Jeffrey Anderson at The Weekly Standard reports that “Mandatory Spending to Exceed all Federal Revenues — 50 Years Ahead of Schedule”.

We have now gotten to the point . . . where if national defense, interstate highways, national parks, homeland security, and all other discretionary programs somehow became absolutely free, we’d still have a budget deficit. The White House Office of Management and Budget projects that in the current fiscal year (2011), mandatory spending alone will exceed all federal receipts. So even if we didn’t spend a single cent on discretionary programs, we still wouldn’t be able to balance our budget this year — let alone pay off any of the $14 trillion in debt that we have already accumulated.

For the full article, please click here.