Comments from Facebook:

If the automatic spending cuts hurt our economy dramatically, it will be proof positive the right-wingers were clueless when claiming deficit reduction would spur economic growth.

I think many people are willing to test it, but if life becomes chaotic with long lines at airports, kids staying home because teachers were cut loose, government and Defense Department employees furloughed leading to recession, then hopefully President Obama and Congress could make immediate amends to keep the recession short.

Have no doubt: If the sequester wrecks this fragile economy, the GOP will get the brunt of the blame. I don't know if that's fair or not, but Republicans clearly prefer all spending cuts and no tax increases on the wealthy.

John Petz

I always hear talk about the deficit, but that never seems to move on to talk about reducing the debt. These are two different things.

Congress and the president have to begin treating the debt like a mortgage: Start paying both interest and principal.

Clayton Spangenberg

Shortsighted politicians. Are you really telling me that none of these geniuses foresaw the actual consequences? When will "we the people" make them accountable for their decisions?

Antonio Augusto Castillo

Folks need to realize we have a mess and there won't be any pain-free way out.

Pushing worse problems onto our children and their children may be good politics, but it solves nothing in the long run.

Fred Finkelberg

Warnings about the impact of sequestration are just another scare tactic. The power of the president and Congress comes from money. When you start cutting the money, you start cutting their power.

Have you noticed how they keep talking about how the cuts are going to impact us the people? There is little talk about cutting unnecessary spending.

Michael Grubb

Letters to the editor:

It is high time defense spending is brought under control. Since neither party has the courage to tackle the defense industry, sequestration may be a blessing in disguise ("Pentagon fears drastic cuts with lack of spending bill").

One advantage of maintaining a smaller military force is that it will be less tempting to use it in situations that don't warrant it.

We need to rethink the war on terrorism. Sept. 11 wasn't made possible because we weren't spending enough on defense. The Sept. 11 attack should have taught us that fighting terrorism requires a different set of tools.

In addition, we need to encourage our allies to take on more of the costs of their own defense. We have hundreds of military facilities overseas. There simply is no justification for this. In fact, our presence can be a destabilizing influence, sowing the seeds of discord for future generations of Americans to inherit.

Scaring people into defense spending is easy. Bringing some sanity to the defense equation will be much harder. But it is critical to the long-term viability of this nation that we do so, even if it means going over the fiscal cliff.

Ferdi Businger; Anacortes, Wash.

There is only one group of people that cannot possibly be fired or laid off, take a reduction in pay or lose any benefits if the sequester goes through. Those will be the lawmakers who will decide to let it happen.

One can only hope that on the way to every airport, they hit every pothole in the road and every flight they take is delayed by at least four hours.

This "it's no skin off my back" way of legislating is obscene unless you have no concern about anything but yourselves.

Philip Barnett; Scottsdale, Ariz.

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