Did Obama increase the National Debt by ~$5T? Nooo.....

[LoveLife&Laughter]

Republican pundits love to say that the national debt has increased by $5 trillion because of President Obama. Factually, that statement is simply untrue. Let's examine the evidence.

Of the alleged $5 trillion, $1.6 trillion is related to costs of the Iraq/Afghanistan Wars. These were costs George W. Bush intentionally hid from the budget, and that President Obama allowed to be calculated when he assumed office.

Note that Obama could have continued to hide the bill as Bush did, passing it along to his successor.

President Bush was able to manipulate funding for the Iraq/Afghanistan wars using special emergency authorization bills. He did this because, as you recall, the Democrats were attempting to defund the war legislatively.

The overall point is simple: Obama, as president, authorized not one cent of that $1.6 trillion to be spent.

It has been previously reported by marketwatch.com that President Obama increased overall government spending by a smaller margin than any modern president, all the way to President Eisenhower.

[Lifesighs]

I would like to know where the 16 Trillion came from that went to the banks in this country and to all the other countries over a period from 2008 to 2012 from the Federal Reserve, all without congress approval. Is this part of the debt? If not how much does the Federal Reserve have that could be used to balance the budget?

[exedir]

The debt...well...is debt.  Notes in form of bonds mostly.  And yes, it gets tricky.  What we borrow and where we borrow is important and it is the Treasury that does it, issue debt.  And worse, we need debt and we need debt from the most reliable source and that is government, and no, it isn't just federal debt which is the problem.  It gets worse when you add in state and local debt into the entire "debt" crisis.  

Most of the borrowing occurs from the trust funds, Social Security and Medicare, debt we owe ourselves.  Debt is also owned by foreign countries.  The People's Republic of China owns about $3 trillion  or so, mostly used to finance Chinese goods bought by Americans.  The rest of the world owns US Treasuries because they are a good place to park money, mostly, excess dollars safely.   A small part of debt is own by state banks, private banks and other financial entities to park money, you see, no one wants to own cash except what is necessary for daily transactions.  Private individuals own some of the US debt but most of that is due to funds setup to buy and hold securities again in lieu of holding cash for a number of individuals as an investment. 

Overall, the US debt is still the root currency that holds up the international financial system.  However, at some point that has to change but not a even $16 trillion going on to $17 trillion or even beyond.  The whole scheme is based on the full faith and credit of the United States as an economy.