Poor kids to go without lunches and vaccinations, meat sold without being inspected, firemen and cops laid off, illegal aliens released from prison, 17,200 teachers fired, airports closed, long lines at airports, and 700,000 workers laid off. Egypt in ferment? Syria at war? Austerity-ridden Greece? Nope. The United States of America as described by President Obama now that the sequester, an across-the-board cut in some domestic and military spending, is in effect.

All of this pain, says Obama, is being inflicted by  those nasty Republicans who refuse to go along with still another tax increase on “the rich” instead of relying completely on spending cuts to make a tiny dent in the on-going deficit. The sequester will take one dollar out of every $100 dollars the government plans to spend in the remaining seven months of the fiscal year. On a full-year basis the reductions will come to $2 out of every $100 of spending. Not much, but better than no cuts at all given that we are borrowing almost $40 out of every $100 we spend, and that even with these cuts, government spending will be more than 7 percent higher than it was when the Obamas moved into the White House.