Irenaeus, that is beneath contempt[/i]

    So was slavery. So was oath-breaking and treason.
    _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

    [i]So, yes, we lost a war[/i]

    And we thereby ultimately gained freedom to become something other than a xenophobic agrarian backwater.
    _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

    I received ample doses of Southern victimhood-awareness from my elementary school teachers (one of whom would almost weep when speaking of Sherman’s March to the Sea). The Civil War was a great human tragedy. But casting the South as the victim was unhealthy—a bit like blaming our current economic troubles on some Them who has nothing to do with us.