Blame Congress

EDITOR:

In support of Mr. Justus' letter on July 3:

I agree that Congress got us into this mess. Both parties specialize in pork and earmarks and wasteful spending. Bush added $500 billion to the debt in just one year and now it looks like Obama is going to top that. If you aren't concerned about government spending consider these numbers:

n President Obama has added 78,000 new government jobs to the federal payroll since he took office. If history is any measure, these jobs will never be eliminated.

n The budget increases spending to $3.9 trillion in 2009, or 27 percent of gross domestic product - the highest level since World War II. The government is spending double what it brings in and that's also double the level of FDR's New Deal spending rate. Unemployment was 25 percent under FDR, right now it's at 9.6 percent. I'm not sure our response is proportionate on this.

n The debt is $11.5 trillion now and it doubles every eight years. Remember when the $3 trillion debt under Reagan sounded huge?

n 1862 Income Tax established at 3 percent to pay for the Civil War.

n 1872 War Debt is paid off and the Income Tax is abolished.

So clearly Congress was a responsible body back then.

n 1913 Income Tax permanently established. A senator suggested a law limiting the income tax to 5 percent but it was never put into effect because the other senators thought he was "crazy." No one could conceive that the income tax would ever go above 5 percent - so we didn't need a law. Don't you wish they'd been a little bit "crazy?"

Autum Resney

Gardnerville