This was just on CBS news:

To hear President Bush tell it, he's on the side of the angels when it comes to federal spending.

In his Saturday radio address, he blasted congressional Democrats for pursuing "tax and spend policies," while trumpeting his own commitment to keep taxes low and restrain federal spending.

He said his plan will produce a balanced federal budget by 2012.

But what Mr. Bush didn't mention, and what he almost never mentions, is the National Debt.

With good reason.

On the day he took office, the National Debt stood at this unfathomable number:

$5,727.776.738,304.64

In fiscal shorthand, that's $5.7 trillion dollars. Trillion with a "T."

Six and a half years later, the Bureau of Public Debt tells us the National Debt clocks in at a staggering:

$8,835,268,597,181.95

That's $8.8 trillion – an increase of $3.1 trillion dollars since January 20, 2001. And that amounts to a jump of 54% during Mr. Bush's watch.

If you wanted to pay it off, dividing it equally among the U.S. population (estimated by the U.S. Census Bureau to be 302,103,675), it would come to $29,245.82 for every man, woman and child.

Sot it's not really hard to understand why Mr. Bush almost never mentions it.

The National Debt has gone up more on his watch than under any other president.

That means it took the Federal Government 225 years to accrue $5.5 trillion in debt under 42 U.S. presidents. But under President Bush alone, it has soared another 35.2%.

And the National Debt is not just a big number, it's an expensive one.

This year alone, it costs taxpayers $247.3 billion in interest payments.

It hardly gives the president bragging rights about fiscal discipline.