Before Republicans, like Jeb Hensarling...

...of Texas, get too hot and bothered by President Obama's budget for 2011, they should remember:

...that most of that $3.8 trillion, nearly $2.4 trillion, is for mandatory spending — on programs like Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security and for interest on the national debt. Medicare and Medicaid alone will cost $788 billion; that should be another reminder of why the country needs health care reform.

Two points on this are: (1) the American health care system will not magically reform itself; and (2) prepare yourself for a European-style (I know that hurts), federal value-added tax.

A VAT would be regressive--it takes more in percentage terms from the incomes of the poor--but it is also a money machine. Lawrence Summers, Obama's chief economic advisor, once said that the U. S. will adopt a VAT when liberals figure out that it is a money machine and conservatives realize that it is regressive.