That darned Washington, spending like drunken sailors! Of course we Americans have nothing to do with that. Right? We aren't the ones asking them to spend like drunken sailors, are we? ARE WE?!?!?!?

Here are some numbers I found just checking Wikipedia for 2010 budget figures. It's Wikipedia, so I can't vouch for the exact accuracy of the dollar amounts. But it sounds about right.

In 2010 the government is expected to take in 2.381 trillion dollars in revenues. That is down 11% from 2009, according to Wikipedia.

They are scheduled to spend approximately 3.552 trillion dollars. Of that amount, mandatory spending adds up to 2.184 trillion dollars. Do the math. This leaves 197 billion dollars to fund the rest of government, those "discretionary" expenses. This discretionary amount includes a budgeted figure of 663.7 billion for defense. The rest of the line items under discretionary spending were under 100 billion each, except for "Other Spending" which added up to 105 billion.

Let's parse these numbers a bit more. If we add together social security, medicare (because we all know those fiscally responsible tea partiers don't want anyone touching their medicare or social security) and interest on the debt, and defense (we are, after all, just coming off a war in Iraq and still fighting one in Afghanistan, and our soldiers deserve this level of support), we come up with a total of 1.959 trillion dollars. This leaves us with a total of 422 billion for every other part of government. Medicaid alone is 453 billion. Other "smaller" mandated programs total another 571 billion dollars. And none of these totals include the interest that is owned to the social security trust fund. The interest cost figure above is ONLY the amount on the debt.

So what can be done? Cut Medicare? It grew 12% in 2010 from 2009. Cutting it would probably entail trying to curb its growth. Good luck with that. Cut Social Security? Oh year, we oughtta be able to find politicians lining up to sign on for that, right? Cut defense? Well, yes, obviously cuts need to come from defense. It cannot continue to grow at 12.7% a year, as it did from 2009 to 2010. Cut NASA funding? That'll net you 18.7 billion. Now that's a lot to you and me, but in this budget, it's a rounding error.

Here's the hard truth. American citizens, that's right, us - you, me, everyone at the tea party rallies, all those senior citizens, the soldiers and military personnel, the rich, the poor, the sick, the huddled masses - we want EVERYTHING and we want to pay for basically nothing. We won't stand for cuts to any of our government entitlements, because, gosh darn it, we paid for them! We earned them!

Without cuts, though, there is simply NO WAY to have a federal government. And no federal government means no Social Security, no Medicare and Medicaid, no national defense, no war in Iraq (hey maybe we're on to something here), no national parks, no Homeland Security, no management of the rivers and locks and such by the Corps of Engineers, no interstate highways, no MONEY!

That is, unless we want to pay more for these entitlements. That means (cue the ominous music) - higher taxes. Crazy, huh? I mean, who wants to pay higher taxes?

Now I know that I don't have a ton of readers, but if someone reading has any ideas to get to a balanced budget, or even something heading in that direction, without either raising revenues, drastically cutting spending, or printing enough money that all of our earnings become basically worthless, I'd love a comment. Thanks for reading!