Why bother to reduce spending when you can just borrow more? That seems to be the mantra of the federal goverment which just voted to increase their borrowing limit to over $8 Trillion. Tax-cut and spend Republicans in the Senate overwhelmingly approved the measure, while Democrats seemed to come out on the side of fiscal responsibility.

A divided Senate approved an $800 billion increase in the federal debt limit Wednesday, a major boost in borrowing that Sen. John Kerry and other Democrats blamed on the fiscal policies of President Bush.

The mostly party line, 52-44 vote was expected to be followed by House passage Thursday. Enactment would raise the government's borrowing limit to $8.18 trillion - $2.23 trillion higher than when Bush became president in 2001, and more than eight times the debt President Reagan faced when he took office in 1981.

In his first remarks on the Senate floor since his presidential bid ended in defeat two weeks ago, Kerry, D-Mass., said his former opponent had presided over "the worst fiscal turnaround in our nation's entire history."

He was referring to the change from the $5.6 trillion in surpluses that were projected for the next 10 years when Bush took office in 2001, to the $2.3 trillion in deficits now estimated for the coming decade. Kerry and other Democrats complained that those bills will have to be paid by future generations.

"This can be called a birth tax, a birth tax that is dumped on the back of every American child unwillingly," said Kerry, who voted against the borrowing increase.

Hearing that, you would almost think that the Democrats are wary about the ever increasing size of the federal government. Almost.

Democrats may not want Republicans borrowing any more money, but they don't want them to cut spending either.

Democrats complained that the bill - which will let non-defense, non-domestic security programs grow by about 2 percent next year - was too stingy. They said that clean water grants, the National Science Foundation and federal subsidies for hiring local police officers were all being cut from last year and that funds for education, biomedical research and veterans health care were inadequate.

By cut they mean not increasing as much as they would like. (Remember, top Democrat and soon to be ex-Senator Tom Daschle actually said that his 3.1% increase in pay was actually a pay cut.)

So on one side we have Republicans who, while letting Americans keep more of the money they earn through lower taxes, continue spending like there's no tomorrow. On the other side we have the Democrats who want to use the threat of lethal force to seize more of our money, while at the same time spending like there's no tomorrow.

I get the feeling that if we don't elect more small government conservatives, there might actually be no tomorrow.