Path: bloom-picayune.mit.edu!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!americast.com!americast.com!americast-post Newsgroups: americast.insight From: americast-post@AmeriCast.Com Organization: American Cybercasting Approved: americast-post@AmeriCast.com Subject: CORRESPONDENCE Date: Mon, 16 Nov 92 13:30:17 EST Message-ID: \SE CORRESPONDENCE \HD U.S. Must Look Inward for Solution to Debt I believe Michael Rust, in "Trashing Waste in Government" [Oct. 26], has not gone far enough. The Grace Commission in 1984 found $1.9 trillion (not $424 billion) in potential annual savings by 2000. And government waste is only part of the American malaise. If the information found in Bankruptcy 1995, the recent book cowritten by Harry E. Figgie Jr. (a cochairman of the Grace Commission), is accurate, individual income taxes won't even cover the cost of interest payments on the federal debt that year, and that is perhaps the "good" news. I am afraid that we Americans have only ourselves to look to for the cause of our present economic woes. To hope to reverse our misfortunes, we must look honestly at our lack of political interest, our reverence for self-interest and material greed, our penchant for casting blame, our mistaken notion that we can do nothing wrong and our misguided belief that someone or something else will come to save our beleaguered land. Rick Wiesenfeld North Hollywood, Calif. The $1.9 trillion figure cited by Mr. Wiesenfeld is simply an extrapolation from the $424 billion figure mentioned in the story as the three years' worth of savings that the January 1984 Grace Commission report predicted from implementation of its recommendations - Ed. Write: Insight, Correspondence Editor, 3600 New York Ave. N.E., Washington, D.C. 20002. Fax: (202) 529-2484. Please include an address and a daytime phone number. Letters may be edited for space. This article is copyright 1992 The Washington Times. Redistribution to other sites is not permitted except by arrangement with American Cybercasting Corporation. For more information, send-email to usa@AmeriCast.COM