the debt ceiling drama - ron paul, page-10

Ron Paul is definitely loopy - he wants to stop funding governments (but wants to stay employed by the government himself, so presumably he approves of some taxes). Re the unfunded liabilities, it apparently does stand at $61 trillion. (Not dissimilar to the 'black holes' that led to the creation of the Future Fund - and got quite a few local councils into some strife because they did not adequately plan for retirements, retrenchments, superannuation and long service leave.), It's a problem but not the immediate or biggest problem the US economy faces. The most immediate problem is default. As explained in USA Today:

The federal government's financial condition deteriorated rapidly last year, far beyond the $1.5 trillion in new debt taken on to finance the budget deficit, a USA TODAY analysis shows.

The Capitol in Washington, D.C., is seen with a marble chimera rhyton that stands in front of the Rayburn House Office Building in the foreground.
The government added $5.3 trillion in new financial obligations in 2010, largely for retirement programs such as Medicare and Social Security. That brings to a record $61.6 trillion the total of financial promises not paid for.

This gap between spending commitments and revenue last year equals more than one-third of the nation's gross domestic product.
Medicare alone took on $1.8 trillion in new liabilities, more than the record deficit prompting heated debate between Congress and the White House over lifting the debt ceiling....The $61.6 trillion in unfunded obligations amounts to $528,000 per household. That's more than five times what Americans have borrowed for everything else ? mortgages, car loans and other debt. It reflects the challenge as the number of retirees soars over the next 20 years and seniors try to collect on those spending promises.

"The (federal) debt only tells us what the government owes to the public. It doesn't take into account what's owed to seniors, veterans and retired employees," says accountant Sheila Weinberg, founder of the Institute for Truth in Accounting, a Chicago-based group that advocates better financial reporting. "Without accurate accounting, we can't make good decisions."

Michael Lind, policy director at the liberal New America Foundation's economic growth program, says there is no near-term crisis for federal retirement programs and that economic growth will make these programs more affordable.

"The false claim that Social Security and Medicare are about to bankrupt the United States has been repeated for decades by conservatives and libertarians who pretend that their ideological opposition to these successful and cost-effective programs is based on worries about the deficit," he says.