Why I, a Liberal, Worry About the Federal Debt

 Most liberals these days don't worry about the debt.  Even Kevin Drum, whose view I mostly follow, is rather blase about it.  So why do I worry?

One word: history.

I've lived throughabout a third of the life of the nation, which included some big increases in the debt, some severe inflation, and lots of changes.  Lessons I've learned:

• nothing lasts forever--the fact that inflation has been low, contrary to expectations of economists and conservative debt hawks, for many years doesn't mean it will always be low.
• inflation causes problems--it works for those with real assets, like homeowners, but not for people like those receiving aid from the government. 
• rising inflation rates leads to rising interest rates, which can rapidly eat up all flexibility in government budgets.  (See Clinton--whose 1992 program was killed by the bond traders.)

If we go on adding debt, it's like living at the foot of a mountain.  It snows on top of the mountain and the drifts build up.  But everyone says it's okay, it's been years since the last avalanche. So people build more houses at the foot of the mountain, and each time it snows there's no avalanche.  Comes the day when there is an avalanche and all the houses are wiped away.

Bottom line, I remember the 1950's, and 1960's when the Dem economists thought they had things figured and inflation was low enough.  Then Vietnam war heated up, debt increased, and money got tight.  We struggled through years of fighting inflation.  LBJ's Great Society dreams were sacrificed as a result.