Gilbert Gutknecht: “It is interesting that some of our colleagues, who like to quote our Founding Fathers when it fits their purposes, tend…”

“It is interesting that some of our colleagues, who like to quote our Founding Fathers when it fits their purposes, tend to forget that when Jefferson said that, he did not just mean it for those people in those times. He meant it for all people and for all times. I think he understood the corrosive effect that the debt would have. I think your chart is instructive. The unfortunate thing is, particularly when we add in what is going to happen with the demographic change, and I have told people this story. I was born in 1951. When I graduated from college, the speaker at our commencement address was the Director of the U.S. Census. Most people do not remember their college commencement addresses and I do not remember all of it, either, but I do remember some of the points that were made that day. He said that there were more kids born in 1951 than any other single year. I represent the peak of the baby boomers. What is going to happen when we start to retire makes that chart look like a day at the park, because as the baby boomers start to retire, all of a sudden Medicare expenses go up dramatically, Social Security goes from a significant surplus to huge deficits, and what it is saying, this should be a siren song for all of us, that we have got to do something now.…”