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Jan. 3, 2025 - Ron Paul Liberty Report
24:23
Will The Debt Hit $50 Trillion Under Trump?

As the emotions of last year’s election fade away, homeostasis is kicking in. The pull of the status quo gets stronger with each passing day. The results of the election were crystal clear. American voters want “America First.” But American voters are in perpetual competition with donors that want “American Empire First” and “American Megastate First." The two are not the same. They are mutually exclusive. It must be one or the other.

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Why We Left Biden 00:12:10
Hello, everybody, and thank you for tuning in to the Liberty Report.
With us today, we have Chris Rossini, our co-host.
Chris, welcome to the program.
Happy New Year, Dr. Paul.
Great to be with you.
Very good.
I hope it stays a happy new year because there was a lot of optimism back in November when it was decided that we had had enough of Biden and the Biden family and dirty politics.
We don't like that.
So we're glad they're going.
But is there anybody lurking in the dark and still promoting some of those same ideas?
Well, tell you what, I think we better continue to worry about spending because even though there's a lot of good intentions in Washington and it's improved with the election, for some reason, I think the task is huge and we have to deal with that.
And we talked to Chris a little while ago about an article that said was talking about the deficit and what might happen in the Trump years.
And they're predicting that it's going to go up $4 billion, up to $51 trillion, you know, in four years.
So I wouldn't bet all my money on exactly what it's going to be like in four years because conceivably explosion of problems can occur.
Something might happen a lot sooner than that.
And maybe something will come about that some of these reforms are passed and allow us to limp along a little further.
But we have a long way to go.
And that's why we partner with Birch Gold Group, because they know about this.
And we've talked with them.
We've worked with them over several years now with the idea that the stock market and the regular markets probably blown up a bit and that gold is still a good haven.
It's been around for a long time and we still believe that is the case.
And I certainly endorse that idea.
So we work with Birch Gold because they offer a solution for some people that might want to protect themselves with gold, but find out that they can't put bullion gold in the IRAs.
So they understand the legal aspect of taking your 501k, 401ks, money and stocks and putting them over into a gold IRA.
And then you get this protection.
It's not overly complicated, but it's nice to have some help.
And what Birch Gold has offered is some free information.
So if you're interested in getting this free information, how you might get involved this way, you text Ron 989898.
And that will connect you to Birch Gold.
And they will send you some materials to help you get started and understand exactly how it works.
So if you're interested in getting that material to find out how you might be able to, you know, get protection in gold bullion in an IRA account, which generally is not available to you unless you have this special IRA account.
So if you're interested in the information, text Ron, 989898, and they'll send you material and there will be no cost for getting this material.
So we will now talk with Chris and some more because that's our problem.
We've been looking at this and I think it's, I always argue whether you're trying to stay out of war or staying out of depressions or staying out of inflation.
I tell you what, it's much better and easier and not as painful if you just prevent it from happening.
But bad policy brings this about.
Bad policy gets us involved in entangling alliances and wars.
And bad economic understanding gets us involved with too much debt.
You know, the effort for government, the special interest to lobby government, all these things add up.
And so it's a long way from preventing it.
We've created it.
Our government, our people have created it.
But what we sense when they're starting talking about a $36 trillion deficit going up to $50 trillion, that means they ought to pay attention.
And that's what we want to do today.
I want to start off by saying I'd like prevention in medicine.
That was certainly the case.
Prevent stuff from happening and disease and occurring.
It's a lot better than trying to get people better.
That's a bigger job.
But there's, and that's the way it is in economics and government.
We should prevent it.
And good policy could prevent us from getting involved overseas and getting us involved in inflation and depressions.
But I think that the big issue says that as we march along and trying to get back to some soundness, that there's a lot of technical analysis.
Do this, raise this tax, lower this, have a tariff, and many technical things and cut here and cut there.
And some of that might help to a degree, but I don't think that's the answer.
I think the answer has to come from a more, not a technical change, but a strategic change, a strategic change into monetary policy, you know, like sound money and following the Constitution.
Balanced budget, like would make a lot of good sense, like staying out of the internal affairs of other nations.
That makes a lot of sense.
And those would be strategic, but they're ingrained.
There's a lot of special interest, a lot of people making money on it, and they're charging it off to the middle class and the poor.
You'd think we'd do a better job in winning all of the middle class over.
But I would say there's a hint of that happening with his last campaign.
And I think Trump has touched on this, and that's why there's some support out there.
But I'm going to continue to emphasize the difference between a technical change, which helps maybe, versus a strategic change, which more simply said, just follow the Constitution and we'd get along a lot better.
Chris?
That's right, Dr. Paul.
Yeah, we read a headline that's not very good.
Defaults, credit card defaults are up 50%.
I think it's the highest since 2010, I believe, is what I read.
And, you know, the American people are a reflection of the government.
The government lives on credit that it can't pay.
And the American people live on credit that they can't pay.
This is a sick economic and monetary system.
To say we're going into a golden age, which I keep reading, is we have to get out of the hole first if it's even possible.
And this is not to rag on the American people who are defaulting.
This is a consequence of big government.
My grandparents, which is not too long ago, I remember my grandparents, they did not live like this.
They paid for what they had.
And if you can't pay for it, you don't buy it.
And they lived, you know, on one income.
Two incomes wasn't even thought of.
It didn't even come into the equation.
Today, two incomes is not enough and people are defaulting on credit.
So we live in a sick economic system, period.
And it doesn't really look like things are going to improve.
The first thing out of Trump's mouth I hear is you got to raise the debt limit immediately.
I mean, that's the wrong way.
You know, we have to go.
I don't want, we shouldn't have to hear about that anymore.
But that's so that's the way it's going.
It's not good.
And we could perhaps end up at 50 trillion in four years, which would be bad.
That means our decline would just accelerate.
But that's what has to happen.
And I've argued the case that debt and malinvestment has to be liquidated to get a new healthy, clean start.
And when you're wallowing in debt and too much spending, if you don't stop, the things get worse.
And I think we're in the middle of an effort to try to shift that back to a more sensible procedure.
On that article that we looked at on Zero Hedge, I want to just quote some things there.
U.S. credit card defaults have surged to their highest level since 2008.
So it's in recent years and have written off $46 billion in delinquent balances in the first nine months of 2024.
That's a couple dollars, a little bit of change there, and a 50% increase from last year.
So it's there.
It's ongoing.
And the fact that, yeah, Chris, you bring this up, credit card, it's part of, well, the government does it.
Why can't we do it?
Well, one thing is, is sometimes, you know, somebody's going to get lost and not bailed out.
But I think in many ways, they're always trying to bail them out because when the banks get into trouble, they get bailed out.
So indirectly, they're picking things up where the investors and the depositors have gone astray.
So it's something that will happen, but can they handle that before it gets much, much worse?
So I think, Chris, your point about maybe how our parents and even my parents that went through the depression, they had to live through that, but they didn't live through it by thinking that, you know, what we did has to spend a lot more money.
I think I remember my dad buying his first automobiles in the 30s, you know, they're several hundred dollars.
And he couldn't conceive of taking a note out for a car.
You saved your money and then you paid for it.
And, you know, I don't know whether they still do it, but there used to be use of the layaway.
So you couldn't pay for the whole thing.
So I'll keep buying it.
You keep the product and lay it away.
You can't sell it until I pay the bill.
But now they beg and plead for you to take it and sign up on here.
And, you know, on the pavement, the paperwork initially looks pretty good.
Oh, we just sold this and now we have an asset.
They owe us all this money.
But then it ends.
The markets are powerful.
And that's what the problems that we have today, the market's telling us we've overstepped our bonds.
We overspent.
We have too much debt.
And we have to shift gears.
There's a sincere effort to try to change this.
But I tell you what, right now, I'm going to encourage it.
I'm going to give them a few hints on what I think should be done.
But I'm not sitting back thinking, oh, oh, the battle has been won.
We're okay.
We've solved our problem.
And over the years, when there'd be dips in the economy, the government would come and lower the interest rates and spend some money.
And the economy did seem to perk up.
I think we're past this.
I think we're past that point where it's going to perk up, even though still the radio and television and financial reports are making it sign.
Well, it's not all that bad.
Well, I think the notion that we're talking about a $50 trillion national debt, That is a serious thing, and it's not going to go away unless we do the thing that I suggest.
Look at this strategically and not like a little technical changes here and there, because it won't change otherwise.
And that's what we've been involved in at the Liberty Report: try to emphasize the necessity of bringing about a free society where people ran the show and not the bureaucrats who made all the money and dumped the bills onto the people they claim they were helping.
Covid's Impact on Property Rights 00:05:26
Absolutely, Dr. Paul.
I'll move on to our next topic, which could end up being the budget buster, and that's immigration.
And one thing we have to keep in mind is this immigration problem is 100% a government-created problem.
They made this problem for our country.
And I'm getting concerned about what the solutions may be and what's it going to cost.
I mean, today I read a message from Donald Trump saying, I said many times during rallies and elsewhere that radical Islamic terrorism and other forms of violent crime will become so bad in America that it will become hard to even imagine or believe.
And quote when I read that, I almost, you know, because I know how government reacts.
Their solutions are, they come after the American people.
They crack down on our privacy, they crack down on our freedom, all for a problem that they created themselves.
And COVID was a perfect example of this.
The American people didn't create COVID, that was a manufactured problem.
But the American people surely paid for COVID with masks that were unnecessary, with jabs that didn't work, with lockdowns that were unnecessary, with social distancing that was made up.
These were all of government solutions to the problem that they created.
So this is a concern.
God forbid there's more attacks.
How will government react?
And, you know, there's people that want wars.
You know, will Trump, who did not get us into wars and promised no wars, you know, what if they want another war over this?
And that, forget about it, we'll hit $50 trillion in no time because these wars that they start, they'll last 20 years.
You could kiss the next 20 years goodbye.
So this is a problem.
People, the American people need to be vigilant and alert, and I hope they will be.
You know, in our early years of our country, we were pretty darn generous with immigration, but we had some rules.
It was that you had to be responsible to yourself.
You had to have a sponsor.
You had to take care of yourself.
You weren't going to be bribed.
You weren't going to be looked at as a new vote coming in to vote for their socialism and all that stuff.
What wasn't going on?
And it worked rather well.
But I think what's happened now is a special interest.
We have decided to subsidize it for political reasons and the pretense of a humanitarian reason.
So they offered all these things.
They get free illegal, illegal immigrants can displace veterans and other Americans who are paying the bills and they get moved into their hotels and all this attention and getting the free food.
It's just horrendous.
No wonder that, and fortunately, the American people finally started waking up like they did under COVID.
But there's been a lot of harm done.
I think the solution would have been, you know, the prevention would have been a lot better than this solution that we have to work so hard at.
And the prevention would be, I think the country should have a model, something what similar to what a property owner has, a house owner, an owner that has their family in their house.
And most states, not all of them, will say, you protect your house.
People can't come in.
They can't knock on the door and sometimes not even knock on a door.
And the policeman comes and says, well, here's a family of 12 people.
You have a couple of extra bedrooms.
We're putting these people in your house and we'd like you to feed them and clothe them because you have something and they have nothing.
They've just come here, have nothing.
And they invade it.
Well, nobody, that would wake up people pretty darn fast, but that is not as, but essentially they do that, but they do it in a collective sense.
They come over by the millions and nobody checks who they are.
You know, and exactly what they do.
And they find out, you know, a couple criminals slipped in here and they're committing a lot of crimes.
And it's unreal.
But if we thought of everybody coming in, because even when they come in as a group, a large group encouraged by our government, they're still invading the private owner and our citizens here at home because they have to pay.
They have to get in lines.
Their schools deteriorate.
They have the big problems.
So they pay the price.
It's, you know, economically and philosophically the same as if they were pushed in your house.
It's except they keep it calm.
Oh, well, we're doing this for humanitarian reasons.
You have to help and pay your share.
But if it's private property, they wouldn't come into your house.
So this whole idea that we can collectively steal the money from the people, open up the gates, let them all come in and don't even check and find out how they're going to take care of no sponsors, no jobs or whatever.
It doesn't doesn't make any sense.
People say, yeah, you're heartless.
You're a heartless, hardcore libertarian.
Well, I'll tell you what, what we have today is a consequence of being one of these sophisticated do-gooders who would take care of them and be open to open borders.
Why We Refuse 00:06:39
That sounds very friendly.
You were going to put a fence around your place?
I think people have been putting fences around their houses.
Guess what?
They still do.
It's the rich people who write all these laws.
They still have their fences around and they don't put any illegal immigrants into the gated communities.
So all these things are waking up the people.
I just hope that when the solutions come, people look at this strategically or on principle, like on private property and who's paying the bills.
And I think it would be much better than just saying, well, we just have to print more money and run up the debt and spend the debt limit and all these things.
That's not going to work.
That's going to mean that maybe 50 trillion is a low estimate on what it'll be like in four years.
That's right, Dr. Paul.
I will finish up with my closing thoughts.
Now that the election emotions have subsided, we are faced now with the pull of maintaining the status quo.
And you can see that the rhetoric has changed, that you don't really hear about Doge that much anymore.
It was all over the place before.
And this is normal.
This is what happens.
You know, it's kind of like when you go on a diet, you lose weight, you exercise, and then you get lax and the weight comes back really fast.
So we are contending with the biggest government on earth, and they are expecting to maintain this.
And that once the emotions are gone for the election, months have passed, people have forgotten, and you just go back to business.
And we're seeing it today.
Trump is, he wants Mike Johnson.
This is going to be a big win for the Republican Party to have Mike Johnson as speaker again.
And we're going to have Marco Rubio.
We could go on.
Everybody knows the slide backwards that we've seen since November.
But no matter what happens with the Trump administration, nothing has happened yet.
He hasn't made one decision yet officially.
So we can't poo-poo it.
I am happy and proud of the American people because this election was won by appealing to the Americans' good instincts, to the spirit of America.
That's how Trump won.
Now, regardless of how he governs, it shows us that our country is not lost on the country level, us, the people.
It was very exciting to see the libertarian principles that were embraced.
Now, maybe it was embraced for votes.
Who knows?
We'll see.
But in any case, those libertarian principles appealed to the American people.
And that, I think, is a very positive sign for our country.
We live under an abusive government.
It's our lot at this point, but things can change.
But seeing that the American people still respond to good ideas, I think is something to be celebrated.
There's a lot of politicking going on as we speak because we don't have a speaker decided upon.
In the next day or two, maybe we will.
And that will cause a lot of problems, but they also have to raise the debt limit, which I think is all fake because I think in a quiet way, they can spend all they want because they have access to the banking community.
They can extend loans.
They have the Federal Reserve.
They can print money.
And sometimes I just think this debt limit, raising the date limit is sort of a distraction from what's really going on and why that isn't enough.
We have to look at the monetary system.
But the other thing that's going on is that the foreign policy, we mentioned that a little bit, but it's a big deal.
And it was involved in this last campaign because Trump took this position that we shouldn't start wars and we should end wars.
And that's great.
And also, there's these battles going on in Ukraine and the Middle East.
Ukraine, I get disgusted with it because 99 times out of 100, if you hear anything on regular news, it's Russia started it all.
They're responsible for it all.
And they invaded.
And they never wants the responsibility of NATO, United States, and our money and the taxpayers' money for getting that started.
But that's still coming because we've had some violence expressed here just recently.
Oh, it was Hamas.
And Trump has thrown out some threat and told Hamas what they have to do or else before he's elected.
Well, I tell you what, yes, we should be out of there, but we should treat everybody equally.
And that is no benefits to either side that's fighting, no money to either side.
And now, look, after these $400 billion we sent to Ukraine, we're thinking that maybe even today, recently, as Biden's walking out the door, he's still passing billions of dollars for intervention on foreign policy.
But I think that that Middle East and Ukraine is still a big deal.
And a lot of money has been spent.
So we can concentrate on the speaker and the deficit limit, and we can tinker with CAT tax code.
But we better look at our foreign policy because it's the military and complex that I think sometimes makes most of the decisions in Washington, especially under the condition when we don't have a president that really is in charge of anything or even knows what's going on.
So that's a big problem.
So, but people should look not only at non-intervention in economics, having a sound currency and protecting our civil liberties, we should look at what would this society be like?
What would be a non-interventionist foreign policy?
We would mind our own business, be friends with everybody, trade with as many people as we can, and have a strong national defense, but not to be the policeman of the world, bankrupting our people and bringing us to this point where we are today, where total bankruptcy may really jeopardize our freedoms.
And that is our goal: to make sure that we can live in peace and prosperity, and that is possible.
But we have to change our views, our philosophic views, on what freedom is all about.
I want to thank everybody for tuning in today to the Liberty Report.
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