I'll expand a little Easy....I'm not sure I can think of a single person I know that isn't benefiting from some government program right now. I'm a teacher so of course I don't want public education cut any. My parents are both receiving Social Security so if you took that away from them they would flip. I'm sure my grandmother is benefiting in some way from medicare (I know she gets prescriptions so I'm sure she is saving off some program).
One of my good friends is still in college and he is receiving student loans and sometimes grants from the government. Another one of my friends is in the Army Rangers and has done three tours. And one of my best friends runs a construction company that is basically only working right now because of the stimulus. Hell he's about as far right as possible, but loved the stimulus...it put money back in his pocket!
My ex-girlfriend had her kid on Head Start, and was getting government money for rent. I've had multiple friends on unemployment for stretches. I'm not sure I know ANYONE who isn't seeing some type of help from a government program.
And the thing is they would ALL flip if you took it away while it's benefiting them, or at least be against it if they had a vote on it. So like I said, Americans love to talk small government, but they aren't going to like it if you take away the parts that benefit them.
This is why cutting the national debt is so difficult. We've all grown to the point where we love the government stuff we get and we also think we shouldn't pay new taxes. It just can't work that way, you can't lower the debt without raising taxes, cutting spending, or some combination. We Americans LOVE to talk small government until we are blue in the face...but it damn sure better not effect or bottom line. And that isn't even something I'd say we should be faulted for...at the end of the day we're all looking out for number one to an extent right?
But what you say right there is the crux of the problem. People expect federal government to provide those services (which the fedaral government isn't entitled to by the constitution). But the money can't come from nowhere, and raising the taxes on the successful penalizes them, while rewarding those who are non-successful. If you've ever tried training a dog or raising children, you know what sort of results that gives you - a growth in failure, a stop in success. The cost of all of those programs as filtered through the ridiculous federal government is far more expensive than if the federal government shrank to nothing and the money stayed in private circulation. The stimulus bill created jobs at a cost of $270,000 per job because thats how the federal government rolls. If that same $270,000 had stayed in private circulation instead of the government touching it, it would have created at least 2-3 jobs instead.
Most unemployment comes from states, not federal government, only the ridiculous extensions come from federal government. And again both studies have found that after the first year on unemployment, people basically "give up" and have gotten used to living on that amount and no longer seriously try to find a job as well as the fact that if the federal government wasn't spending that money there would be more money in private industries to create jobs. And for every $1 that goes out in unemployment benefits from the federal government almost $2 has to come in.
What you are seeing and talking about is the continued growth of people expecting the world to owe them something just because a sperm and an egg met. And thats not reality, and doesn't work anywhere for any significant length of time. Watch the movie IOUSA.
[video=youtube;O_TjBNjc9Bo]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O_TjBNjc9Bo[/video]
This movie was done by the prior head of the Congressional Budget Office. An accountant, non partisan, and he makes no attempts at placing blame on anyone in particular, just blame in our outrageous spending. But he gives an accounting view of what will happen over the next 20 years if we don't drastically change how we do things. And not raising the debt ceiling is one way to force drastic changes today. Otherwise within 20-40 years tax rates across the board will have to more than double to JUST pay social security and the interest on the national debt without any other programs being funded at all. Rip the baindaid off today, stop kicking the can another generation down the road.