Guest Post by Patrick J. Buchanan
In the first quarter of 2015, in the sixth year of the historic Obama recovery, the U.S. economy grew by two-tenths of 1 percent.
And that probably sugarcoats it.
For trade deficits subtract from the growth of GDP, and the U.S. trade deficit that just came in was a monster.
As the AP’s Martin Crutsinger writes, “The U.S. trade deficit in March swelled to the highest level in more than six years, propelled by a flood of imports that may have sapped the U.S. economy of any growth in the first quarter.”
The March deficit was $51.2 billion, largest of any month since 2008. In goods alone, the trade deficit hit $64 billion.
As Crutsinger writes, a surge in imports to $239 billion in March, “reflected greater shipments of foreign-made industrial machinery, autos, mobile phones, clothing and furniture.”
What does this flood of imports of things we once made here mean for a city like, say, Baltimore? Writes columnist Allan Brownfeld:
“Baltimore was once a city where tens of thousands of blue collar employees earned a good living in industries building cars, airplanes and making steel. … In 1970, about a third of the labor force in Baltimore was employed in manufacturing. By 2000, only 7 percent of city residents had manufacturing jobs.”
Put down blue-collar Baltimore alongside Motor City, Detroit, as another fatality of free-trade fanaticism.
For as imports substitute for U.S. production and kill U.S. jobs, trade deficits reduce a nation’s GDP. And since Bill Clinton took office, the U.S. trade deficits have totaled $11.2 trillion.
An astronomical figure.
It translates not only into millions of manufacturing jobs lost and tens of thousands of factories closed, but also millions of manufacturing jobs that were never created, and tens of thousands of factories that did not open here, but did open in Mexico, China and other Asian countries.
In importing all those trillions in foreign-made goods, we exported the future of America’s young. Our political and corporate elites sold out working- and middle-class America — to enrich the monied class.
And they sure succeeded.
Yet, remarkably, Republicans who wail over Obama’s budget deficits ignore the more ruinous trade deficits that leech away the industrial base upon which America’s self-reliance and military might have always depended.
Last month, the U.S. trade deficit with the People’s Republic of China reached $31.2 billion, the largest in history between two nations.
Over 25 years, China has amassed $4 trillion in trade surpluses at our expense. And where are the Republicans?
Talking tough about building new fleets of planes and ships and carriers to defend Asia from the rising threat of China, which those same Republicans did more than anyone else to create.
Now this GOP Congress is preparing to vote for “fast track” and surrender its right to amend any Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal that Obama brings home.
But consider that TPP. While the propaganda is all about a deal to cover 40 percent of world trade, what are we really talking about?
First, TPP will cover 37 percent of world trade. But 80 percent of that is trade between the U.S. and nations with which we already have trade deals. As for the last 20 percent, our new partners will be New Zealand, Malaysia, Vietnam, Brunei and Japan.
Query: Who benefits more if we get access to Vietnam’s market, which is 1 percent of ours, while Hanoi gets access to a U.S. market that is 100 times the size of theirs?
The core of the TPP is the deal with Japan.
But do decades of Japanese trade surpluses at our expense, achieved through the manipulation of Japan’s currency and hidden restrictions on U.S. imports, justify a Congressional surrender to Barack Obama of all rights to amend any Japan deal he produces?
Columnist Robert Samuelson writes that a TPP failure “could produce a historic watershed. … rejection could mean the end of an era. … So, when opponents criticize the Trans-Pacific Partnership, they need to answer a simple question: Compared to what?”
Valid points, and a fair question.
And yes, an era is ending, a post-Cold War era where the United States threw open her markets to nations all over the world, as they sheltered their own. The end of an era where America volunteered to defend nations and fight wars having nothing to do with her own vital interests or national security.
The bankruptcy of a U.S. trade and foreign policy, which has led to the transparent decline of the United States and the astonishing rise of China, is apparent now virtually everywhere.
And America is not immune to the rising tide of nationalism.
Though, like the alcoholic who does not realize his condition until he is lying face down in the gutter, it may be a while before we get out of the empire business and start looking out again, as our fathers did, for the American republic first. But that day is coming.
@Nickel: “With that said, I can tell you that there is no grand conspiracy to destroy America. No one is sitting here saying, “lets screw the middle class.” No, what everyone does is fulfill their legal binding obligation to maximize profits. Patriotism, nationalism and civic responsibility are not written in to the legal framework of the U.S. corporate structure. It isn’t even something that can be addressed.”
And that is the problem. Nobody puts the country first. Money/profits/power rule the day. Sounds like you are smack in the middle of the corporate facism monster. Do you like being there?
And you are dead wrong–there ABSOLUTELY a grand conspiracy to destroy America. Maybe not by the people you sit with in that room, but can you deny there is a demented plan afoot?
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starhumper- But if you want to participate in the american market, you need to have the living shit tarriffed out of you on the way in.
+1000
Americans should take care of American , first and foremost.
anon was I.
starfcker, Pat may be right on what needs to happen or what should happen but the fork in the road that led to those things is no longer visible in the rear view mirror and for all intents and purposes, we’re on a one way road. As TE said, there will be no return to greatness.
The events unfolding throughout the world today are designed to destroy all national sovereignty and finalize the global, new world order. What “was” is over my friend. We will continue down this road until a complete economic collapse or world war takes place. Even then, our owners will be positioning themselves to bring the new world order to fruition while dining elegantly as they oversee armies of young men die in a giant, calculated real world game of RISK!
The solution is to exterminate the owners with extreme prejudice and outlaw their ilk for externity! Only then will saner minds begin to gain traction.
I-S- +100
Well said and I agree. So why do these people believe there are still “good guys in white hats” here to turn it all around?
Bea, By and large I believe THE PEOPLE have the right ideas and good hearts but they have become SHEOPLE that have allowed themselves to be captured and owned by the owners in small, almost unnoticeable incremental steps (a brilliant strategy by our owners BTW) and now these cocksuckers run the show. The suffering headed our way will be unimaginable but necessary to wake the SHEOPLE from their complacency and knock the owners from their perch. If we survive this chaos then reasonable men will be able to restore our Republic but not until the chaos runs its course.
There are many things wrong with big business but they are forced to meet their obligations while followings laws and regulation. The problem is not big business, it’s the laws and regulation. Laws and regulations should be made to benefit the MAJORITY in our country. Lobbyists and special interests should be absolutely banned from DC and confined to a 3 sq. ft. area directly downwind of the sewer plant or dump in every American community.
But, then again humans are involved………………therefore, I like Billy’s hangman noose solution. It’s a bit extreme but gets the message out especially if you let them dangle until there’s nothing left to dangle.
Nickelthrower is quite correct. There is no grand plan. People are working within the framework they have. Politcians keep fucking with the framework.
I agree with IS, too, except when he says events have been designed. I do not believe they have – it is just a steady accumulation of stupid decisions.
Way up the thread, Star asked, well what is the answer.
Fact is, not everything has an answer, and this is the case with the current world situation, save for a major reset.
The bullet has left the gun, and there is now no stopping it.
Protectionist trade policies will not work. People could buy US made at any time but will not. Why should, once again, the govt impose its will on the people, who are making their own decisions in the matter?
Because it is smarter? It knows what is best? For fuck sake, that is opposite of liberty – it is just one further enslavement.
Liberty s about being free to choose. People need to choose wisely. They are not. But that is no reason to deprive them of their right to choose.
Llpoh, the bullshit that put the united states this position were just political decisions. We can make different ones. Looks like we’re going to. The people who invested in china? So sorry. Dumb shits. I’ve seen friends property get nationalized in the bahamas, for christ sake. China? Ha ha ha ha. SUckers
And llpoh, I have never once argued against allowing anybody to set up shop in china. More power to them. But they don’t have a ‘right’ to access the most lucrative markets in the world, cost free. Fuck them, we have laws against slavery. That’s the way niggers think. Rights. Fuck that.
Star, there are too many problems to list, but I will make a start:
– substandard educational system
– govt drones making more than private citizens while being protected from any disciplinary action
– EPA over-regulation
– absurd taxes across business and individuals
– loss of individual freedoms – right to bear, illegal search, etc ad infinitum
– growing policy state
– absurd welfare state
– lack of personal responsibility
– foreign aggression and the cost thereof
– entrenched politicians
– steady loss of mfg jobs to tech/outsourcing with no industry to replace the lost jobs
– technological nature of work increasingly beyond skills and abilities of many individuals
– degradation of the family structure and erosion of morals
– rampant and uncontrolled illegal immigration
– fraudulent banking system
– govt and private addiction to debt
– loss of work ethic
– over-protection of citizens by the govt
– failure to develop energy independence
– crumbling infrastructure
– absurd cost of medical care and insurance
I can go on and on and on. The list is damn near endless. There is no stopping this derailing train.
The world, the country, was not meant to be like this. Life was not meant to be easy, with free stuff and cradle to grave care.
People were meant to work hard, study hard, and take care of themselves, their families, their communities, and their country.
Free rides were never on the agenda – until the last fifty years. The concept that there should be/will be an affluent middle class by divine right is false. It can only happen if there exists a hard-working, dedicated, honest society that pushes itself forward, and even then it is not guaranteed – the society must compete with the other societies.
The US cannot compete at the moment, and may never do so again. It is ageing rapidly, and by 2030 will have 1 retired person to every 2 workers. That is a recipe for disaster, and the US will not pull out of its current nosedive in 15 years.
It is going to be an absolute disaster.
The entire system has failed.
The answer lies in personal responsibility, and in individual liberty, in my opinion, and that answer will not occur until the current situation crashes.
But the US will not rise again to what it relatively was. That time has passed.
Star – you miss the point. You think you know better than the people who are happy to buy from China, and so are prepared to impose your will.
People have the right to make their own choices. If enough want tariffs, it will happen. But they do not so want. They want cheap foreign shit.
I am not prepared to advocate that a minority over-ride the will of the majority. It is that simple.
Put it to the people, honestly, and hear what they say. Tell them:
“We need to protect US jobs by putting in place tariffs that will drive the price of goods up 10% but will add 1 million jobs” and see what answer you get. Also, do not fail to mention the prospect of trade sanctions that might affect US exports.
They will revolt at the price increase. Especially the hundred million or more that are govt drones and free-shitters.
The people do not want what you are selling.
Llpoh
Your 6:52…7:49…7:59 posts, very good, agreed.
I-S
Thanks, could not agree with you more.
lloph, you keep saying to buy American, but what’s left that is made in the U.S. to buy other than American cars? Or are you referring to manufacturing purchases?
Also I said there is a conspiracy to take down America but you say there is no “grand plan”. How do you explain policies that favor the new world order (TPP/Agenda 21/etc.), no border enforcement, nobody in jail for the financial fiascos, and more. Are these just a series of bumbling political mistakes and mismanagement? Are our leaders and corporate titans that incompetent? Or is it simply a matter of greed and corruption both in guv and the private sector that shows no regard for loyalty to country?
I do you agree with you on this: “But the US will not rise again to what it relatively was. That time has passed.” I just disagree with how we got here and the means that are enabling it.
Llpoh says:
“Nickelthrower is quite correct. There is no grand plan.”
I don’t believe that at all. Among the worlds central bankers, our real owners, there is a definite, deliberate plan. The politicians work for and are beholden to the bankers. Everyone else, from big business to sheople is forced to work within the framework established by our owners and implemented and enforced by our politicians.
This is why nothing makes sense to regular, sane people. Our owners establish a set of goals. The goals serve to further enrich them but more importantly the serve to increase their power and control. The owners finance the politicians careers in exchange for the politicians implementing the plans/goals of the owners. The owners then have scapegoats to blame, frame and punish when shit goes sideways. Just think about how a newly elected President’s stated goals and plans change between campaign/election day and their swearing in. My guess is that they get “invited” to a meeting soon after election day where they are given the current “agenda” and then shown a never before seen version of the Zapruder Film that perfectly and plainly shows what really happened that day, before being asked if they have any “questions”. Of course each newly elected President is given a little latitude to implement a few of his own pet projects as long as the main goals and plans are taking shape.
For the most part our Federal politicians, the ones with real pull, are just as educated and savvy as you are llpoh but they are marching to the drums of someone else. Making what appear to be the most fucked up and asinine decisions to “us” is just quid pro quo to between them and their masters. I think this is why there are so many career federal politicians. llpoh, you know how hard it is to find a good employee that does what you say without question………same goes for our owners. Once they find a Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi, John Boehner or Mitch McConnel, they do what it takes to keep them grinning like bat shit crazy morons for the cameras.
The politicians no longer work for the people. Maybe they never did. They are definitely working for someone and the incentives/benefits are more than enough to make them willing to look like complete idiots and sell outs….even traitors.
llpoh, you say the entire system has failed. I agree with you but there is a very tiny minority that has benefited and continues to benefit from this failure. What looks like epic failure to you and I and even the man on the street is nothing but blue skies and sunshine for that tiny minority.
Your short list of problems can be explained entirely and neatly by my post at 10:27pm.
Or by George Carlin!
Rise up – I posted a link re where you can find US made products. Justabout anything you want can be found US made. But it will cost you, and you have to look for it.
Doubt you will do it, though. No one does anymore.
Llpoh 7:49 pm + 1,000 in recognition of the pending election, I’ll attempt to post a video by the best band ever to come out of Califuckingfornia.
Ah fuck it. Click the link.
Whenever there is a tree in bloom it is because of a very specific set of conditions- season, soil quality, water, age, vigor, etc.
A blooming cherry tree is a beautiful sight, the orchard right now is like a painting and the scent is almost maddening.
During the past winter one of the tree was girdled by field mice under the snow and though it has thrown buds, they failed to develop and the tree- while alive and drawing nutrients through the roots from the soil- has no ability to produce fruit because the function required has been damaged beyond the point of recovery. I know I have to remove it because otherwise it will attract all form of parasites that will take advantage of its weakened condition and if left among the healthy trees in the orchard, that condition will spread.
It is virtually impossible for Americans to even begin to understand why the founders of this nation considered liberty and self sufficiency to be the foundations of its construction because they are so many generations removed from those practices. Furthermore they no longer see themselves as part of a natural system because they have created man made systems- cities, houses, factories and cars are far more likely to be the places where people spend the majority of their time rather than pastures, fields, forests and orchards. In those places the element of morality, the practice of politics, the concept of ideology are all meaningless. If a corporate CEO was suddenly given my ruined cherry tree as their next project their plan would almost certainly be to fix what’s wrong with it. That’s what Pat Buchanan is trying to do with America. Like Llpoh said, it’s not fixable. No amount of capital, no passage of any legislation, no policy, no program, no restored patriotism, no return to past ideals will save this Nation from its fate. The question is when will people realize that the time has come to let go of our emotional attachment to a failed system.
Nations, like forests or reefs, are living organisms made up of large numbers of living beings that are similar enough in their biology to work together for a common goal. The life spans of the individuals are much shorter than the life span of the collective organism, thus it is hard to see the differing trajectories of each. While the collective organism may look just fine to the individual member when it looks around, it cannot see the dissolution and the febrile nature of the mass in decline. At some point the reef chokes out the depth required for it’s needs, built upon the skeletons of the dead that created it. Just as the old growth forest hits the stage where its inevitable end is brought upon by a single spark, our own collective biological organism- the nation- is awaiting its own death without knowing it is coming.
And thus we have the waving of hands, the posing of solutions, the seeking of answers by those like Pat B. who are intelligent enough to see it approaching, but ignorant enough to have allowed his own genetic contribution to the continuation of the species come up snake eyes. There will be a conflagration or there will be a slow rotting from the core that ends with collapse but the end result will not be the USA, but rather the salted plains of Carthage, or the buried ruins of Troy. Other vital, young and self aware tribes and races will flower on the same soil again under another name with another look and another destiny. Pieces of the past nation will remain as warnings or as rubble for the new foundations that will be built, but it will be gone for eternity.
I have a cherry tree to remove.
HSF, that has to be the dumbest post you’ve ever put up. Wake up on the wrong side of the bed or something? I like metaphors, but they’ve got to be good ones. A girdled tree just dies, it doesn’t take anything else with it. At some point the reef chokes out the depth? Gibberish. I’m an expert on coral reefs, and an expert on trees. Run rings around you on both.
Yes, the nation is a mess, a real mess. Is it terminal? This is where we disagree. Every new administration has a series of choices. Broad policies sort of set the course, like the proverbial steering of the aircraft carrier. No input is instantly noticeable. But our problems are just political. We aren’t doomed. Our system isn’t doomed. It’s challenged for sure. But overall, the busses still run on time.
I don’t believe our problems will be solved by revolution, or violence. I could be wrong, but probably not. The people most responsible for our decline are aging out very quickly, and I’m young enough to watch them go. Obama has been an abberation. I don’t think we will make that mistake again. We were sold a bill of goods by a bunch of liberal do goods who seem to have started understanding how badly they were fooled,
Look at Wisconsin. Walker clipped the teachers unions hard, in a blue blue state. Talk about political third rails. He has survived, triumphed really, in two elections since. OBL, people will follow the strong horse. You are old enough to remember LBJ/nixon/ford/carter. That was a mess, too. Nothing happening right now that can’t be fixed
HSF
If this experiment in liberty dies and we become just another segment of a communist world government, remember that you will no longer have the right voice your discontent and I sincerely doubt that you would have the right to own private property on which to grow your cherry trees.
There will be no “come back” for the USA. No sir, and Buchanan and Ron Paul won’t save us. The water is circling the bowl and once it’s flushed there is no going back to liberty.
“By definition, the future belongs to the breeders.”
Yeah, that’ll be a GREAT deal. They’ll be really happy to have that.
Bea, scratching my head at all the people who think we’re doomed. Have you ever even missed lunch? Globalization is a failure on one big level. It’s not self sustaining, any more than baltimore can be self sustainable without productive industry. The feds keep trying to boost purchasing power by giving the unproductive money. One big malinvestment that begats a million more.
hardscrabble farmer says: If a corporate CEO was suddenly given my ruined cherry tree as their next project their plan would almost certainly be to fix what’s wrong with it.
I read of a guy once, the board hired him as CEO and offered him a huge bonus if he could get a much larger amount of uncollected receivable monies down by such and such a date. On his first day he wrote off the entire amount and collected his bonus. Easy Peasy.
Llpoh despises hard working people, and it gushes out bitterly in his writing, but if you ignore that he makes some really good points. “People were meant to work hard, study hard, and take care of themselves, their families, their communities and their country”. I couldn’t say it better. But then he goes on to say that liberty is threatened if he can’t use slave labor in china and import duty free. Not a very bright perspective.
But I am, as quinn likes to tell me, just a dumbass with an opinion. But reread buchanan’s post. See if you can shoot holes in his facts and numbers. I trust his analysis over the pro multi-national cheerleaders here, anyday.
starfcker says: Llpoh despises hard working people, and it gushes out bitterly in his writing,
Your assessment of LLPOH is so ass-backwards, it’s not even wrong. Quite the opposite, just because he admits you can’t fight the herd mentality does not mean he is not for buying American and rewarding hard work.
You should review the LLPOH Bible.
starfcker says: But I am, as quinn likes to tell me, just a dumbass with an opinion.
Even Sir Stucky was once wrong as a noob.
EC, relax. I’m fine with llpoh. We agree on lots of things, but he has a blind spot. No big deal. Self interest will do that. If he lived in my town, I’d pick up his bar tabs. I like strong opinions, whether I agree with them or not. It’s the opposite of political correctness.
“NickelthroweR says:
@Starfcker
I get it but how is it different than Communism? If the State dictates what you can produce (EPA, FDA, SEC) and where you MUST acquire your inputs then it sure looks like Communism to me.”
Yes, BUT:
If the Corporations dictates what you can produce (EPA, FDA, SEC) and where you MUST acquire your inputs then it sure looks like Communism to me, and THAT is the problem with the fee trade deals and their hidden provisions (such as we have had a glimmer of in the TPPA leaks) that will allow the corporations to sue governments in secret courts and either pay billions in penalties or capitulate.
seem interested in maximizing the health and profits to their corporation the the CEOs would not be incentivized to pump the share price through buy backs via additional corporate debt that can not be sustained.
Step back – long term trends in where society is going and no one in power (except the real elite) seem to have a long term horizon, it’s all gimmme mine now!
starfcker said:
“Nothing happening right now that can’t be fixed”
You’re right. However, you assume that the people in charge want to fix what we perceive as a problem. What we perceive as a problem for us is working out just fine for the owners which is why it continues against all logic and reason.
More than 50% of the sheople are members of the Free Shit Army. These morons will NEVER vote for less free shit……..EVER. The owners are profiting mightily while simultaneously consolidating power. The media, owned and controlled by the owners, no longer informs. The politicians are fat dumb and happy implementing theplans/goals of the owners. The rest of us, despite knowing there are problems are sort of stuck between a rock and a hard place. We’re trying to maintain what we have, put kids through college, save for retirement and in many ways, trying to maintain against hope the American middle class life that served as our example from day one.
Where exactly is this impetus to “fix” things? We’ve passed that “Last Services” exit on the highway leading into the desert. Our owners are going to run this ship aground at full speed much like that Germanwings pilot did. They will profit from that too via Hegelian Dialectictic! It’s heads they win and tails we lose. The momentum of this clusterfuck alone practically guarantees a massive crash.
starfcker said: ”
Llpoh despises hard working people, and it gushes out bitterly in his writing,”
Your problem is beginning to come into focus. Reading comprehension is not your strong suit.
TYPO in above post where some text got deleted, this is corrected: “NickelthroweR says:
@Starfcker
I get it but how is it different than Communism? If the State dictates what you can produce (EPA, FDA, SEC) and where you MUST acquire your inputs then it sure looks like Communism to me.”
Yes, BUT:
If the Corporations dictates what you can produce (EPA, FDA, SEC) and where you MUST acquire your inputs then it sure looks like Communism to me, and THAT is the problem with the free trade deals and their hidden provisions (such as we have had a glimmer of in the TPPA leaks) that will allow the corporations to sue governments in secret courts and either pay billions in penalties or capitulate.
ALSO if the boards were truly interested in their real responsibility to steer a corporation to a truly healthy fiduciary existence with real sustainable profits to their corporation then the CEOs would not be given bonus based incentives to pump the share price through buy backs via additional corporate debt that can not be sustained.
Step back – long term trends in where society is going and no one in power (except the real elite) seem to have a long term horizon, it’s all gimmme mine now!
Billy,
Re: PBJ, I would like to agree with you where we would be if he had been elected a fair time ago, unfortunately I think PBJ wold have ended up where Kennedy did if he had made it to POTUS.
IS, give me a break, i went to public school. Clip your ending, and you might have the best post on this thread. Let me try to address the good questions you raise, top to bottom. The people in charge desperately want to fix things. But not by changing anything. They just want things to work out the way they are really badly. They see what’s coming
Globalization was an all in bet, and contrary to what llpoh says, was never the will of the majority. Done properly, it could have been, to quote lloyd blankfein, gods work. But the wheels fell off in 08. Everything that has happened since then is has been a clusterfuck of hubris, corruption and deciet. And so it morphs to oligarchy.
“The people in charge desperately want to fix things. But not by changing anything. They just want things to work out the way they are really badly. They see what’s coming”
What is not changing? The jobs are still going away, wages are still being reduced. Wars of choice are still being pursued. Wealth of the bottom 99% continues to be transferred to the 1%. Freedom and Liberty continue to be eroded. Purchasing power continues to be eroded. Taxes, fees and penalties continue to be raised and imposed. Sovereignty continues to be eroded. Property ownership continues to decline. Small businesses continue to be regulated out of existence. The Free Shit Army expands unabated. This list goes on.
The people in charge are NOT the people you vote for. The people in charge are providing the fixes I’ve listed. These fixes benefit them greatly. The people in charge don’t give a shit about you or your silly beliefs regarding right and wrong.
What part of this do you not get?
I’m dead serious about my comment regarding llpoh. For you to claim llpoh despises hard working people is beyond laughable. Perhaps you have not read many of his posts over the years. (sorry, I don’t know how long you’ve been a part of TBP)
The FSA only gets to 50% if you include retirees, SS, retired military and so forth. I don’t. Nothing dishonorable about those people.
starfucker, It’s quite clear that there are some fundamental things regarding the management of this global plantation that you do not know or agree with.
Who and where are all these people who want things to be fixed? What kind of power, influence and authority do they have to do so? Don’t you think that if some group of people wanted things to be fixed that we would be moving in that direction instead of running away from it?
SS recipients generally receive far more than they put in. That perpetuates the problem and makes them feel entitled. They deserve nothing more than what they put in. The military pensions I can’t argue with but I will say that without our owners having the ability to print money from thin air, military pensions are entirely unsustainable. Lifetime pensions for 20 years of service is just a tool to buy votes and obtain volunteers to be cannon fodder.
Llpohs a big boy. I’m going to tweak him now then. He’ll be ok. Rule number one for surviving in a tough environment. Don’t stand up unless they’re calling your name
IndenturedServant -SS recipients generally receive far more than they put in. That perpetuates the problem and makes them feel entitled. They deserve nothing more than what they put in.
Aren’t people entitled to interest on money loaned , just like banksters , who BTW get bailed out when their bets go bad?
Shouldn’ t the productive of this nation receive the same ROI protections as is doled out to the big banks or are we beneath the banking industry and deserve no amount of protection for our hard-earned investment in the government of these United States?
Get em, flash. IS, you’re brilliant in one sentence, and a dumbfuck in the next, because you pulling in unrelated and opposing facts to make your case. Learn to stay on point. Whether or not we have SS or military pensions are fine topics, in a different discussion. But how do you make the jump that they are grifters
flash, I absolutely believe that people are entitled to interest on loans and ROI. One small catch though, your contributions to SS is not a loan and no interest is paid on your contributions. I stand ready to be corrected.
You practically prove my earlier point regarding the changes afoot with ” just like banksters , who BTW get bailed out when their bets go bad?” Where are the sane people and leaders that are preventing this shit? I seem to recall a huge public outcry against the first bailouts but they were rammed down our throats anyway. This is just more evidence that our owners are firmly in control. Your congress critters work for them………not us.
starfucker, my most recent SS “contribution” was well north of $300 via payroll deduction yet my SS benefits statement (from memory) indicates my benefit at age 67 will be about $2800. Maybe you are some kind of math savant that can pencil out how my $300+ contribution magically translates to a $2800 MONTHLY benefit roughly 20 years from now in a program that pays no interest or dividends.
Allow me to answer…….CENTRAL BANK PRINTING PRESS.
Once a SS recipient has been paid back his total contribution, every other penny they receive is on the backs of those still working. At that point they become FSA members. Just because they contributed $3.22 a week back in 1952 does not translate to their current monthly benefit of $1000 or more. They continue to vote and demand more. That is how SS recipients become grifters.
I made no claim that military retirees were grifters. They honored their end of the agreement. I simply stated the fact that they benefit from something that would not be possible if the owners did not have a printing press. If we had a sound currency, I doubt that those pensions would have been promised in the first place. Again, I stand ready to be corrected.