It would be fiscally irresponsible to raise the ceiling on the national debt from $8.1 trillion to $8.9 trillion, the junior senator from Illinois said when President George W. Bush wanted to do that in 2006. Raising the debt limit "is a sign of leadership failure," he said.  "Washington is shifting the burden of bad choices today onto the backs of our children and grandchildren." The national debt has doubled since 2006, but Barack Obama says now it would be fiscally irresponsible NOT to raise it.  For hypocrisy, this can't be topped.  But the president isn't the only hypocrite.  Nothing has generated as much posturing and grandstanding as the all too frequent votes to raise the debt ceiling.

The current debate about the debt vote is minor league compared to what will happen when the government literally cannot spend more than it is taking in. That time may be nearer than you think. It is true that the U.S. government can always "print" money to pay its bills, but at some point, printing more money becomes self-defeating because the resulting increase in the government bond interest rate and required interest payment will spiral out of control. At that point, the government will be forced to operate on a pay-as-you-go basis, as any individual or business is forced to do when they can no longer get credit. Several California cities are now in this situation. The U.S. government now receives about $200 billion a month in revenue and spends about $320 billion a month. Any responsible business or individual faced with a situation where receipts are only 60 percent of expenditures would make changes before their credit was cut off or, at the very minimum, have a plan for which bills to pay first -- but not the U.S. government. It appears that President Obama is once again going to produce a budget that assumes very high levels of deficit spending can go on forever. It also appears that Senate Democrats will continue to not bother to pass a budget. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is the ultimate spoiled child, accusing the taxpayers of engaging in child abuse by not giving him an unlimited allowance.

When you get to know people, you are, in part, building a reputation with each other. "What kind of person is he?" "How does she handle a difficult situation?" "What kind of attitude does he bring to his work?" "How does she respond to confrontation or adversity?" Over time, we learn whether a given person is honest, whether they can be relied upon, how playful they are, to what degree their actions reflect what they say. We get a sense of their style, their likes, and their dislikes. Here is a piece that is often missing: We watch ourselves just like we watch others, and we develop a reputation with ourselves accordingly.   This is the essence of earned self-esteem.  Here's how to increase yours.

This was an exceptionally busy week of spinning, posturing, grandstanding, lying, smearing and demagoguery as President Barack Obama sought to thwart Republican efforts to restrain the growth of federal spending; to impose new curbs on guns, and to win confirmation of his "in your face" Cabinet. It began with a news conference Monday (1/14) so remarkable for mendacity, hypocrisy and churlishness even Dana Milbank of the Washington Post and Maureen Dowd of the New York Times noticed. "The next time Mr. Obama holds a press conference, somebody should ask him to identify by name those who want to repeal Social Security, steal food from orphans and cancel science funding," said the Wall Street Journal. Fat chance of that. "The deeply unethical relationship between the White House and the Washington press corps ensures that nary a statement of Obama's will be subjected to questioning or scrutiny, much less the mockery that attends just about anything a Republican says," said Michael Walsh. * * * The president used children as props for his news conference Wednesday (1/16) calling for new gun control measures. Here's more on the infantile spectacle. But, said White House Press Secretary Jay Carney, it is "repugnant and cowardly" for the NRA to note his daughters have armed protection. * * * Nothing has generated as much posturing, grandstanding, and hypocrisy as Congress' now all too frequent votes to lift the ceiling on the national debt.  * * * Little illustrates Zero's "my way, or the highway" attitude better than his choices for his Cabinet. Jack Lew, slated to replace Turbo Tax Tim Geithner, may be the worst. * * * The French have intervened in Mali, where al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb" (AQIM) has established a larger base than al-Qaeda had in Afghanistan. With the French intervention, "the stage is set for another bitter, chaotic al-Qaida defeat," said my friend Austin Bay.  The harshness of Islamist rule will backfire, as it did in Iraq and Algeria, he thinks. But Walter Russell Mead wonders if another Dien Bien Phu looms.  Or another Afghanistan, frets the London Daily Mail. * * * "The shortest distance in modern politics is the one between a Republican willing to denounce his party for extremism and the set of a cable or Sunday morning talk show," says Artur Davis,

Will 2013 be a better year? A number of economic commentators have been saying the worst is behind us. I think they are wrong, and here is why. In most major countries, including the United States, government is growing faster than the private sector.

As Mitchell's Golden Rule explains, when the private sector grows faster than government, prosperity increases, and when government grows faster than the private sector, misery increases.

As can be seen in the accompanying table, in most of the major nations, debt-to-GDP ratios are increasing, because the deficits as a percentage of gross domestic product (GDP) are greater than economic growth -- meaning these countries are getting deeper in the hole each year.  The US is one of them.

China has threatened Japan, the Philippines and Vietnam with war over islands in the South China Sea which under international law belong to Japan, the Philippines and Vietnam. China has built up its military forces opposite Taiwan, even though the new Taiwanese government  seeks closer ties to Beijing. China is building up military forces along its border with India, India's intelligence service reported in July. If that weren't saber rattling enough, "China will not hesitate to protect Iran even with a third world war," a Chinese general said last month. China bullies its neighbors because it can, most analysts think. "Beijing is deploying superior power in an effort to repeal basic geometry and clearly written treaty law," wrote James Holmes, a professor of strategy at the U.S. Naval War College.  "Learn to love Big Brother, Southeast Asia." There could be a very different reason for Chinese bellicosity.