For a while now, I have been saying America is at a crossroads, or at a fork in the road, or stuck between a rock and a hard place.  But it appears with the debt numbers released on Wednesday, we are now standing at the edge of a cliff.

Reuters reports that:

“The U.S. debt will top $13.6 trillion this year and climb to an estimated $19.6 trillion by 2015…The total U.S. debt includes obligations to the Social Security retirement program and other government trust funds. The amount of debt held by investors, which include China and other countries as well as individuals and pension funds, will rise to an estimated $9.1 trillion this year from $7.5 trillion last year. By 2015 the net public debt will rise to an estimated $14 trillion…”

Yet, The Hill informs us that labor leaders actually want the government to spend more on their behalf, despite that fact that our national debt is at an all-time high:

“Lawmakers should not allow themselves to be held back by concerns over deficit spending, the leaders argued, as the best solution to bringing down the national debt is to create more jobs and raise consumer spending and government tax revenue.”

It’s not just “concerns” over deficit spending that have lawmakers worried, it’s the common sense knowledge that you can’t spend your way out of a spending problem.

In March, Moody’s warned both the US and the UK that stale growth in the economy and increasing unemployment rates would threaten our AAA credit rating:

“The pattern of growth and the high rate of unemployment raise the question of how strong the recovery will be going forward,” Moody’s said. “The ability of the U.S. economy to grow more rapidly and, therefore, for government revenues to contribute to fiscal consolidation, will have to depend on a revival in the growth of consumption.”

Our country is standing at the edge of a cliff, and meeting the demands of the unions will push us off.  The left can continue to ask for more money, more stimulus and more benefits, but commonsense must rule the day.  We cannot spend our way out of a spending problem. If we keep it up, we risk losing our National AAA credit rating which will spell certain disaster for every single American. It time to restore a sense of fiscal responsibility in Congress.