Yesterday morning on CBS, James Baker was interviewed about a number of issues including the escalation of war threats between the idiot in the White House and the idiot running North Korea. The issue he focused on, though?  The “ticking debt bomb”.  He warned of the unsustainable level of debt that is almost 100% of GDP (a measure used by economists), asserting that we must cut “entitlements” to get it under control.  I asked myself, “Is that really true?”  I’ve taken a simpleton’s approach to this question, just using math, not political spin.  For the purpose of this discussion, I’m going to ignore defense and other discretionary spending – that’s a whole other kettle of fish and a subject for a future post, probably after I’ve been drinking.

So I looked at a couple of things:  First, I assume entitlements to Baker mean Social Security (more…)