Forum Post: Trust Fund Perfidy
Posted 7 years ago on June 16, 2017, 9:34 a.m. EST by agkaiser
(2552)
from Fredericksburg, TX
This content is user submitted and not an official statement
FICA tax withholding from our paychecks is the source of the social security trust fund.
The mostly conservative politicians borrowed and spent the the trust fund on regular government expenses at the same time they gave tax cuts to their wealthy patrons.
Now they tell us that social security is broke, because they don't want to tax the rich to get back the money they stole from us. (A loan that one has no intention of repaying is a theft.) They say social security and Medicare are a great part of government expenditure. The reality is they owe that money to us because they already taxed us to get it and spent it on the military industrial complex and other corporate welfare programs and/or tax cuts that also make their handlers richer.
Who are they? Paul Ryan is one. http://www.cbpp.org/research/the-ryan-budgets-radical-priorities If you've been paying attention, you know others. If you haven't, you'd better start educating yourself on the 2017 economic realities in America.
The attack on social security is only a hint about what's going on in neoliberal times. Eventually people will see that most politicians and especially conservatives serve only the rich masters. Perhaps more frequent mass shootings are a sign of that change, like more frequent storms indicate climatic upheaval.
What follows is most of the last paragraph of seven by Gaius Publius: "The Collapsing Social Contract"
"... The country is already in a pre-revolutionary state; that's one huge reason people chose Trump over Clinton, and would have chosen Sanders over Trump. The Big Squeeze has to stop, or this will be just the beginning of a long and painful path. We're on a track that nations we have watched - tightly "ordered" states, highly chaotic ones - have trod already. While we look at them in pity, their example stares back at us."
Take 30 seconds and read the whole thing:
http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2017/06/gaius-publius-collapsing-social-contract.html
There's no honesty or sincerity in them!
''We Are Not Broke: Trashing the Austerity Lies'', by William Rivers Pitt:
as ... ''Five Men Own Almost As Much As Half the World's Population''
Thanx for excellent forum-post. It needs to be read and disseminated widely.
radix omnia malorum est cupiditas ...
Catch up! '16 campaign is over. The SS Ripoff is still afloat.
Americas dirty secret is the extreme amount of child rape...if you want to know why men are unhinging and then breaking down later in life...look deeper at their pasts. We need to make it ok for them to talk about it, we need to show them the heros they are surviving and getting through that...instead we shame and hush and get quiet and weird, look down on and make jokes. We love to kick people when they are down...that is our culture now...and this is the natural effect of all that horror, time and pressure just cooking in those poor kids who become adults until some of them finally break ...and we just think it is such a mystery. They didnt stand a chance and we are guilty of turning our backs on this issue. In most cases they never tell another soul what happened by family or stranger...the secret dies with them. We need to change the culture of shame surrounding rape. Of course we won't address this...in America we don't talk about the one in six men which is staggering and one in four women raped as children...look around the room and ponder that for a moment. And they muscle through it alone and shamed... until some of them just crack up and want to prove how dirty and disgusting they have come to believe they are...so they make themselves as filthy as they can by killing lots of people. It's sad on so many levels. We let them suffer and that suffering spreads like a disease....and Trump is going to strip away mental health care and disability while this crisis continues at epic proportions and we concentrate on the middle east and build walls to find the monsters and keep them out. We are making our own monsters (ans so are many countries) How we nurture children matters...this is not some spontaneous combustion this is a man-made problem if not directly by silence apathy and fear....we go on silencing and normalizing child rape and abuse instead of discussing it openly in our society and normalizing survivors. At any rate...abuse has been normalized in America. Corporations aka our government treat the people like battered wives. And let's face it they are bigger and stronger and we need them to live. We are trapped in an abusive relationship with this whole unfeeling system. Meanwhile victims are shamed more and more each day treated as though we cause our own predicaments. Psychology 101...reliance on abusers.
The psychopaths who make billions, run corporations, become politicians and rape children wouldn't live long in a hunter gatherer community. Civilization is Original Sin!
The looming self-extinction of the human race will be the best thing that's happened to the Planet Earth in 10,000 years.
only somewhat LOL
There's no honesty or sincerity in them. The worst of it is cuts to SS and Medicare that give the Trust Fund working people's payroll tax built to the top 10% in the tax cut! The money has already been borrowed and spent on overpriced medicine and the fraudulent military industrial complex!
I'm not sure why you call this "neoliberal" instead of "conservative principles" is it more important to appear educated or to communicate? I honestly think that part of the problem is people using words like "neoliberal" when it's the Goddamn conservatives that are screwing the world.
Unless the ''Neoliberalism'' ideology is fully understood, the Politics and Economics that we all suffer under now - will seem unfathomable! Further to agk's reply, I strongly urge all readers to engage with ...
this - http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/35692-neoliberalism-the-ideology-at-the-root-of-all-our-problems by George Monbiot and also here is an alternate link to the very same excellent article:
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/apr/15/neoliberalism-ideology-problem-george-monbiot
Also perhaps consider this .. https://twitter.com/Shadz66Shadz6t6/status/882715801702236160
Furthermore, see .. http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/41145-bernie-sanders-on-resisting-trump-why-the-democratic-party-is-an-absolute-failure-and-more (Bernie Sanders & Amy Goodman/Vid)
I know that U fiercely identify with the word ''liberal'' but as you've said yourself before - That's Not Enuf!
http://occupywallst.org/forum/why-liberals-have-to-be-radicals/ An excellent forum-post & thread.
Finally & in compliment, consider ... http://billmoyers.com/story/radicals-at-heart-dont-forget-it/
per aspera ad astra ...
Is it like a neoradical that says oh we can't kill a big o political party like the GOP?
IF U don't or won't understand ''Neoliberalism'' for what it is - U are a far bigger idiot than previously imagined!!! Re.your ''Kill The GOP'' - well here's the best reply you ever got on the matter from DKAT:
http://occupywallst.org/forum/i-support-the-truth-party/#comment-1073907 & here's U
[Shock and Awe!!!] talking sense ... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yGcHlXO-3Zg
multum in parvo ...
Your weak ass shit gave us Trump I hope you're happy with YOUR choice!
You Trump loving idiot!
Neoradical.
Unable to see past the word ''Liberal'' ... you are rapidly turning into the DNC/Likud Faction's ex-mod, plant shooz here now, lolol! We both know that I've nothing to do with Trump - but that won't stop you transferring, projecting and taking out your umbrage at your friends & familly; kith & kin for being RW and voting for tRUMP - on us here! Finally, do U think Hellary War-Hawk would have challenged this:
spero meliora ..
you are not turning into anything you have always been a GOP sucker
Your mendacity is pathological & frankly, that's a very deeply RW trait. U are Sad.
http://occupywallst.org/forum/i-support-the-truth-party/#comment-1074022
More importantly, see http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/47174.htm
"Material abundance without character is the path of destruction"(Thomas Jefferson)
nosce te ipsum ...
The liberal in neoliberal is like the original, 241 years ago. It's about Adam Smith's "liberal economy." But today's conservative liberals [neoliberals] whether Repugnocrats, Libertarians or whatever, keep only the freedom of the invisible hand of Smith's naive hypothesis and dismiss all the warnings about runaway power in the private sector.
The Democrats since Carter have been free market true believers almost as much as the conservatives. They really are "neoliberals" just like the Wall St masters and the owners of all. The latter include those who hold the mortgages on most of what they don't own outright.
And yes, it is the conservatives who are screwing the world. The liberals are now almost as conservative as the Repugnacants. The free market is become a tool of the Tory traitors, who've owned most everything since before Adam Smith ["...Wealth of Nations" - 1776] and the American Revolution. The freedom to enslave, by debt or any other means, is abomination - no matter what it's called.
Well when you get done dancing on the head of that pin and maybe want do something, remember THAT begins with defeating the GOP.
you're not likely to get my applause for stating the obvious but when you preface the remark with an insult, there's no chance at all. Do you really want to facilitate an alignment to achieve an end or are you just into hearing your mouth go with petty BS criticism of everyone else?
I don't expect to make any friends here I just stick to the truth, the truth is there are a lot of people who post here that don't seem to understand even the basic requirement to defeat the GOP, sure there is a LOT of work to do but at its core we must defeat the GOP if we don't do that none of the other stuff matters, there are many on this site that dispute this simple fact and they are as much a part of the problem as those that vote for the GOP.
How does insulting potential allies win them over to your point of view? Trump's personal attacks energize the morons who voted for him but do nothing to forward his agenda. But he's so stupid he only cares about hearing his mouth go and the applause of his idiot supporters.
What is your plan to get support for toppling the GOP? Is it the same as theirs: attack the faults of the left and ignore the issues that matter?
You may be on the good side of the issues/fight but your tactics suck.
My plan is to tell the truth about the GOP, that they work to make the rich richer and money more powerful and make sure that any stupid shit that says stupid shit like there is no difference between HRC and Donald Trump are exposed as the stupid shits they are before they help elect another W Bush or Donald Trump because I am tried of stupid shits walking around acting like they give a shit when really they don't care who actually wins the election, no telling people the truth won't make me any friends, but if you need someone to blow smoke up your ass before you give a shit, then maybe it doesn't matter if you don't.
People who sit on their hands after Bernie had lost the nomination because HRC was just so bad are stupid shits, whither I say so or not, so how do you think you can get anything done if we are afraid to tell people the truth?
the truth is obscured by all those "shits"
ok ag I will give you this, just in case you actually want to know, my "plan" is to tell the truth, my "belief" is that the truth matters....
that's what I'm doing. I think most of those who post here believe that's what they're doing. fascists claim purity and truth too. it matters how you say it and the pain you're willing to inflict to get your truth out.
yeah a lot of people talk about truth but few face it head on whither it makes you friends or not, the truth is it matters who wins and the GOP always is the worse pick so pretending like it doesn't is lying and that is the opposite of truth so yeah i understand a lot of people claim to tell the truth but their truth depends on who is in the room....
marginal issues are better under dems but the decline of the middle class and impoverishment and debt enslavement have advanced steadily under both parties. the dems don't even slow it much. they pay lip service then cave to the parasites at every critical juncture. Maybe we need an ultimate conservative victory/meltdown to wake the fools who vote over and over for phony progressives and, insanely, expect a different result.
well as of right now the GOP have all the power at the federal level and most of the power at the state level, I think it is in part because elected Democrats are weak, when you see them on TV the R's claim to be conservative and talk about conservative values and such over and over while the D's never say liberal except to say "don't call me that" but people on the left running around complaining about "neo-liberals" all the time don't help matters much as I see it...
I think its time we had some proud liberals willing to say they are liberals and get in the face of people who want to dump on that...
how about proud socialists like Bernie? The average person in Cuba has better schools and medicine than the average American. Yeah, many professionals, land and factory owners lost their freedom to enslave but ordinary people are much better off than they were 50 to 60 years ago. Can we say the same?
well like I said right now the GOP have never been stronger so I guess attacking them wouldn't do any good? huh?
I think many on the left would rather spend their time attacking the DNC than talking about the GOP maybe that's why the GOP has so much power.
Which explains why the repeal of the aca happened in the 1st week of Drumpf's administration...........................Wait a sec........no the ACA is still the law of the land and the GOP has been unable to get anything else done either............huh........the GOP should always be so strong?
did you see what your man Trump did to the ACA today? your man Trump is doing the shit you want done eh?
the truth is the world is a shitty place right now
no argument there! but it gets us no closer to forming the critical mass of sane minds to effect real change or even get to a consensus of what that change must be.
sitting around while people say it doesn't matter who actually wins an election and saying nothing about how stupid it is to say such things is no better than the DNC or the GOP and certainly is in no way close to the truth
it hasn't mattered much who won elections for the past 50 years. what has to change to make it matter?
really? ok how about when wages were actually increasing over inflation as they did in the 90's? or how about when W Bush won over Gore and not a damn thing was done on climate change, you think we didn't miss a few things that could have been done? you don't think it matters that we went to war in Iraq? or do you think Gore would have done that? and yes Obama should have raised MW and put some bankers in jail, but do you really think there would have been no difference under McCain?
and let's not forget the truth is Nader put W Bush in the WH with his ego and forgetting that fact is the most dangerous thing we can ever do...
I said it's a little better and that the argument can be made that it must get worse to bring on real change. compromises with conservatives are death by a thousand cuts.
yeah too bad the planet doesn't have your time, but really in 2000 the Nader fools killed the planet so the truth is I don't know why I brother at all, it's not like it matters really the world is screwed, Nader saw to that in 2000, but still it's hard to see such a simple and easy solution and not tell people about it so i do, you know the simple solution that if there were no GOP in public office things would get better, but most people just want a tax cut....
Yes, indeed, when the knuckleheads get their tax cuts, they'd scream, "Ouch! That's Not what I meant." Too late! Meanwhile as usual, the rich'd get the biggest tax breaks of all, inheritance tax exemptions and corporate tax rate reductions(with more than two trillion dollars stashed overseas waiting for favorable repatriation, cutting by half implies a potential trillion-dollar-order-of-magnitude tax-exemption windfall for the U.S.-based corporations.)
We may eventually impeach Trump(家有家規，國有國法) but the inheritance tax reductions will make his family much richer with trust funds, regardless of what happens to him(71 years old, right? What usually happens, regardless of everything else?). Isn't that the real motive why he ran for the Presidency in the first place? "Drain the swamp of tax revenues at the U.S. Treasury and flood the nearby swamp hotel and the 'conservation' land of the golf resorts." Being a 'PR conservationist,' he had to get away to receive his honey pot treats most weekends(a few million dollars per 'holiday' weekend paid by the 'blackheads, brownheads, yellowheads, and whiteheads'), doing the 18 holes in the Spirit of Love. A shot of strong Johnnie Walker Black Label whisky is called for, to toast this scotch-earth moment.
Are you still glad you helped elect him?
''America has enjoyed over a half-century of productivity, during which we and our parents and grandparents all played a role, through our work efforts and our tax dollars. But the benefits have largely accrued to the relatively few people who know how to get rich by coordinating all the technological components, or by managing the money that derives from American innovation.
''Meanwhile, our jobs have been disappearing. It might be argued that we've been here before, that similar concerns about the takeover of technology surfaced during the Industrial Revolution and the space race. But there are two clear differences now. First, in the past, technology created manufacturing jobs, white-collar jobs, higher-paying jobs. Now the growth areas are in food service, retail and personal care, while the only one of the 10 fastest-growing occupations that pays over $33,000 per year is nursing. Secondly, globalization has outsourced middle-income jobs, such as those in manufacturing, which is still shedding workers after the post-2008 recession. Because of globalization, jobs are being outsourced not only from rich to poor countries, but also from one developing nation to another, as, for example, from China to Vietnam.
''We need the assurance that every American family receives a sufficient living income as compensation for the great productivity and unprecedented levels of wealth derived from decades of new technologies funded by our tax dollars. Ideally this would be done through new job creation. But short of that eventuality in our slowly adapting and politically inert society, a guaranteed income will become a necessity.'' - from ...
ad iudicium ...
Truth is these right wingers who want to rip away at the welfare state are the first ones to get in line to receive benefits when they, like any other human being, may come across unfortunate circumstances and need them.
Ayn Rand and Friederich Hayek, the queen and king of libertarianism and the "free market" and "rugged individualism" are at the top of the list.
"An interview with Evva Pryror, a social worker and consultant to Miss Rand’s law firm of Ernst, Cane, Gitlin and Winick verified that on Miss Rand’s behalf she secured Rand’s Social Security and Medicare payments which Ayn received under the name of Ann O’Connor (husband Frank O’Connor)."
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-ford/ayn-rand-and-the-vip-dipe_b_792184.html
http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/Screen-shot-2011-09-30-at-4.02.42-AM.png
one of the worst conservative lies is that social security is welfare. it's insurance we pay for through a payroll tax on workers. the trust fund that money goes into is solvent.
the reason the gov't must pay ss out of the general fund is that they borrowed and spent the trust fund on fraternity brothers' and in-laws' G-Contractor businesses, mostly in the military industrial complex. Now they want to dissolve ss so they don't have to pay back our money.
the cons want debt forgiveness ... for their frauds.
We must hold onto the hope that most humans want to do better and that the oligarchs will be overthrown by the sheer numbers of good people.
Jeremy Corbyn and Bernie Sanders think this is so.
https://theintercept.com/2017/07/13/video-naomi-klein-and-jeremy-corbyn-discuss-how-to-get-the-world-we-want/
Corbyn says "Don't be discouraged. At the end of the day human beings want to do things together. They want to do things collectively. And that's the kind of society we're trying to create."
More people than ever are aware of what the problems are. The next step is to convince them that there are solutions to those problems that can actually be implemented.
Christina walks about.
Into my heart on air that kills From yon far country blows: What are those blue remembered hills, What spires, what farms are those? That is the land of lost content, I see it shining plain, The happy highways where I went And cannot come again.
-- "Into my heart on air that kills" from "The Shropshire Lad" by A. E. Houseman.
"PISS OFF Plebs" says Chris Christie:
"This is my beach - in my New Jersey!
"So shut up and just keep voting
''Like Turkeys For Thanksgiving!"
also FYI see .. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/jul/03/new-jersey-beach-shut-for-everyone-bar-chris-christie-and-family
and: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/world-us-canada-40486350/chris-christie-and-beachgate-what-happened
Yep, the human hating psychopath that was Ayn Rand .. who has had an unspeakably terrible effect on the US Body Politic .. including on people like NJ's Cris Christie - would've died in the street without SS and Medicare. That particular irony was lost on her ardent acolyte - Alan Greenspan! On a happier note:
dum spiro spero ...
The NJ beaches were bad enough to take away from kids and families on 4th of July weekend who count on them for their holiday. Worse is when things like Grenfell Tower happen where hundreds die because of austerity cuts. Or, when millions lose health insurance coverage because the USA doesn't have the courage to take the profit out of healthcare. And hundreds of thousands will die if Trumpcare ever takes affect.
The truth is there is plenty of money to go around, the oligarchs just don't want to share it out. It's up to the people to demand it.
''The truth is there is plenty of money to go around, the oligarchs just don't want to share it out. It's up to the people to demand it." & ''demand it'' on The Streets because representative democracy has clearly broken down in The U$A!!! Ergo, re. Resisting Neoliberalism, please consider the following:
"Trying to Build in the Rubble of Neoliberalism" .. Michelle Alexander and Naomi Klein on Bringing Movements Together: http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/41175-trying-to-build-in-the-rubble-of-neoliberalism-michelle-alexander-and-naomi-klein-on-bringing-movements-together-in-the-trump-era &
''Imperialism Is Alive and Kicking: A Marxist Analysis of Neoliberal Capitalism'', by C.J. Polychroniou: http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/41204-imperialism-is-alive-and-kicking-a-marxist-analysis-of-neoliberal-capitalism
Finally, re. your substantive reply here: http://occupywallst.org/forum/a-st-paddys-post-hunger-the-real-irish-american-st/#comment-1073342 - where I can't reply .. I append this important yet infuriating read:
multum in parvo...
Regular libertarian type folk who just want their "freedom" don't realize how the oligarchic libertarians are so totally about taking that very freedom away from them.
Interesting article by Mark Karlin showing how purposefully the wealthy go about actually removing freedom and democracy from the people. Here's an excerpt:
"And from that kind of thought, Buchanan offered strategic advice to corporations on how to fight the kind of reforms and taxation that came with more inclusive democracy. In the 1990s, for example, as Koch was getting more involved at George Mason, Buchanan convened corporate and rightwing leaders to teach them how to use what he called the "spectrum of secession" to undercut hard-won reforms through measures that have now become core to Republican practice: decentralization, devolution, federalism, privatization, and deregulation. We tend to see the race to the bottom as fallout from globalization, but Buchanan's guidance and the Koch team's application of it through the American Legislative Exchange Council and the State Policy Network reveals how it is in fact a highly conscious strategy to free capital of restraint by the people through their governments."
"Debunking Libertarian Myths" .. was a series of three OWS forum-posts done by sff80 from Norway, which really do warrant being remembered here at this or any time, as does he:
http://occupywallst.org/forum/debunking-libertarian-myths/ and, re.sff80:
http://occupywallst.org/forum/search/?q=user%3Astruggleforfreedom80
Also pertinent here,see http://reclaimdemocracy.org/powell_memo_lewis/
Thanx for excerpting that fine article by Mark Karlin. Such pieces do deserve wide readership in a time when The 99% in U$A need to discover the roots of their Oligarchic Corporate Tyranny. Ergo 3rd Link^.
fiat lux ...
Excellent post. Struggleforfreedom was a great occupier. Most "libertarians" have no idea what it's really about. If you're not wealthy, heed this warning, libertarianism is not for you. It's main goal is to oppress others economically, including you.
In U$A, "Libertarianism" is an ideology of Extreme Selfishness - raised to faux-virtue by psychopaths!
e tenebris, lux?