Paul McKain: Boyd and Congress need true PAYGO

Paul McKain: Boyd and Congress need true PAYGO

Tallahassee Democrat

February 25, 2010

On Feb. 4, Congress passed the Pay-As-You-Go (PAYGO) Act, which is supposed to bring fiscal responsibility back to Washington — "fiscal responsibility" in that money for additional spending cannot be borrowed but must be paid for by either increasing taxes or cutting spending elsewhere.

After the legislation passed, President Obama said, "Mandatory spending increases and tax cuts must be paid for; they're not free, and borrowing to finance them is not a sustainable long-term policy."

A key supporter of the PAYGO measure was Allen Boyd, one of my likely opponents in the upcoming 2010 election in Florida's second congressional district. In an article in the Tallahassee Democrat on Feb. 5, Mr. Boyd was quoted as saying, "This is a tremendous victory for the American people. For far too long, Washington avoided making the same tough financial decisions North Floridians are forced to make every day. But today we said enough is enough, and we've got to stop digging ourselves deeper into debt."

While I commend Mr. Boyd and President Obama for being proponents of the legislation, I would like to see them stand by their convictions and quite frankly stop paying lip service to the American people. The very same day PAYGO was passed, Congressman Boyd and many members of the House voted to increase the federal debt limit by 15 percent, from $12.4 trillion to $14.3 trillion, allowing us to continue borrowing money from many different sources, including the Chinese government, which is now our country's largest creditor.

Yes, like Congressman Boyd said, enough is enough, and we've got to stop digging ourselves deeper into debt. But how can he and our elected leaders tout financial responsibility in one vote, and then essentially disregard it in the next? It defies all common sense and logic. Do they really expect us to buy it? Do they think we won't notice?

In January 2009, our national debt was $10.3 trillion. In a little over a year, we increased that by 20 percent and are now at $12.4 trillion or $113,000 per taxpayer. What do we have to show for it? Not much. With Congress raising the debt limit (while ironically passing PAYGO), those numbers are not going down anytime soon. In fact, according to an article last month in USA Today, just to maintain our debt at current levels through 2050 the government would have to raise taxes 28 percent, cut spending 22 percent, or approve some combination of the two over the next 40 years. And that simply keeps us at the status quo. It doesn't even lower our debt.

Ladies and gentlemen, we have some hard choices to make. If you have not done so yet, it is time to start paying attention and think about the future of this great country. We can continue down this road and bankrupt our country in record time, or we can send people to Washington to make the hard decisions that need to be made, fight against out-of-control spending, and bring principles and common sense back to our government. Now is the time. What say you?