The story of 1963 Lancaster graduate Kathleen Tyson Heslop and her plunge into national politics was one of those that landed on my lap and then grew. Melba Edwards was given Gerald Dennis’s yearbook by his widow, knowing Melba was interested in Zanesville history. But this isn’t Zanesville history, Melba told me, it is Wells County history. So a “thank you” to her for bringing it to me.
Wondering if there might be anything in the library’s Indiana Room, Kate Heslop’s name drew a blank from Jason Habegger, but only a couple hours later, he sent me links to the two videos, a UPI story and an eBay listing for a vintage bumper sticker and campaign button which I promptly purchased. He is obviously a much better Googler than I — but then, he’s a lot younger.
Bill McBride was the only name I recognized in the Class of ’63; he was able to connect me with Kathy’s sister, Sylvia Wann, who said I also need to talk to Linda Isch who said I also need to talk to Jeanne Rinkenberger.
Fun stuff. It all came together in Tuesday’s N-B this week. If you have not taken the time to watch her presentations in New Hampshire and Iowa, I would recommend it. More fun stuff.
And now I have to wonder what Kathy, as her classmates called her, would say about today’s national debt.
She repeated a sobering statement in a number in her appearances, that “the professional politicians in Washington are funding their political popularity by borrowing $500 million every day, stealing the future of our children and your grandchildren.”
That’s $500 million a day in 1987, resulting in a deficit of about $144 billion. Today, we are borrowing $5.5 billion every day. That’s $5,500,000,000. That is not what the government is spending; that is the amount we are borrowing — spending over and above what the government’s income is every day. Kate did not blame only the Democrats in 1987, but rather pointed at her fellow Republicans in Washington who “talk about a balanced budget but have never submitted one.”
One could be forgiven is you missed it — with the weather, the who’s-on-first presidential campaign and the Olympics dominating the headlines — but our national debt passed a significant milestone earlier this month, now equalling the nation’s gross domestic product.
“Throughout history, nations that blithely piled up their obligations have eventually met unhappy ends,” Gerald Seib wrote in the Wall Street Journal in late June.
The Congressional Budget Office projects that, in part because of rising interest rates, the federal government will spend $892 billion during the current fiscal year for interest payments on the accumulated national debt of $28 trillion—meaning that interest payments now surpass the amount spent on defense and nearly match spending on Medicare.
What would Kate have to say to today’s Republicans, who are, sadly, at least equally complicit in getting us where we are? During Donald Trump’s four-year tenure, the gross national debt increased from about $19 trillion to about $27 trillion. As George Will explained, a good portion of that — but not all — was Covid related:
“Because of the fiscal follies during the pandemic — “forgivable loans” (hitherto called grants), cash downpours (recipients, including most Americans, many of them gainfully employed, fattened bank deposits by $3.5 trillion) — the government issued more debt in 12 months than it had in the first two centuries after 1776,” George Will shared on this page in late June.
Wells County’s Kate Heslop was ahead of her time. While you might occasionally hear some concern expressed by the current “professional politicians in Washington” about this “economic time bomb” (another of her phrases), no one is sounding an alarm. I don’t know that anyone but Kate was sounding an alarm almost 30 years ago.
“What we need in the White House is someone with guts,” she told that Iowa crowd, “to make decisions based on what’s best for the country rather than their own electability.” That was true then and, sadly and perhaps tragically, even more so today.
She was correct when she said “what I have to say you may not want to hear,” but she said it anyway. That’s heroic. And she was one of us. Part of who we are.
miller@news-banner.com
