U.S. nears $10 Trillion in the red

Congress just raised the limit once again, and the U.S. debt nears $10 trillion.

That's comes out to about $30,000 for every American.

For the fifth time since 2001, Congress is raising the debt limit, increasing it by $850 billion to $9.815 trillion. That's $9,815,000,000,000.00.

According to the folks who follow this stuff closely, the national debt has been rising by an average of $1.36 billion per day since September of last year.

Congress has an easy solution to deal with the rising tide of red ink. Instead of fretting over it, members simply allow the government to borrow more money, much to the consternation of some critics.

Sen. Kent Conrad, D-N.D., who heads the Senate Budget Committee, said the United States is ''in hock'' to Japan, owing more than $600 billion, and China, owing more than $400 billion.

He said the rising debt comes at the worst possible time, right before a flood of baby boomers retires, but that Congress has no choice but to raise the debt ceiling.

''If we fail to act in a timely way on raising the debt limit, the creditworthiness of all United States instruments would be called into question,'' Conrad said. "That could have a very severe effect on already shaky financial markets.''

[Excerpt of an article by Rob Hotakainen, McClatchy News Service]