Experts Tier round 2: Is there any hope that the US can eliminate its national debt in our lifetimes

1) Political Dichotomy"My opponent mentions that the surpluses we"ve recently had were quickly wiped out. This is not a refutation of the dichotomy of the political environment. While it shows that it CAN happen. It, in no way , proves that it WILL happen."Its happened every. single. time in the past though..... Every time we've had a surplus in the budget, it was entirely wiped out in the next presidential term. Its a given fact that Democrats and Republicans will be at each others throats over the course of the next 70 years, and its a given fact that every time a budget has produced a surplus, it was so small that it was wiped out the year or term after the surplus occurred. This cycle of Congress quickly wiping out any surplus/progress made towards paying off the debt made the year before heavily stacks the odds against the idea that the US could pay off such a massive national debt within our lifetimes. Congress has to average close to $250 Billion in surplus over 70 years to pay off the national debt, at a time when political dichotomy in Congress has caused there to be TRILLION dollar deficits in the budget. It simply cannot be overcome. A surplus that massive cannot be sustained over such a long period of time (70 years), especially since Congress has a history of wiping out surplus's immediately after one is achieved."We"ve already cut $732 billion from the deficit, another $800 billion is not so impossible."A lot of that came out of exiting the 2 wars that we couldn't even fund in the first place and getting out of a terrible recession ..... Unless you can find two more wars we've been fighting that we can end and an economic golden age hits the US tomorrow, then it is pretty impossible to cut another $800 billion. "All wars since have been us getting involved in other wars. I"m not arguing if they were justified or not, or if our involvement was ultimately beneficial to the world or not, but that they were choices that we made and that we could have made the other choice."And the US is the second most interventionist country in the history of mankind (second only to the British Empire). The US cant just flip the switch from ultra-interventionist to outright non-interventionist, and its not going to happen anytime soon. The US will still get into wars they didnt need to get into in the first place, its the one thing the US is still good at. "So don"t ask for conduct for never using the word "never" when you entire side of the debate is based on that and you basically say "never" "Do you even read the arguments I post anymore? I accused you of putting words in my mouth when you said 'My opponent also claims that republicans will never accept cuts to the military', not about using the word never in the first place....3) No support for cutting military spending by $500 Billion"It doesn"t have to"It kinda does have to.... You wont be able to get people in Congress to reduce military spending by $500 billion if their constituents they are representing dont even want that. "we can simply maintain the same level of cuts that we"ve done for the last 2 years for the next 5"Except we CANT, because those cuts are the result of bringing an end to two very costly wars that have been waged for the last ten years, not because we finally were able to look at a military program and say to ourselves 'eh, we dont need this'.We dont have any more wars to withdraw fund to be able to keep reducing military spending at the rate it has been reduced. "I have shown that there is growing support for military and social cuts"There isnt any support for cutting either of those by $500 billion though, which you continue to insist or imagine that there is. " I know that it is popular and cool to attack the government and say that they are the most evil people in the world, but it is a complete stretch and fallacy attack to do so."If you would like to prove that Congress isnt incompetent and incapable of doing anything noteworthy then by all means be my guest, the fact still stands though that they are incapable of doing anything right, as mentioned before about the level of political dichotomy that exists in Congress right now....3) Events"I never said that we weren"t the most powerful military, only that we don"t have to be."And I argued that they dont have to be the costliest military in the world doesnt matter since the US simply IS the most powerful country in the world and also happens to like being the most powerful country in the world. Just because they dont have to be the biggest in the world, that doesnt mean that you can say for certain they will eventually let someone else become number 1 and cut $500 billion from military spending.....Events like recessions and depressions will happen, and recessions + depressions make it impossibly hard for Congress to produce a significant surplus in a budget without driving itself into economic ruin..... These plus the inevitable conflicts and wars the US will involve itself in alone makes it impossible for the US to maintain a $250 Billion surplus for 70 years to pay off the national debt. 4) Military cuts in the past"from 1989 to1996, we saw military cuts in every year but one"Thats primarily because we just got out of the Cold War and no longer had to fund a ton of programs to counterbalance the Soviets.... The war on terrorism meanwhile rages on and it doesnt look like that one is gonna end anytime soon. "our military spending was its largest in 1945, $846 billion [4], it was cut to $166 billion in 1947"And those happened because WWII ended and we no logner had to fight against Japan and Germany......I dont know why its so hard to understand this concept, but the US only significantly reduces military spending when it is ENDING wars, not when its just strolling along in between major conflicts..... To point at cases of reducing military spending when the US transitioning from the Cold War or WWII to years of peacetime, and allege that the same can be made at any given time when a massively large war or conflict is not being fought, is simply ludicrous and impossible to justify as sensible. The US simply cannot nor will not cut military spending by $500 billion from its military budget. There arent anymore wars we can withdraw from and nobody is supporting the idea of cutting military spending by over 50% or by $500 Billion.....5) Healthcare" It is true that we"ve not been good historically with cutting healthcare spending, the support from both sides show that a change will occur"Theres also support from both sides for tougher background checks, but despite that those still did not become a reality.... Just because something has bipartisian support, it doesnt mean it will become a reality, and considering how partisian Congress currently is right now, bipartisian may not be a word used to describe Congress anytime soon. 6) We owe a truly stupendous amount of money alreadyDropped. ===================================================================================There are a few reasons why there is no hope that the US can eliminate its national debt in our lifetimes1) We already owe so much already. We are really, REALLY deep in the hole to the point that if we averaged a $200 Billion surplus every year, for 70 years, THAT STILL WOULDNT BE ENOUGH2) We cant simply cut $500 Billion out of military spending and maintain that for decades to pay off the debt. 3) Congress is known for being incompetent, and that is especially true when it comes to being fiscally responsible. 4) Wars and recessions will happen, and there will be a lot of them too. These will make it impossible for the US to maintain a large surplus every year for the next 70 years. 5) Partisanship in Congress will always be there, and that will make it even harder for the US to even produce a surplus in the first place, let alone maintain it for 70 years.And thats why the simple truth is: there is no hope for the US to pay off its debt in our lifetimes.