The other Ponzi scheme

Now that justice has been served by the sentencing for Bernie Madoff’s Ponzi scheme, when are we going to get a grand jury to indict the 535 members of the House and Senate for running an even bigger Ponzi?

The scoundrels have apologized for slavery. When will they own up to the rest of us for running an even bigger scheme, Social Security?

Joe Neuner
Olathe

Comments

[JoCo]

But back to the segue in the original letter!

"Now that justice has been served by the sentencing....." I must say, Joe, you have a strange take on justice if you think it's been served, or ever can be served in the Madoff case. Best talk to the real victims of the scheme to get their feelings. There are many more culprits to come as well as cash to follow.

So, in your style, now that the Madoff case has been shown to be largely unresolvable due to the many details, legal nuance, and lost money, the myriad problems with the slow-to-adapt SS system make its resolution a revolving undertaking.

Not at all an "OK, next case" proposition.

[Engineer]

Whispering
Didn't the Democrsts raise the SS "take" from workers when it was already more than reqired to pay SS costs and put the rest in the General Fund? Where it was promptly spent? Trilions of dollars? Wasn't this really just a tax increase hidden under another name?

[whispering_to_kc]

That was part of Alf Landon’s attack on FDR's Social Security - September 26, 1936 - running against FDR. Alf's speech, "I Will Not Promise the Moon", presented in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/8128

Alf won two states a few weeks later.

[whispering_to_kc]

... Let me explain it in another way, in the simple terms of the family budget. The father of the family is a kindly man, so kindly that he borrows all he can to add to the family’s pleasure. At the same time he impresses upon his sons and daughters the necessity of saving for their old age.

Every month they bring 6 per cent of their wages to him so that he may act as trustee and invest their savings for their old age. The father decides that the best investment is his own I O U. So every month he puts aside in a box his I O U carefully executed, and, moreover, bearing interest at 3 per cent.

And every month he spends the money that his children bring him, partly in meeting his regular expenses, and the rest in various experiments that fascinate him.

Years pass, the children grow old, the day comes when they have to open their father’s box. What do they find? Roll after roll of neatly executed I O U’s.

[Kee]

Who the hell does horsey think he/she is, I mean really a "foil hat" calling someone a "wing nut". Loosen it up some Horsey you ae foaming at the mouth again.....

[Dan Beyer]

Just like Madoff's Ponzi scheme, SS will eventually collapse too.

[pmcw]

To read the truth about social insecurity, please see:

www.nextinning.com/socialsecurity2.php

[whispering_to_kc]

Joe is almost the first wingnut idealogue to call SS a Ponzi scheme.

Okay, so he's not exactly the first one ...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_Security_debate_(United_States)#Criticism_of_Social_Security_as_a_Ponzi_Scheme

... someone's already even written it up in Wikipedia and the comparison goes all the way back to the 1930s.

Joe skipped the usual wingnut "the only way any of us can retire is if we all privately invest in the stock market instead of paying into SS" lecture.

Bernie Madoff's Ponzi scheme was, of course, built on stock market private investments.

My auto insurance is also a Ponzi scheme.