I've been told that President Ronald Reagan once asked, "What is it we have that the Russians don't?" "Money," was the answer. The president said, "Then that's what we'll use to beat them." I don't know if President Reagan really ever asked that question, but it is an appropriate short summary of the Cold War. America certainly beat the Russians with money. And, it was the right decision at the time as victory was imperative. The problem is... America won the war but still lost.The American national debt was 907 billion dollars upon President Reagan's inauguration. At the end of his presidency, it stood at 2.6 trillion dollars. Of course, the next right decision would have been to start paying off the debt, but that didn't happen. The national debt since the end of the Cold War has never been less in any year compared to the previous year. Now, the current debt is trillions and trillions of dollars and totally out of control. To borrow from one of my previous articles ( America the Once Great, Part 2, November 22, 2011), the current national debt equals $197,579 per family according to Terence P. Jeffrey, a veteran budget reporter and columnist for CNSNews.com. This brings to mind the famous quote attributed to Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev, "We will take America without firing a single shot."No politician is willing to do what is necessary to fix the debt problem because it would mean certain defeat come the next election. No matter what areas that might be chosen for reduction, there would be tremendous backlash from the fully entitled American special interest (see Greece). But there is a way...In order to cut the programs necessary to create meaningful reduction, we must institute a one term limit (of maybe six years) for the President and congress. In the past I have always been against anything that would limit my choice in an election. However, there cannot be real deficit reduction without eliminating the need for re-election. As it is, once a president or congressman is elected, he or she immediately begins thinking about campaigning for re-election. Without this obstacle, a politician would be free to do what's necessary, even if it isn't politically popular. Besides, we shouldn't be paying a politician to campaign anyway.