Posted on 09/14/2011 2:38:29 PM PDT by Nachum
Blue Dog Democrat Rep. Jim Cooper (D-Tenn.) said that most Americans do not understand that federal entitlements are not “bank account” programs that hold their money, adding that Social Security is not even a legal guarantee -- "Legally, they're not even promises." Cooper, asked about potential reforms to Medicare and Medicaid, said that the core problem was that the public does not understand the true nature of entitlements. “Many Americans don’t really realize that Medicare is a government program,” Cooper said at a press conference with fellow Blue Dogs on Wednesday.
(Excerpt) Read more at cnsnews.com ...
I’d also like to know how it works when people immigrate here, legally or not, and somehow end up on the social security and/or Medicaid roles?
I can’t tell you how many foreign patients I see in our hospital. I ask them how long they’ve been there — most will say 15 years or less ...however, they are on FULL Medicare/medicaid and social security.
So how does that work? What exactly is THAT doing to the budget?
Then why does the government send out paper which says that it is an account and shows the contents thereof (i.e. a statement)?
Perhaps we should heed the observation that was made in antiquity [by Aristotle, IIRC] that shifting definitions are indicative of an immoral intellectual dishonesty.
They live today off of what the government confiscates from today's workers. What was confiscated from them through the years paid recipients through the years.
They're not getting back what was taken from them. What was taken from them was spent when it was taken. Classic Ponzi scheme.
The previous poster was only correct on the second assumption, you will get SS payments according to the current regulations. And you are right, Congress can change the payment schedules anytime they want, including setting them to zero.
The first statement, that what you paid in created an obligation on the part of the government to pay you back, is false. It's also the assumption that the hardest for folks to give up.
>The government legally owes you {and me } nothing.
Not true, Art 4, Sec 4, of the US Constitution clearly obliges the federal government to protect the Several States against invasion.
{But they *don’t* want to do that; re: AZ’s sb1070[?].}
Blue Dog Democrat Rep. Jim Cooper (D-Tenn.)...See, he's a conservative. /s Matt Cover's 'blog has some other stuff of interest, looks like he's probably a Perry supporter.
Truth.
Perhaps, but how does that absolve the liars?
If a private citizen made the same type of statments about a the same type of program, he would be guilty of fraud.
I’m 59.
I propose that Social Security be phased out over a generation’s time. Step 1 would be to freeze current benefits to those on the receiving end now and end cost of living increases. Step 2 would be to redefine beneficiaries to only those who have paid into the system, eliminating 25% of the benefit amount over a four year period to those who don’t belong. Step 3 would be to offer a one-time cash incentive buyout to those who are within ten years of being eligible to receive benefits including a provision that they will never have social security taxes taken from their checks again as long as they live. This would lower the long-term obligations being faced by those of you in the younger generations and allow more of your money to go toward your own private retirement accounts that you would own. Step 4 would be to redefine benefit levels for those who fail to accept the buyout offer. They have a choice, the buyout or whatever results from the redefinition committee. Those who are between ten and twenty years away from receiving benefits will have their social security taxes lowered a little to help them cope with the redefined benefit levels they will receive. Anyone more than twenty years away from being eligible to receive benefits will not be able to collect anything from social security. Their social security taxes will be decreased as current recipients die off over time until one day it’s simply over and done with.
This approach has everyone giving a little and getting something positive in return. It’s the only way to get full buy-in.
What he’s REALLY saying is that there’ll be NO SS check for YOU Granny unless you pull the (D) lever good and hard...
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,79013,00.html
So, does that mean that citizens have no obligation to pay into social security, though it is taken out of our paychecks before we even see them? Good for the goose, after all.
They do this to mislead you. Plain and simple.
To paraphrase Patrick Henry, there will never be a law against bad laws.
The complete quote is, “They may go without punishment though they commit the most outrageous violation on our immunities. That paper may tell me they will be punished. I ask: By what law? They must make the law, for there is no existing law to do it. What, will they make a law to punish themselves?”
That is only part of the story. If fact the withholdings produced surpluses continuously up until 2009. Those surplus revenues were then spent on other items in the budget having nothing to do with Social Security.
“In fact” not “If fact”.
I don’t see where we could get the cash for a buyout without taxing it, borrowing it or printing it.
It was also never intended for the young, illegal or complete corrupt system to be spent at will.
If the Republican Party was not playing bad cop-good cop with the Democrat Party, the Republicans would be running ads on this guy’s statement tomorrow.
If the Republican Party was not playing bad cop-good cop with the Democrat Party, the Republicans would be running ads on this guy’s statement tomorrow.
>>Then why does the government send out paper which says that it is an account and shows the contents thereof (i.e. a statement)?
>
>They do this to mislead you. Plain and simple.
True. And perhaps there should be a [/dry] tag or somesuch, as it wasn’t really sarcasm...
I am coming to think that much of what the Government does is done to mislead... for the purposes of controlling you.
Consider the Constitution and how much of it is ignored until, in some way, it benefits the Government. {This is, I think, the major driving force behind the judiciary’s love of precedent.}
And, have you ever asked an “law enforcement” officer why certain things which are contrary to the Constitution are allowed? Listen carefully to how much they bullshit.
(A good example for me in NM was Asking the sheriff why there was a state law prohibiting firearms on College campuses when the State Constitution clearly says “No law shall abridge the right of the citizen to keep and bear arms for security and defense [...]”)
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