Senator Evan Bayh warns President Barack Obama

America is on an unsustainable fiscal path that threatens our future. Changing course is imperative, and Democrats should lead the way.

Specifics:

Any serious effort to control the deficit must begin with spending restraint. Efficiency and frugality, common virtues in the private sector, must be incorporated into government. Congress should enact health-care reform that actually lowers the deficit. For the next fiscal year, assuming the economy has gathered sufficient momentum, we should freeze domestic discretionary spending, limit increases in defense spending to the rate of inflation, forgo pay raises for federal workers, and institute a federal hiring freeze.

The danger:

...if we wait for the markets to force corrective action, the danger to our economy will be greater and the correction more painful.

Spending restraint will not come easily to the Democratic Party. Pent-up demand for investment in education, health care and the environment is understandable after the Bush years. But long-term progressive government can't be built on a foundation of debt and deficits. We cannot indefinitely share with the less-fortunate resources we do not possess. Ultimately, a growing economy with increased revenues and a stable national balance sheet are the best guarantors of social progress.

The solution:

The choice is clear. We can take the path of least resistance and ignore the impending day of reckoning. Or we can do what is necessary to right the fiscal ship of state and lay a foundation for prudent, progressive government for a generation.

I believe Barack Obama will choose the responsible course. If he does, he will find kindred spirits in our party prepared to help.

Implied: Or Else.

Why Democrats Must Restrain Spending