One can read and hear about the federal government’s mounting debt and increasingly dire financial outlook in a variety of places. The annual Social Security and Medicare Trustees report, which painted a bleak future for Social Security and Medicare on Monday, is one. Speeches by Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke and Comptroller General David Walker are even more eye-opening, and depressing.
For those who want a little laughter with their tears, Christopher Buckley’s new novel, Boomsday, is a must read. It’s a comic take on that most hilarious of all topics — generational warfare, the likely consequence of the nation’s fiscal irresponsibility.
But one place not to bother looking for leadership on these issues is the presidential campaigns. The solutions are so unpleasant that candidates fear they’ll be punished for delivering the bad news. Never mind that the crisis will begin to arrive in 2016, in what would be the next president’s second term.
