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Who’s Watching The Nation’s Cash Register? |
If you ever go into a family owned restaurant, you will usually see one or more people near the cash register. Sometimes they’re working the register and running credit cards through. Why do they do this? Why do they lurk about the register? Well, if you ask them, they will tell you that it’s because they know if they take their eye off of the register…it’s inevitable that money will start disappearing. Inevitable. If you came into the restaurant at 2:45 pm, when it’s in between meals and really slow, you’ll likely see one of the owners or their relatives sitting in the booth closest to the register, reading the paper, or watching TV. Why is he or she sitting there when hardly anyone’s in the joint at that time? Because that’s where the money is. Because they want to make sure that’s where the money stays. So, let’s take that mental picture over to the biggest cash register of them all…the US Government’s! And we have to ask this important question: Who’s minding that register? Who’s sitting in the first booth keeping an eye on our money? Well, in our opinion…there ain’t nobody watching nothin’! Why do we say this? Well, let’s look at the recent bill submitted by the President to the Congress to ponder and debate over. Now, we aren’t going to bore you with all kinds of stats and complicated rules/regulations contained in this mammoth budget proposal. What we are going to do is discuss the main philosophy and meaning behind it. Again, in our opinion. (And, as we always do…to ask you to please understand what we’re saying here has nothing to do with any kind of partisan politics. What we’re presenting to you to ponder and maybe debate over is the TRUTH. The reality of what these men and women in the White House and Congress are doing, irrespective of what party hat they wear. We don’t wear party hats here either. The ONLY bias and prejudice we DO admit to is to YOUR financial success. Period.) Anyway, let’s quickly review what has been laid out for us to accept as the “budget” the Washington crowd wants us to swallow. President Bush has proposed a $2.7 trillion budget that would shrink most parts of the government unrelated to the nation's security…while slowing spending on Medicare by $36 billion during the next five years.
The spending plan Bush is to recommend to Congress will call for the elimination or reduction of 141 programs -- for a savings of $14.5 billion -- across a broad swath of federal agencies. Many of these cuts are targeted for the departments of Education, Energy, Interior and Commerce.
Overall, the budget for the 2007 fiscal year would further reshape the government in the way the administration has been striving to during the past half-decade: building up military capacity and defenses against terrorist threats on U.S. soil, while restraining expenditures on many domestic areas.
In addition, the White House is continuing a pattern of leaving substantial military expenditures out of the budget; last week, the Pentagon announced it intends to ask Congress for an additional $120 billion -- not contained in the new spending plan -- to help pay for the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq this year and next.
In another area of emphasis, Bush will include $5.9 billion in the budget for what he is calling an "American Competitiveness Initiative," unveiled in the State of the Union speech. The bulk of the money, $4.6 billion, would be used to resurrect a research and development tax credit for industry that expired last year. The rest would go for such initiatives as increasing research in physical sciences, and training more teachers in math and science.
| In total, the administration plans to assert that the new budget would keep the government on a path to reduce the federal deficit by half between 2005 and 2009. In part, the spending plan tries to achieve that goal by renewing efforts to persuade Congress to trim or abolish programs that lawmakers have refused to touch in the past. In last year's budget, Bush took aim at 154 such programs worth a total of $15.8 billion in savings; Congress agreed to about $6.5 billion of those cuts.
Now, that’s very, very brief summary of President Bush’s plan, which will be attacked in various ways by Congress…but end up in some very close fashion to Mr. Bush’s proposal.
Again, no political opinions expressed here…but this noble idea of balancing the budget in the near future is simply ridiculous. Why? Because no one’s watching the register!
See, in the restaurant, or in your business or home…you have some checks in place that stop you from spending your money like a drunken pirate.
But…who’s there to slap the Congress’ hand when they dig it into the till and grab all the money out of our national register? (AND, taking out more than what’s in the drawer… slipping in potentially worthless IOU’s for future people to deal with!) We’ll tell you who…NO ONE!
See, the blame for the fact that we are spending ourselves into almost 2 Trillion dollars of new debt in the next nine years…sits squarely on the shoulders of the entire US Government. Not one party. Not one administration or another. ALL of them are to collectively blame. Since the 1970’s our government has just continued to spend and spend and spend.
Plus, they don’t ever give us the REAL numbers of the deficit. For example, they won’t include in the deficit figures the amount of money they spent on “emergency” spending provisions such as for the hurricanes last year, and the cost overruns on the dual wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. (Like the Pentagon’s admission they will be requesting, and likely get….the 120 Billion they need for part of this year to continue to fight the wars as well as do research into better weapons and tools to protect our troops.) Now again, please don’t take us wrong here. We are not saying we don’t support our troops, because we do, in every way possible. They SHOULD have the best weapons and armor. All we ARE saying is that these immense expenditures and ongoing additions to the national debt WILL affect us and our kids and their kids. History has shown over and over that when the spending gets so out of control, there are eventual repercussions that are unavoidable. Will the effects be felt by you this year, in 2006? What about next year? What about five years, ten years, fifteen years from now? Will there be a recession? Will interest rates stay low? Will they climb? Will jobs become more plentiful or lessen? The REAL answer is that NOBODY knows! And anyone who says he or she knows what or when things will happen in the economy is lying. Period. No one has any idea. None. So what does all this mean to you and your family? Well, it means that the ONLY safe prediction we can make without risking a mistake is that…change and uncertainty are likely to be the condition of our national cash register for many years to come. And, accordingly, the ONLY weapon YOU have is to be pretty darn serious about doing financial planning NOW, and every year. Especially in the spring, when you have the rest of the year laying out in front of you. Planning is the key! Consistent financial planning to keep up with today's ever-changing political and economic world is a must, and your best chance at bullet-proofing your finances! Taking the time to review your current financial situation NOW can pay you back a thousand times later! If you have any questions or concerns about your financial plan, please use our quick contact form below and we will have our financial experts address your concerns. If you would like a credible referral, just post that in the box labeled 'question or concern' and we will give you the contact information of one of our elite financial planners near you!
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