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Chris B
Salt Lake City, UT

Barack has added almost as much to the national debt as every past president in the history of our country combined

Thid Barker
Victor, ID

Rosier picture? We are $17.4 trillion in debt! More spending of money we don't have! Not even close to being "rosy".


Chris B,

Barack has not added a single cent of spending. All spending bills (100% of them) are approved by congress. The president can propose a budget, but nothing else. If congress decides to pass that budget or reject it (which they always do) there is nothing he can do. 100% of spending is done through congress. When Obama came into office, there was $9 trillion in debt. The 2009 budget proposed by Bush had already been passed through both houses of congress and was in effect. That added another $2 trillion that no one could do anything about. It had already passed congress. The remaining $6 trillion has been added during President Obama's time in office. A good portion of that was continuing the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. $400 billion of it is from the F-35. $21 billion was from three new Navy Destroyers. Did you want to cancel all of these programs? Congress approved every single cent and all Obama could have done would have been to veto it. Then you would complain about him being weak on defense and not supporting the troops.

DN Subscriber
Cottonwood Heights, UT

More spending will only do one thing- ensure more votes are bought from people who like "free stuff" more than the concept of working to support yourself and achieve your aspirations and desires for "stuff."

At $17 trillion in debt, we already cannot afford any more "free stuff" to buy votes, we cannot even afford to pay the debts we already owe. Yes, we will have to make cuts to military spending which are a very real risk in this dangerous world.

But we also must, and should FIRST make even more draconian cuts in other spending, especially the out of control and unsustainable entitlement programs. Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, welfare, Obamaphones, studies on mating habits of snails, student loans, $1 billion to the Ukraine, and a ton of other programs must, repeat MUST, but cut. If not eliminated entirely, then cut to levels that we can afford while we make serious repayment on what we already owe. Not just "cutting the amount we add to the debt."

Economists who want more spending now are not worth listening too as they are detached from reality.

We are broke already. Stop the spending!

Cedar Hills, UT

It's always a one way street with Barack. Give me my new spending!!! In return I will cut nothing!!! So what's the problem? The problem is we have a man who has no idea how or desire to actually govern. This is like Goundhog day the movie...that never ends.

Las Vegas, NV


You're absolutely right and he(Barack) is not the leader either right?....well, what the heck is he doing then? Is this how he is leading from behind?

Provo, UT

Fact: Obama's budgets can't attract votes from his own party: they regularly get defeated in the Senate by votes of 97-0 and such.

Not even Harry Reid is willing to consider Obama's budgets as anything more than sheer lunacy.


DN Subscriber,

I always find it interesting that republicans talk for 1.5 years (every few years) about the need to cut Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and student loans. Then when election time comes around they run like crazy from those statements and blame the democrats for wanting to cut those same programs. One of the biggest complaints that republicans ran on in 2012 was that Obamacare cut money from Medicare. Paul Ryan ran ads complaining about those very cuts. Yet, most of the time, republicans are the ones saying those cuts are necessary. Those same cuts they complained about in 2012 were in the Ryan budget. The same Ryan budget that the House recently passed. I will be interested to see in November if you are still talking about the need to cut Medicare.


He is the president, not king. He cannot spend a single dime without John Boehner's signature. We have three branches to our government in the US.

Virginia Beach, VA

What Right Wingers can't seem to understand is that investments are necessary. And investments can pay back with big gains.

If Republicans had not opposed Obama's job's bill in 2011, we would now have millions of people busily building necessary infrastructure and employed in support industries. With that infrastructure, we would be much more competitive as a nation.

Instead taxpayers are now paying billions in unemployment extensions for people to sit around and do nothing.

. . . And it's all thanks to Republican obstructionism.

boneheaded, but not a smidgen

i hope the children of the father of four thank him and barry for spending their futures. this type of attitude will not be appreciated by the coming generations,......pathetic

Provo, UT

What is pathetic is people who talk out of two sides of their face -- things are wonderful if done by a Republican, but if a Democrat does the exact same thing it is socialism and going to lead us all to ruin. When a Republican is president, then all of a sudden deficits don't matter. Now they are the end of the world as we know it. Tea Partiers do not use logic and are rarely consistent.

USS Enterprise, UT

What I want to know is who these economists are that Obama has been consulting. The more reputable economists that I have read say that the ever debt, and the excessive deficts that we have seen over the past 20 years are becoming a drag on the economy.

It is almost as if Obama has a magic 8 ball that he consults for economic matters.

Murray, UT

Outlook is rosy, according to Obama's economists? Yeah, and the recession was over in 2009, except for those who can't find a job. We have yet to replace the jobs lost, let alone actually grow.

These guys have been predicting 3% growth every year since Obama took office. They haven't been right yet.

The operative words are OBAMA'S ECONOMISTS. He bought them with taxpayer money, but he owns them completely, so they say what their master tells them to say.

Slavery was supposed to be illegal, but apparently if you hold the public purse, you can buy guys if you want to.

Murray, UT


You seem to be forgetting that the shovel ready jobs aren't shovel ready (Ha ha).

And the rest of the money went to corporations like Solyndra, where all it bought was a high paid exec and a bankrupt company. There were no unemployed folks who got jobs out of that fiasco. The money just made the rich richer and the taxpayers poorer.

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