U.S. debt should be top presidential issue
As we enter the final six months of the presidential campaign season, one thing is clear: It’s all about the money—the national debt, the coming Social Security and Medicare crisis, and the tax structure and tax rates.
The current budget deficits are not sustainable for much longer. In years to come, the daily bond sales to finance our government deficits will get wilder when it becomes clear to investors that the interest payments on our debt are the biggest budget item. Markets will demand higher interest rates, and the downward spiral will accelerate.
The Trump solution is to let the death spiral continue and let someone else clean up the mess. Biden has attempted to swim against the current and tinker at the margins of the problem. Everyone has skin in the game: the investors, current and future retirees, pension funds and the economy of the entire world.
Will Americans choose a responsible path in November? It looks to me like Uncle Sam better get used to standing in a corner with a tin cup; most people have their heads buried in the sand.
BOB LOWTHER, DALLAS
Scientists positioned to help us through changing climate
Thank goodness for the creativity of our scientists and engineers. As climate and other environmental disasters confront us, they are in a position to save us from our fossil fuel ways.
As reported in the AJC, EVs are getting cheaper than gasoline-powered cars. They might also become a solution to storing renewable electricity with their batteries as part of the electric grid.
Also, the Environmental Defense Fund is preparing for the worst case by initiating studies of geoengineering to save us if we fail to adopt scientific solutions to climate change soon enough.
Believe in science, not special interests and those politicians that they buy. The world’s progress in almost every aspect of life owes its success to those who innovate and seek the truth.
JOHN SHACKLETON, ATLANTA
