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Well, as Eric Boehm reports, not really: Despite November’s Record $249 Billion Deficit, Congress Prepares To Spend More.
The federal government ran a $249 billion deficit during the month of November—that's the largest total ever posted for that month, and a staggering $56 billion increase over the deficit from November 2021. Treasury Department data released this week show the government spent $501 billion during the month but collected just $252 billion in tax revenue, meaning that nearly 50 cents of every dollar spent were borrowed and added to the national debt. That's utterly unsustainable.
And now Congress is gearing up to spend even more.
Though the final details of a lame-duck session omnibus bill won't be known until next week (likely not until just before lawmakers are asked to vote on it), it's a near certainty that the final agreement will add to this year's budget deficit and the ballooning national debt. Congress passed a short-term spending deal on Thursday night to avert a government shutdown and give lawmakers another week to hammer out a more comprehensive deal to fund the government through the end of the current fiscal year. That larger omnibus bill could include billions of dollars in additional military and humanitarian aid for Ukraine, as well as emergency funds for hurricane relief, The Washington Post reports. The final price tag is likely to be about $1.7 trillion, according to Politico.
The appropriate Mencken quote from this collection
Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.
But we (apparently "uncommon") get it right along with them.
Briefly noted:
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Does opposing LGBT ideology cause violence? It's a simple question, with a simple answer from Madeleine Kearns: No, Opposing LGBT Ideology Does Not Cause Violence.
When the Supreme Court found a constitutional right to same-sex marriage in 2015, then-president Obama said that there were “Americans of goodwill” on either side of the issue. He stated that opposition was, at least for some people, “based on sincere and deeply held beliefs.” And he emphasized the need to “revere our deep commitment to religious freedom.” Just seven years later, in signing a bill which requires states to recognize same-sex marriage should Obergefell ever be overturned, President Biden took a very different approach. If you’re not fully on board, you’re a bigot.
Biden’s litany of bigotry reads like an intersectionality checklist. “Racism, antisemitism, homophobia, transphobia — they’re all connected,” the president said. Racism is an ancient evil, from slavery to the KKK and beyond. What does enslavement and lynching have in common with opposition to experimenting on children confused about their gender by lying to them, chemically stunting their growth, sterilizing them, and removing healthy body parts? As recently as ten years ago, opposing medicalized gender transitions for minors was common sense. But in his speech, Biden called out “callous, cynical laws introduced in the states targeting transgender children, tarring families and criminalizing doctors who give children the care they need.”
Biden is a demagogic bully.
But not all the time.
Sometimes he's either delusional or an outright liar. Not sure which would be worse.
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Michael Graham has the Granite State angle on what your vanished cryto currency was up to: Hassan, NHDP Near Top of Bankman-Fried's Donation Target List.
New Hampshire Democrats are near the top of the list of accused fraudster Sam Bankman-Fried’s political favorites, receiving tens of thousands of dollars of donations from his allegedly stolen funds.
According to data from the Federal Election Commission, Sen. Maggie Hassan is tied for #6 on the list of campaign contribution recipients from the indicted crypto scammer and his FTX companies. Hassan and Michigan’s Sen. Debbie Stabenow were the top two individual recipients of Bankman-Fried’s largesse.
Looking at the FEC link above, SBF's contributions were 99.4% to Democrats.
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And not that it matters, but our local TV station reports some unexpected accusations of skulduggery: NH man accused of being part of Russian smuggling ring.
A Merrimack man is facing federal charges after he was accused of being part of a Russian smuggling ring.
At a hearing Tuesday in federal court in Concord, Alexey Brayman had bail set at a $150,000 unsecured bond. He is also subject to a curfew and electronic monitoring.
Elsewhere, Brayman is identified as born in Kyiv, and holds Israeli citizenship. The charges involve shipping items that could be "used to help make nuclear and hypersonic weapons and in quantum computing."
Quantum!
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