If it were not for the 110th Congress and the slandering of true conservatives in the 109th Congress, this wouldn’t be an issue.
The only thing we can do, if we are smart, is to tighten our belts, slash entitlement spending and redirect that money to paying off foreign held national debt. (Domestically held national debt is actually a good thing, it drives $$$s into the pockets of US Citizens. Foreign held debt is bad, it removes $$$s from the US Economy.)
For instance:
Social Security reduced so only the impoverished get payments
Welfare replaced with Workfare. If you need money to live and cannot prove you have no ability to work, then you have to work for the state and earn the money.
Schools need to be reduced in funding. (Yes, I know that there’s a lot of hype out there saying it’s underfunded. That’s hogwash. Go get a budget for just about any school and you’ll see how readily and ignorantly they waste the money they are given on worthless programs.)
We also need to strip down the government. I suggest disbanding the US Armed Forces and reassigning them piecemeal to the states, keep a corps of Federal Officers and NCOs to coordinate in times of war, otherwise we don’t need the burden. That would, of course, mandate the immediate surrender and withdrawal of troops from such front line assignments like Germany, Italy, France, India, Korea, Vietnam, Japan, Philippines, Midway, etc and serious considerations for keeping troops in the Useless Nations.
We’d need to slash funds wasted on research into how global warming is affecting the dung beetle. Let them get corporate sponsorship.
Hell, make me benevolent dictator for 3 weeks, I’ll get the government back on track and reduced in size by no less then 98%. All I’ll do is enforce the US Constitution.