The national debt — currently totaling about $22 trillion and rising — is a major issue of concern for most Americans. Federally elected officials and those who work for the federal government don’t seem to lose sleep over it, though. For all the cheap talk they give us about reducing the debt and controlling spending, no bipartisan plan ever develops to prevent this slow-moving train wreck.

Reason reports the latest: “The national debt will hit ‘unprecedented levels’ in the coming decades, soaring well above the record highs set during World War II and reaching nearly one-and-a-half times the size of the entire U.S. economy by 2049, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projected in a report released Tuesday. And that’s the optimistic view.”

After decades of warnings about impending disaster over the national debt, you’d expect the political parties to have coalesced around a plan by now. There are several reasons why this has not happened.

For one thing, conservative versus leftist views of the country and what it should be are so diametrically opposed that there is little room for agreement on anything.

Additionally, in tough economic times, politicians don’t like to cut spending because it seems hard-hearted to the needs of the poor. In good economic times, nobody ever thinks that the party will end, so no emphasis is put on setting aside something for tomorrow. And in the swamp, there is no such thing as a tomorrow beyond the next election.

It would be foolish to think that our current economic position will guard against the hazards of enormous debt. The national debt erodes public confidence in the economy and hampers the government’s ability to respond in times of economic crisis. The trouble is, we cannot predict with much certainty when that fateful moment will come when the national debt finally pushes us over the fiscal cliff.

Annual trillion-dollar deficits are not helping the case. Neither are the approaching twin calamities of Social Security and Medicare [bankruptcy](https://patriotpost.us/articles/56448-crying-wolf-on-entitlements. A spike in interest rates could shock the bond market, creating a major crisis worse than the Great Recession, sending investors worldwide running for cover.

For their part, Democrats don’t seem concerned. True to their belief that the Swamp has a revenue problem, not a spending problem, House Dems issued a $1 trillion spending bill to partially fund the government for the next fiscal year.

The bill is essentially an anti-Trump wish list, seeking ways to reverse the president’s decision on a number of items, including eliminating the Mexico City policy, the withdrawal from the Paris climate deal, the transgender military service ban, and actions taken to combat illegal immigration. The package passed 226-203, with seven Democrats joining every House Republican in voting against the measure.

Separately, the House Ways and Means Committee approved bills to extend expired and expiring tax credits for workers and families, and some corporate sweeteners like those earmarked for the renewable-energy industry. How will they make us pay for it? Roll back estate-tax cuts for one quarter of the cost, with the rest “covered” by deficit spending.

The spending bill is mostly political theater, and it doesn’t have much chance of making it through the Senate. But it positions Democrats for a fight over spending in the fall just when a debt-ceiling hike must be considered.

There is no answer as to how far Democrats will go to defeat Trump, but they are not above tanking the economy to make it happen just as they did in 2008. And a healthy dose of fiscal chaos would give them the cover they need to push us even closer toward their socialist worker paradise where we can all enjoy equality … of misery.

(Updated.)