In the eight days that led up to the short term resolution, which paved the way for April 8th’s compromise vote to cut $38 billion in spending, the United States went $54 BILLION more into debt. On March 30th, the debt was $14.2101 Trillion. On April 7th, it had increased to $14.2642 Trillion. Half of this debt is held by foreign countries.

In March of 2007, the national debt was $8.84 Trillion and now – $14.2642 Trillion; the monthly deficit $95 Billion, now – $189 Billion.

This country cannot sustain this spending we are on a collision course with national bankruptcy. We need our representatives to stop the semantics and the spins and get a handle on what is really at stake.

I live in Virginia, home of such historic figures as Thomas Jefferson, George Mason, George Washington, James Madison and Patrick Henry to name a few. These Virginians struggled and fought against a tyrannical government choking the economic life out of citizens. They had the courage to stand and say no.

I expected more from this crop of current Virginians on the Hill. I expected them to stand up to the ridiculous spending and represent their constituency. Imagine my surprise when I found only one person who said no on April 8th.

That one lone voice that said no was Scott Rigell from VA-02. He cast the only nay vote from the Commonwealth.

Rigell, a businessman, sent Glenn Nye packing in the last election. Supported by the Tea Party, he ran a very common sense campaign – create jobs, control government spending, reform health care, take care of the military and change Congress.

Yeah, yeah I know, lots of candidates ran on that platform. Looking at April 8th’s vote, he’s about the only one that stuck to it. He voted his principles and what he promised.

I will assume that as a businessman, he understands debt, unsustainable spending, revenue projections, and cash flow. As a legislator, he understands the vote. As former military, he understands those who serve. VA-02 did well sending him to Washington.

I read his press release on his vote and his reasoning was sound:

“Friday night’s vote should have been a stand-alone bill to fund our military and pay our troops for the remainder of the year. Instead it was another stop gap, short term funding mechanism to provide more time for a deal that will not satisfy the vow I made to my constituents when they sent me to Washington, DC. It is because of this that I did not support this short term spending bill. I believe we should have funded our military for the remainder of the year and remained in Washington to negotiate a deal which is more representative of the financial crisis that we find ourselves in.”

He gets it. He understands what he was sent to Washington to do. I give him praise for standing as a matter of principle for his district.