We will have to tell our children that we received fair warning

Our entitlement problems are becoming too big to comprehend. This must be how the Romans felt just before the barbarian horde crossed the Rhine. From MSNBC:

"Our government has made a whole lot of promises in the long-term that it cannot possibly keep," Comptroller General David M. Walker, the head of the Government Accountability Office, said Monday.

Members of Congress said the increase in the unfunded liability for Social Security and Medicare underscored the critical urgency to do something in light of the looming retirement in coming years of 78 million baby boomers.

"The longer we delay action on the issue of entitlement reform, the more difficult the solution will become," said Sen. Judd Gregg, the top Republican on the Senate Budget Committee.

Rep. Jim Cooper, D-Tenn., said the new report emphasized the need to enact legislation he is supporting that would create a bipartisan commission to make recommendations on overhauling benefit programs and then submit those recommendations to an up-or-down vote in Congress.

"If we don't take action now, it threatens to destroy our social safety net and ruin our economic prosperity," Cooper said in a statement.