Time to grow up. We're all in this financial mess together

Here we are, a week after the debt deal and drop in credit rating, and the markets are still crashing because we still haven't gotten our act together. It is time for leaders of both parties to get together and actually explain, without any blame or rancor, what our projected revenues and expenses really are -- best case scenario and worst case scenario -- for the next decade or two so we can really decide what benefits to cut and what revenues to increase. It is not a political issue, it is a survival issue for the nation and as soon as we realize that and stop the partisan silliness and work together, the better we, and the economy especially, will be. There is going to be pain no matter what happens. Lets be honest about the sacrifices that will need to be made and share it, that includes, but should not be limited to, upper-income tax payers such as including well off retirees.

We've known for years that paying generous benefits to the elderly while incurring obligations to the future was going to cause a problem when the baby boomers began to retire -- which is now. The way things are presently, the benefits scheduled to go to this generation of retirees is going to destroy the younger generations' ability to cover that, school for their children, their own retirements plus actually spend money to get the economy moving again. The country can't survive that, especially when the lower middle classes, uneducated and unskilled due to school cuts, begin to riot like they are doing in England where anarchy reigns in some neighborhoods and will cost businesses much money.

Tax hikes alone won't work. Neither will benefit cuts alone (well actually that would work but it would be very painful for those already retired and unable to re-enter the work force). Happy days are not here right now and will not be again unless we and especially our leaders grow up like our grandparents did during the Depression and WW2 and tackle this problem that looms over our nation's future. Unfortunately I don't think our leaders will have the backbone and courage to actually tell we the people that we are at war with our spending and debt to encourage us to mobilize to fight it before it is too late.