Once again, just a few short weeks from now, Congress will need to authorize another increase in its self-imposed spending limit in order to put us further into debt to be able to continue making payments on our existing debts.

It’s called raising the debt ceiling. Remember that from this time last year?

And if Congress has to borrow more money this year in order to make the increased payments on the money it had to borrow last year to make the payments on the money it borrowed in the previous year, doesn’t it stand to reason that next year we’ll have to borrow more money to make the payments on the money we’re about to borrow this year?

It’s enough to make your head hurt. Or your stomach sick.

No ongoing entity, not a business, family or government, can survive financially if it continues to spend more than it makes by borrowing money to fund its excesses. The end result of continuing to spend beyond one’s means, without exception, is financial disaster. And that is precisely where this nation is headed.

Both parties in Congress, with all due respect to drunken sailors, have spent as though they were on shore leave for years. And now, at closing time once again we find ourselves unable to pay the tab.

Everyone knows that the borrow-and-spend cycle is unsustainable. In fact we can barely sustain it now. But unless we cut up the credit card, Congress will almost certainly go on another bender next year. And the American people will once again be the ones to wake up with a throbbing headache and an upset stomach.