COEUR d'ALENE - The whole nation is nail biting over how our children and grandchildren will be sunk by national debt, U.S. Sen. Mike Crapo observed on Monday.

Well, stop worrying about future generations, Crapo advised.

Financial catastrophe is going to hit a whole lot sooner than that.

"It's not generations off. It's a matter of a few years. Economists believe it's not more than five," he said. "It (the national debt) is today 94 percent plus of our GDP."

Rocketing federal spending and crippling national debt are the most dire crises the nation faces right now, Crapo said, and members of Congress are scrambling to find a solution.

Economists have shaped it out for Crapo, a member of President Barack Obama's fiscal commission last year.

First, debt will reach 100 percent of the country's GDP. Then the economy will begin to shrink.

Interest will skyrocket. Inflation will balloon.

"The damage to America will be huge, not just to the nation but to our economy, to families, to our businesses," Crapo said. "The economy that we fear is literally at our door. We are facing a level of debt that goes beyond anything our nation has seen in its history."

Congress is working on it ... Or at least trying to.

Crapo pointed to the plan presented last December by the 18-member fiscal commission he had sat on. The document called for $3.7 trillion in cuts over 10 years through steps like reforming the tax code, and cutting discretionary spending. It also pushed to retool Social Security.

"We've got to make this (national debt) a long-term issue, which involves paring down the fiscal spending pathway we're on," he said.

But too few commission members supported the plan for it to go to a congressional vote.

President Obama has ignored the plan, Crapo added.

"I believe that's because he's looking at a re-election in 2012," Crapo said, adding that special interest groups would lose tax breaks under the plan. "It puts us on a path of fiscal austerity that's not popular."

Still, some Congress members haven't given up.

Some of the senators from the fiscal commission, Crapo included, are bent on refining the plan to a point that it will both achieve its goals while garnering support across the federal government.

"The issue is so big, we want to move it forward," he said.

There's no set deadline for the new version.

"These are really huge issues," Crapo explained. If they don't retool the plan just so, he said, "it could result in one side or the other rejecting it all."

Meanwhile, there are other battles being fought.

Congressmen are still trolling for ideas to stall the implementation of Obama's health care reform act, Crapo said, after efforts have failed to de-fund and repeal it.

Crapo said the bill's implementation so far has only seen premiums increase, as well as the cost of health care.

"We're in the same fight we were having when fighting the bill itself," he said.

The federal government is also mulling the role to play in assisting Libya, he said.

Crapo recently got an update from the administration that the U.S. might assume the responsibility of rebuilding the African country.

"My concern is the U.S. can't continue to be the world's police and the world's economic development agency," he said. "The U.S. is already engaged in Iraq and Afghanistan."

Idahoans shouldn't feel powerless right now, Crapo said.

State residents can help by staying engaged, he said, contacting their congressional representatives and urging friends across the country to do the same.

"One of the most significant changes in the country is people are beginning to get how important this is," he said. "It's helping us make a difference already."