A bond for every baby

Just a day after George McGovern announced he would endorse Hillary Clinton, she is out with her newest idea - a $5000 bond for every born in America.

"I like the idea of giving every baby born in America a $5,000 account that will grow over time, so that when that young person turns 18 if they have finished high school they will be able to access it to go to college or maybe they will be able to make that downpayment on their first home," she said.

The New York senator did not offer any estimate of the total cost of such a program or how she would pay for it. Approximately 4 million babies are born each year in the United States.

Clinton said such an account program would help Americans get back to the tradition of savings that she remembers as a child, and has become harder to accomplish in the face of rising college and housing costs.

Well, it wouldn't be getting Americans back to the tradition of saving since they wouldn't be the ones doing the saving. They'd be the ones getting the handout from the government. Of course, there is no word on how she'd pay for this new entitlement that would cost over $20 billion a year. On top of her other ideas for health care and other domestic programs. You're not going to be finding that sort of money just by taxing the rich more. And is it really the government's responsibility to be handing out baby presents? But I guess that doesn't matter when she can talk about handing out these sorts of bribes for votes paid for from the taxpayers' pocketbooks.

I would like to think that this idea will die the death of McGovern's plan to give every American citizen $1,000. But I'm not so sure that people have as much sense today about taking on a new entitlement.

Here's John McCain's take on the idea:

McCain: I’d be interested to know how she would pay for that. Raising taxes? I’d like to give every baby born $100,000; I’d just like to know how to pay for it.

(Sorry about that - it would be $20 billion not million, of course.)