Campaign to Raise Awareness About Soaring National Debt

From Foxnews.com

A nonprofit advocacy group has launched a multimillion-dollar campaign to raise awareness about America's soaring federal debt.

The multimedia campaign is trying to hammer its message on all fronts. It includes a Web site -- Defeatthedebt.com, which features a rolling odometer showing the red ink at over $11 trillion -- and a startling new TV ad. The ad shows school children pledging allegiance to the national debt.

"And to the Chinese government that lends us money, and to the interest, for which we pay, compoundable, with higher taxes and lower pay until the day we die," the school children in the ad say.

Organizers say it's a critical educational campaign to inform the public of the real-world consequences of owing so much on the national credit card.

"We're also trying to get people to understand who we owe all this debt to, and the leverage that foreign governments and foreign banks have over this country when they start to accumulate that much debt," said Rick Berman, executive director of the Employment Policies Institute, the conservative group behind the campaign.

Taken together, this year's $787 billion economic stimulus package, the ongoing rescue of American automakers and new proposals to spend $1 trillion reforming health care may make it tempting, to some, to blame President Obama for the sea of red ink. The projected federal deficit this year is $1.6 trillion.