Retired Adm. Mike Mullen, former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has repeatedly told Congress that the greatest threat to our national security is our growing national debt.

It took 205 years for our nation to amass a national debt of $1 trillion. How big a number is a trillion? If we go back a billion seconds, we go back almost 32 years and it is 1984. If we go back a trillion seconds, we go back 32,000 years and it is 30,000 B.C.

In 2002, our national debt was $6 trillion. Thanks to George W. Bush fighting two wars and introducing Medicare drug coverage, with no effort to pay for any of it, the debt grew to $10 trillion by the time he left office in 2008.

In the last seven years, the national debt has almost doubled to $19 trillion. President Obama is not responsible for the first one or possibly two years in office but is responsible for his last six years and the first one or two years of his successor’s term.

When we remark how the economy has improved over the past seven years, we have to realize that it is artificially propped up by our creating $1 trillion worth of notes each year from thin air, having historically low interest rates and the Fed supporting the bond market by buying $3.5 trillion worth of questionable bonds.

This is similar to a neighbor who mortgages his house, cars and boat to the hilt and maxes out on several credit cards and then tells us how great life is. But personal debt affects only the involved family, while our national debt affects many future generations.

Hopefully, the candidates for president and Congress will spend less time on how they are going to spend our money and cut our taxes and start addressing how we are going to balance our national budget.

Stuart Gilbert

Falmouth