Does it make a difference if spending cuts are idle and meaningless, or is there a positive impact from all spending cuts, regardless of their place in a budget?

It is by no accident our National Debt is nearing ten trillion (10,000,000,000,000) dollars.

Irrational spending, procured by irrational politicians, have made this devastating and embarrassing milestone possible. Too few politicians with the courage and the nerve to challenge their wayward colleagues exist within the halls of congress to thwart and end this arrogantly excessive, tireless spending. But, should there be a revival of courage among politicians (perhaps around the same time pigs take to the sky) who would actually make meaningful and substantial cuts in spending - is cutting spending, in of itself, the end all solution in solving budget deficits?

No!

It is only half the battle, and one that cannot be won of its own accord. The best, most effective, method in balancing a budget, or at least making it more manageable, is a “one-two punch” which includes both spending cuts and cutting taxes at the same time. The reason why is logical enough to understand - money makes money. Cutting spending in a given budget does not create more money, it merely takes already existing money and diverts it somewhere else. And if spending is being cut, but taxes aren’t, (which rarely occurs), we really have to ask ourselves, and our elected officials, the obvious question -where is all that extra money going? It must be going somewhere. Right?

And if spending isn’t being cut, if politicians refuse to cut spending - which happens all too often - the only other option available to politicians with a one track mind is to raise taxes. Not that there are many of them who oppose such “drastic measures”.

Think about it!

With an out of control deficit as unhinged as our politicians, with spending going unchecked and unchallenged, with an economy, although as strong as it remains, slowing, and in need of an infusion of capitalism - just the opposite is being advocated by those we, the taxpayers, are paying to represent us.

When we could be cutting subsidies of all kind, foreign aid, the Department of Education, the waste that exists in Social Security, Medicaid and Medicare, and a plethora of federal departments and programs, instead the only spending cuts our “valiant protectors of democracy” offer us for consideration are those relegated in areas of defense and military. Areas of the budget that are necessary to our national security, and for which are actually an integral and genuine role of government expenditure. In other words - worth the money in taxes we pay.

Huge budget deficits, as in the case of our federal deficit, occur because of greed and maladministration, and a political ego as over-bloated as the deficit they helped to engineer. But mostly, deficits are derived from the fact that there is too little political restraint in the first place. This holds true in state and local budgets too. Undoubtedly, in your own state, in your own county, in your own city (so many layers of unnecessary bureaucracy and government) budget battles are raging as politicians are scrambling to find the means to balance their budgets without having to resort to “plan B“, and what really is, for a politician, a last resort - spending cuts.

Cutting taxes, at least, gives back to entrepreneurs, business folk, investors, and the average person more of their own money, (what a concept!). But it does something else, too; something extraordinary, spectacular and positive. When taxes are cut, when we own and possess a greater share of our own money to spend as we dictate, we have and hold that very power currently deeded over to our elected politicians. And this power imbues in all of us a better and equal representation and participation in our own economy; a greater and more diverse contribution; a sense of real democracy as defined by our founding fathers in an economy that rightfully belongs to us - not our government.

Many local and state governments have constitutional amendments that mandate a balanced budget, which means if cowardice prevails, taxes are raised. Cook County, IL. is such a prime example, where, just recently, the highest sales tax in America was enacted into law to help balance an out of control budget, manufactured by an out of control county president.

The real courage in reducing deficits, indeed in actually balancing budgets, will come when voters begin electing politicians who hold a degree in fiscal responsibility. If we keep electing the same cowards, the same shiftless politicians, who contribute more toward our ballooning deficit than what they ought to be contributing to - our ballooning wallets - ten trillion (10,000,000,000,000) dollars will eventually come to be seen as a debt we all would long to revisit, and for which we would feel less ashamed to own.