Perry's Ponzi Scheme

So, U.S. president wanna-be Rick Perry has come out with guns a'blazing at Social Security. It's a "Ponzi scheme," he claims. It won't be there for young people when they need it. It's even unconsititutional!

First, don't you think that all of the rabid Social Security critics and fascists--particularly those with legal training--who have tried to dismantle the program in the seven decades since FDR signed it into law would have mounted legal battles and, if it really were unconstitutional, would have been able to get it struck down as such?

Second, who does Perry think he's fooling by saying Social Security won't be around for Americans who haven't yet reached 65? Even if nothing's done to change anything, it will be fully funded for the next 25 years. And by making one simple change--raising the $106,000 cap on which income is subject to Social Security tax, or better yet removing the cap altogether--it can be solvent for a great deal longer. (Yes, that's right, folks, all those mega millionaires who already skate on paying their "fair share" of taxes on the lucre that overflows their coffers, pay nothing into Social Security over the first $106,000 of their income. That cap is just one more way the rich guys have bought off lawmakers.)

Third--and most important--by saying Social Security has got to go and that people need to rely on private pensions, Perry is providing irrefutable proof that he's been living either under a rock or in deep space for the past decade. It was during his fellow Texan's turn at the presidential till that private pensions began to disappear--just ask United Airline employees whose wonderful pensions were simply confiscated--as company execs and boards of directors began to raid employee pension funds to cover their faltering operations budgets.

And that's for the folks who are 'fortunate' enough to have jobs that even provide any benefits at all. So, what are the "private pensions" is Perry talking about? 401Ks? IRAs? CDs? The stock market? Storing gold bricks in the closet?

Oh my god, no, Mr. Perry! Ain't no way anybody is ever going to have any kind of retirement fund if it's going to be up to you and the greedy, grasping, heartless, soulless corporate world.

Social Security is exactly what its name says it is. It provides at least a modicum of security for aging people in our society and for their children and grandchildren so they won't be burdened with having to support granny and great-grandma in addition to their own children and hope for any kind of a decent lifestyle. Social Security keeps everyone--except the mega rich like Mr. Perry and his well-heeled cronies who don't need it--from becoming impoverished and being put in the poorhouse.

Oh wait! Poorhouses don't exist anymore, do they. And when they did, they were government institutions, weren't they? So I'm sure Perry will make sure they don't resurface. 'Cause no gubment is good gubment, is it Mr. Rick "I want to be prezdent of what I think is evil" Perry?

Nope, I'm way too conservative to want to trust my future and that of my children, children and great-grandchildren, or the well-being of The People of this country to a Perry parisite of what he wants to destroy (keeping in mind that he will keep intact any way he and his ilk can benefit from a government program as he has done so well as governor of Texas).