Essays
Resources

Contact Me

Politics • Essays

Who Will the Government Pay Back First: You or China?

05-20-2009

As a working American, you have paid roughly 12% of all the income you have earned your whole life into Social Security. Is this your money? In my opinion it certainly is. The government took it from you with the promise that it would manage it wisely for you and provide for your future retirement. Please underscore that last part: the government took your money because it deemed itself more capable than you for providing for you in your golden years.

Let us begin with the assertion, then, that this is your money. Upon your retirement the government owes it to you, with interest.

The trouble is, we are now told that the Social Security system is teetering on the edge of backruptcy and soon won't be able to pay. You see, the government has been borrowing from the piggy bank of the Social Security trust fund and filling it with IOU's it has no ability to pay back. Even the Treasury, under the leadership of the current administration, can't print Obamabucks® fast enough to provide even an illusory blanket to conceal this improvidence.

In light of this conflict between a ream of obligations and empty coffers, my advice to the government is to be ready to pay the people back their money, and to encourage the kind of economic growth that can settle Uncle Sam's outstanding debts.

The government that has been all too happy to saddle future generations with debt to the Chinese must begin exercising the fiscal discipline it will take to reimburse those of us from whom it compelled a substantial portion of our earnings.

To do so, Uncle Sam needs to stop plahing "Uncle Santa" and, instead, begin behaving like it is beholden to you. It needs to court your respect with at least as much humilty as it displays when it bows to Arab moguls.

Is it too much to demand that the US Government meet its Social Security obligations? No? If anything, it extends too much generosity to a government that has exploited your trust, work ethic, and goodwill. As Americans, we have gotten too used to expecting too little from government. If we were treated by a waitress or a clerk like we are treated by say, local road construction crews, the DMV, airport screeners, or switchboard opersators in Washington DC, we would demand our money back AND demand to see the manager. Why are we conditioned to expect so little of the government? We cannot afford to do so any more.

Our leaders in Washington must be held to higher standards. They must pay their debts. As the baby boomers retire, they must be paid their money back. With interest. Period. America must unfetter the economy now and get out of the business of paying for everything everyone thinks they need to have a carefree, happy life on someone else's dime. This means saying so long to sweetheart contracts for donors back home, so long to Murtha airports, to bridges to nowhere,to foreign aid to countries that hate us anyway. This means saying so long to cash not to grow crops, to federal and state dollars for roads that don't last and schools that can't teach kids to read or write but can show them how to put a condom on a banana.

Uncle Sam - pay us before you pay China. Do not borrow from China to pay us. Grow US wealth, do not endenture her citizens.

In closing, the time has come to tell Obama and big-spending Republicans to be honest and loyal to their own citizens, The debt economy not only has got to stop, it HAS stopped. Dear federal government, pay Americnas what they paid you, pay it with dignity, and quit playing games with other peoples' livelihoods because you think you are smarter than everyone else.

Top