Is the U.S. Going Broke? Laurence J. Kotlikoff 09.29.08, 12:00 AM ET Now that the federal government has bailed out Fannie and Freddie, who's going to bail out the federal government? The federal government's takeover of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac represents a huge financial tremor. These two institutions now issue 70% of Americans' mortgages. Their failure would have triggered a complete meltdown in housing and financial markets. So now Uncle Sam is on the hook for $5 trillion, consisting of corporate debt owed by those two institutions and mortgage debt guaranteed by them. If only the government's total debt...