E-Newsletter No. 77                     May 2020     

As we mentioned last month, we are starting a series of newsletters about What’s Wrong with the Federal Government.  This month, we take a look at the Legislative Branch (aka Congress) aka the House of Representatives and Senate.  Unfortunately (and as we anticipated) the list of issues is extensive, and we also want to provide our Editorial Board’s recommendations on what We-the-People can do about it.  Therefore, we have added the following new Conversation Piece to our website (on our “Join the Conversation” page) –

http://www.f2ppr.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Whats-Wrong-with-the-Legislative-Branch.pdf

In our opinion, many of the laws that have been passed by Congress have created many of the problems we see with the federal government.  And in a few instances, the legislative branch has failed to do what it needs to do.

Congress has passed many laws over the years that have enabled the federal government to grow well beyond its enumerated powers.  Our elected representatives, who pledge to uphold the Constitution, have been the worst violators of the Tenth Amendment, which states that  “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively or to the people.” 

As we discuss in our analysis of the legislative branch, Article 1 specifically states that “The Congress shall have Power to lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts [etc.]…..”

Our federal government has allowed its “on-book” debt to rise to $24.9 trillion as of May 1st.  In addition, the “off book” liabilities for Social Security, Medicare, and other “entitlements” are multiples of this amount.  The cumulative historical dysfunction of Congress represents an abject failure of our country’s “leaders”.

US Debt Clock – – April 1st – $71,888 per citizen / May 1st – $75,432