Replies

Thanks for your well thought out reply.

You asked how I would change things. Here's how:

Farm Bill: Abolish it or cut it waaaaaaay back. Most of the $$ went to corporate farms, not the prototypical family farm.

NEA: Defund it entirely.

NCLB: Abolish it and the Education Department in one swell foop. I am a firm believer in the separation of school and State. Public schools used to be "good." Why is that? Because that period of time was before the establishment of the Dept. of Ed. and the culture wars. The public schools used to be funded entirely from local districts $$. There used to be a lot more direct accountability than there is now.

Pills for Grandma. Should be cut off or at least means tested. LITTLE KNOWN FACT: something like 60 percent of the wealth of this country is in the hands of retired people. Why they think they are "owed" and have the right to saddle my generation and my children's generation with massive debt as a result of the wealth redistribution scheme (which this is) is beyond me.

*** LITTLE KNOWN FACT: something like 60 percent of the wealth of this country is in the hands of retired people.***

Tht does NOT mean that 60 percent of the retired people are wealthy.

It merely means, if it is accurate, that a small percentage of retired people were VERY wealthy.

That leaves the rest of the retirees. Do you realize that if someone retired just ten years ago, he may have been lucky to have been earning $400 a week, or a total of $20,800 a year. What do you suppose his retirement pay is today? IF he (or she) was fortunate enough to be allowed to stay in a job until retirement age.

Add in the fact that most retirees do NOT receive medical insurance. Did you know that, even if a retiree can afford to pay his/her own medical insurance, it is NOT possible to get prescription insurance unless one is employed?

Obviously, there are exceptions to the above. But they ARE exceptions.

Now tell me, which system works best for the taxpayer?

1. Help out with the prescription payments.
2. Drain any remaining savings the retiree has and then place them on Welfare.

Do you know how much more it would cost to maintain people on Welfare than to let them pay the rest of their own bills and get help with the prescription bills?

Putting people on Welfare so that the govt. can spend the dollars is what Clinton wanted when he said in Buffalo, NY (circa 1995 if I recall correctly) that the govt. knows better than the people how to spend the people's money. He was wrong, of course. It costs the taxpayers far more to spend the taxpayers' dollars (some estimates are 73 cents on the dollar goes to govt. agencies) than to let the people spend it themselves.