The U.S. debate over more government spending versus fiscal austerity is captivating the nation’s capital, dominating the airwaves and providing the best excuse in at least a millennium to recycle St. Augustine (“Lord, make me chaste, but not yet”).

What it has failed to do, with rare exception, is produce any viable alternatives. The choices are warmed-over Keynesian pump-priming or “passively waiting for disaster,” as Harvard University historian and business school professor Niall Ferguson put it on the July 4 edition of CNN’s “Fareed Zakaria GPS.”

Given President Obama's glaring domestic policy missteps, it is understandable that the public has largely been blinded to his foreign policy failings. In fact, these may have been even more damaging to America's future. He fought to reinstate Honduras's pro-Chávez president while stalling Colombia's favored-trade status. He castigated Israel at the United Nations but was silent about Hamas having launched 7,000 rockets from the Gaza Strip.

Let’s say you’re the leader of the free world. The economy is stuck in the doldrums. Naturally, you want to do something.

This weekend, on July 4, Americans celebrate the 234th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. Over the burgers and sweet corn, that’s always a good day to think about what, exactly, it means to be American. One of the best summaries I’ve heard lately came during a press teleconference Wednesday with someone who is not yet an American citizen. His native tongue is Arabic, thus the slip of syntax: “I think I became an American when I start to fight for liberty and freedom.”

"'Next year when I start presenting some very difficult choices to the country, I hope some of these folks who are hollering about deficits step up. Because I'm calling their bluff."

That was President Barack Obama, the heretofore unknown deficit hawk, all but announcing the other day the tax trap that he's been laying for Republicans. From what we hear about intra-GOP debates, more than a few will be happy to walk right into it.

A new poll finds that Republicans have increased their lead among independent voters. According to the latest Gallup survey, the GOP now leads Democrats by 12 points — 46 percent to 32 percent — among independents, a voting bloc that looks to be pivotal in determining the outcome of the November elections.
For Democrats, this is bad but not surprising news. Since March, the GOP has enjoyed an average 10-point lead among independents. Last month, Gallup found that independent voters believe the Democratic Party has become “too liberal.”

The administration's stimulus program has failed. Growth is slow and unemployment remains high. The president, his friends and advisers talk endlessly about the circumstances they inherited as a way of avoiding responsibility for the 18 months for which they are responsible.

But they want new stimulus measures—which is convincing evidence that they too recognize that the earlier measures failed. And so the U.S. was odd-man out at the G-20 meeting over the weekend, continuing to call for more government spending in the face of European resistance.

The 1974 Budget and Impoundment Act requires Congress to pass a budget resolution by May 15 of each year. Congress hasn’t done so yet in 2010. But that isn’t so unusual. Delays are common.

They are usually the result of interparty or intercameral disputes. But this year is different. Congressional Democrats aren’t simply delaying, they’re deliberately refusing to offer a budget until after the November elections. They’re simply choosing to ignore the law.

At this year's G-20 summit in Toronto, the world's leading economies sealed their fate. Rather than reach a consensus on the need for fiscal consolidation or for more aggressive fiscal stimulus, the assembled officials have, in scrupulously diplomatic and often hilariously vague language, agreed to disagree on the future direction of the global economy. The U.S. will continue to borrow vast sums in an effort to keep demand afloat, a policy that will aid exporters in Europe and East Asia and the oil-rich states of the Gulf.

PRINCETON, NJ -- Terrorism and federal government debt tie as the most worrisome issues to Americans when they consider threats to the future wellbeing of the U.S. Four in 10 Americans call each an "extremely serious" threat, with healthcare costs ranking a close third.