"Our national debt continues to rise, and there's no end in sight," Sen. Rand Paul (R-Kentucky) tweets. "Washington needs to get serious about cutting wasteful spending. Our children and grandchildren's future depends on it."
Our national debt continues to rise, and there’s no end in sight. Washington needs to get serious about cutting wasteful spending. Our children and grandchildren’s future depends on it. https://t.co/MEU38X7SZk
— Rand Paul (@RandPaul) August 17, 2025
The national debt must be addressed. More than $37 trillion in total U.S. public debt outstanding is a problem. That problem will continue until steps are taken to deal with it. As it grows at an increasingly steep pace, the problem becomes more burdensome, and what is needed to deal with it becomes more overwhelming.
A ballooning national debt has been a problem for many years. Too few politicians and elected leaders have discussed how to practically and actually deal with the problem, and too few have allocated political capital toward practically and actually dealing with it. The national debt debate should be a top political priority, and there should be a vigorous ongoing debate about what significant measures should be taken to rein it in. The center of the national debt debate should not be whether or not to do anything about the problem. The debt debate should not be about whether modest or significant measures should be taken to deal with it. The debate should concern what significant measures, policies that will unequivocally reduce the national debt, are most appropriate to deal with the problem. The national debt bill will eventually be paid. The longer it is allowed to grow at an already steeper pace, the more expensive that bill becomes.
Democrats seem oblivious, based on the agenda they push, to the reality that government-growing policies trickle down to individuals, families, and businesses. Democrats spend government dollars. They campaign making no secret of their intention to spend, and in office they continue to push an agenda filled with government spending. One of the first steps (if not the first) to deal with the national debt problem is the cessation of reckless spending. The national debt elephant can be eaten one bite at a time, which is one cut of egregiously wasteful spending at a time. These days, it is rare, though not unanimously unaddressed, to hear a Democrat offer as much as lip service to the need to eliminate wasteful spending, to the need to balance the federal budget, or to the need to rein in the national debt. The Democrat agenda contravenes the steps that need to be taken to address the national debt, yet Democrats continue to win elections. There is a gigantic gulf between where the national debate should center, as outlined in the preceding paragraph, and where it too often falls.
We cannot as a nation continue to spend recklessly. It is an affront to those who founded the nation based on a prudent set of practical virtues. It is an affront to those who contribute and have contributed monetarily to our nation through taxation, which has resulted in less take-home pay from work; a higher bill when making a purchase; less opportunity per captial when investing; and other reductions. It is also an affront to the next generation (posterity) of Americans who will consequently be left with a larger financial burden.
One of the most significant harms inflicted by out-of-control government spending is the devaluation of government spending. The wasteful spending renders other dollars spent by the government, which might be allocated toward a useful project or initiative, literally worth-less.
There are other issues that are just as pressing and present just as much potential for cataclysm. There is, though, no more urgent problem facing the U.S. today than out-of-control government spending. The fix-it can for that problem has already been kicked miles down the road.
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