The headline item from Tuesday's elections is that Democrats wiped out Republicans in the House and the Senate. Congratulations. But do our newly minted senators, with their terms ending in January 2033, realize that they will be the cohort of legislators who face the exhaustion of Social Security's retirement trust fund in 2032?

Each official will choose between letting a 22 percent automatic cut to benefits go through, finally making the program's math work by reforming its outdated design, or letting Washington borrow trillions more to prevent any cuts. Few, if any, of the candidates said a substantive word about it while campaigning.

In fact, fiscal sustainability was remarkably absent all election season. During the 2010s, powerful politicians openly championed "austerity." As late as 2018, according to AdImpact data reported by The Wall Street Journal, 140 political ads mentioned the debt or budget deficit. During this cycle, only 30 did, putting the subject 52nd among campaign topics.

That's beyond crazy. It has been widely reported that in the fiscal year that just ended, government debt held by the public reached 100 percent of GDP, a level last seen following World War II. The deficit is nearly $2 trillion, or 6.2 percent of GDP. Interest payments have more than doubled in only four years, surpassing the United States' bill........

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