It's a Matter of Arithmetic: Debt to Hit $20.3 trillion?

US News and World Report had the following blurb in yesterday's morning political e-report. I thought it was worth sharing:

CBO Head: Nation's Fiscal Policy "Unsustainable" Politico reports that CBO chief Doug Elmendorf said yesterday that the nation's fiscal course "is 'unsustainable,' and the problem 'cannot be solved through minor tinkering.'" Elmendorf "noted a recent CBO report that pegged an increase in the public debt from $7.5 trillion at the end of 2009 to $20.3 trillion at the end of 2020 if President Barack Obama's fiscal 2011 budget were to be implemented as written. As a percentage of gross domestic product, the debt would rise from 53 percent to 90 percent, CBO forecasted." The Hill notes that Elmendorf went on to say, "It's a matter of arithmetic. ... Government would need to make changes in some set of the large programs, large parts of the tax code that we think of as the fundamental parts of the budget."