Cra97, Rob for an explanation and chart of US debt go to the Wikipedia site below:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_public_debt

This as good a explantion and is as up to date as anything. Be sure to go down to the chart of which countries own the US debt. I hadn;'t checked it in a long time and was surprised how little is now owed to "Oil Exporters" and how much is now owed to Japan. We have owed our soul AND LAND to China for a long time.

Grumpy