Do you mean balanced? The last time the US budget was in surplus was 2001.

But debt can be fiscally sound, as anybody with a mortgage knows.

A healthy mortgage (like any healthy debt) has the expectation of timely repayments and reduces over time. What we see here is the exact opposite to the point debtors are worried about interest default.

Turn of the century. The Democrats left a balanced budget for George W. Bush but the Republicans decided that meant tax cuts were needed so they could continue campaigning against “big government spending”.

https://www.factcheck.org/2008/02/the-budget-and-deficit-und...

The most significant long-term problems they created were probably exempting rich people from Social Security taxes on more than their first $125k of income and Medicare plan D, both of which created massive time bombs as the boomers headed towards retirement. The longer we delay dealing with those, the harder it’ll be to close the gap — which is exactly what they were counting on to build support for privatization.

Doesn't matter. The problem is that passing the budget does not automatically authorize the debt to pay for it. All that needs to happen is welding those two together.