The campaigning is just about over, the pollsters have either succeeded or failed, and by now voters have decided what their concerns are on this election day.
Pollsters tell us that people care about the Iraq war, about ethics issues and scandals, about the threat of terrorism, and about the economy.
But, really, what should have been the foremost issue on the voters' minds as they choose who will direct the Ship of State for the next two years?
May we be so bold as to make a suggestion?
Consider this: The latest Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projections show that the U.S. federal budget will consume 38% of total GDP by the year 2050. This represents an almost doubling of the post-World War II trend of federal spending hovering around 20% of GDP.
In other words, federal spending is projected to almost double relative to GDP over the next 40 years.
That means that the U.S. model of a robust private economy that thrives in the absence of a stifling, European-style welfare state will be replaced by, well,a stifling, European-style welfare state.
And it means that your taxes are going to go up. Dramatically. And your children's taxes, and your grandchilden's taxes.
What is driving the demand side of this nightmare scenario are the giant entitlement programs Medicare and Social Security. Driving the supply side is our dysfunctional tax system that is restraining the natural productivity of our free-market economy and the natural creativity and hard work of the American people.
Unless voters insist that their leaders in Washington, regardless of party, come to terms with this looming fiscal disaster, everything else pales in comparison.
What the country needs is bold leadership to solve our domestic fiscal issues. To transform Social Security and Medicare into solvent and self-funding programs. To reform our tax code. To rein in out-of-control government spending.
If such leadership emerges as a result of Election Day 2006 and its subsequent fallout, we will all benefit, regardless of party.