Could it be that John Snow, the new Secretary of the Treasury who replaced Paul O'Neill, played a little hanky-panky with the Treasury holding back on borrowing weeks before the close of fiscal 2003 and then going hog wild once the new 2004 fiscal year began on October first?

Remember, this is the same man who was in charge when the federal government hit its self-imposed debt limit on February 20, 2003, and went 92 days before doing anything about it. Not exactly a responsible thing for a federal government that set out to run a deficit of $304 billion in their budget and planned their discretionary spending around that figure.

States and local governments are still reeling from that one. Already suffering from a shortfall in tax receipts due to unemployment and underemployment, these local governments found themselves in even tighter constraints when the feds didn't come through with much of the promised money in everything from medical care to education.

Oh well, we ended up with a $555 billion increase to the national debt (the true deficit) in fiscal 2003 and maybe we can look forward to 666 (the mark of the beast) this year, proving that Mr. Snow may have a warped sense of humor.

Naturally, the loyal laugh-a-lot television people haven't covered any of this. They are content to give us Simple Simon explanations of how the economy is improving because parents are spending money for school clothes and supplies, stores are about to start hiring for the holiday season, and productivity is up because those with a job are working twice as hard to keep them.

The outsourcing sucking-sound has sent manufacturing jobs to cheaper nonunion labor in other countries and may be gone forever. With many of these jobs going to China where a population of one billion four hundred million and a labor force that dwarfs ours, what will happen when the standard of living for these workers rises? With only two or three percent of the Chinese population currently able to afford cars, what do you think will happen to peak oil when this percentage rises substantially?

While our kids were going to school to become lawyers, the Chinese were flooding hi-tech and engineering schools such as the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and the Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT). Now, China has become the third nation to put a man in space and improves constantly while our brains talk about "quantum leaps"—the smallest steps imaginable.

Defense is just about the only industry that isn't outsourcing. And the Pentagon complains that if they were restricted to a "buy American" policy their budget would have to be increased.

The object of the New World Odor is not simply to establish an American Empire but to level the playing field. The standard of living in nations like India, China, and others will rise while middle class America learns to get by with less.

Ask yourself this. If the federal government can borrow $50 billion in just a few working days, why is there so much argument and disagreement about $87 billion to rebuild Iraq, Afghanistan, and carry on the war against terrorism? Did anyone ask for your approval in borrowing the recent $51 billion so far this month or running up the national debt $555 billion last year?

Why aren't the same people screaming about that?