I am sometimes accused of being belligerent and told that my articles would go much further if they didn’t include words like scam, rip-off, Beltway Bandits, theft, stealing, crooks, and so forth. Some even tell me that my subject matter is too important to risk being ineffective with an audience of people who’ve been educated and conditioned to be well rounded nice guys that don’t rock the boat, who blend in with the crowd; sensitive people who are liable to take offense if a writer uses words that are overly bombastic. And they may be right.

Let’s take a look at the other side of the coin. Let’s look at what the editorial staff of the New York Times, one of the most respected papers in the country, has to say on my favorite subject and how they word it. And you might remember that this is the same editorial staff that, after months of supporting Bush and his fibs to promote the invasion of Iraq , later apologized for the things they had published – and a lot of good that apology did anyone. (See, I’m being nice. I didn’t use the phrase “outrageous lies.”)

On Thursday, June 23rd, the Times published an editorial titled “Social Security Follies” written by author or authors unknown and even available on DVD should anyone wish to preserve the paper’s opinion for prosperity.

It’s a short article, probably fewer words than I’ve already written here, and it will not hurt you to read it entirety before reading the following comments. It’s a definite statement of the paper’s position in favor of the democrats who are finally coming out of the closet with something other than their borrowed “just say no” policy against Bush’s private accounts. Here’s part:

“After listening to Mr. Bush talk of little else during his second term, the American people understand quite well what he is proposing for Social Security, and by wide margins reject it. In fact, the polls show that the more they learn about privatization, the less they like it. And with good reason. The very real risks of privatization – in terms of retirement security and the enormous budgetary cost to the country – far outweigh the potential rewards.”

“Enormous budgetary cost to the country,” you do realize what’s being talked about here, don’t you? They’re saying that if we do not continue to allow the government to walk off with the Social Security surplus, the poor dears in Washington will have to borrow even more money to fill their bloated budgets. The borrowing is what’s going to cost us.

Since when does a newspaper that is supposed to represent the people condone and encourage theft and try to tell us that it’s better to have an enormous tax on our future than save money or be fiscally responsible?

Nobody wants to raise taxes. Politicians think its political suicide. So the pirates will be forced to borrow more money from China, Japan, large pension houses, and individuals foolish enough, intimidated enough, or tied to our overwhelming consumption enough to loan money to a country whose people cannot possibly pay it back unless they are heavily taxed, taxed far beyond reason. No one but the taxpaying public is responsible for redeeming any part of the national debt that is already being run up in our name. And legitimate Treasury securities can be “cashed-in” at any time should the lenders tire of, or get upset with, our policies or find better places to invest.

Make no mistake about it, this is the democratic position and it probably has support from many republicans as well. They feel the government deserves or desperately needs your excess payroll taxes that are supposed to be reserved for retirement and health care. But heavens, let’s not call it nonpartisan stealing, or a policy to screw the people and blow their money on Empire expansion.

And this isn’t the only thing democrats are adamant about. They’ve been criticizing Bush’s tax cuts for the wealthy ever since 2001, but they will never tell you that the “great surplus” of Clinton’s last year included $87 billion in income tax overcharges that deserved to be cut. Nor will they tell you that the rest of that year’s $237 billion record surplus came from entitlements – Social Security leading the pack with a $94.5 billion surplus they “borrowed.” They hope the public never finds this out.

Then there’s a whole group of democrats, including the Center for Economic & Policy Research (CEPR), that believe we ought to return to Clinton’s debt laundering Marc Rich tricks and use the Social Security surplus to pay down the legitimate side of the national debt. They don’t see this as an illegal use of our retirement and health care money because it’s going towards a good cause. It’s making payments against the government’s credit card so people like Bush can go out and borrow even more money in our name.

This is all what Alan Greenspan, the master of nicer and more academic words as well as the inventor of the Intragovernmental Holdings phrase, calls a “conundrum” involving our educational system, deficits, balance of trade, national debt, and ends up telling the Congressional Joint Economic Committee must be solved by returning to “accrual” accounting (Translation: become honest).

The New York Times editorial goes on to finish with: Rather than accept defeat and consider alternatives, Mr. Bush is becoming even more feckless as public and political opposition mounts. On Tuesday, in a lame ploy to draw the Democrats to the table, he gave a tepid approval to a proposal by Robert Bennett, the stalwart senator from Utah, to restore the system’s solvency in a way that would not include private accounts – all the while saying that he was not prepared to give up private accounts… Mr. Bennett’s plan includes drastic and unnecessarily large cuts in Social Security benefits, but at least he is being straightforward in offering a plan that addresses the real problem Americans want solved.”

How do you feel about words like “feckless, lame ploy, tepid, and stalwart” in this context? Do you think they are meant to slant the subject in one way or another? And just how much do you suppose this editorialist really knows about public opinion and the people’s real reasons for rejecting Bush’s plan?

Myself, I’m against Bush and almost any of his plans. I don’t have anything against his private accounts plan because he hasn’t put forth the details, but I don’t trust the man. How can anyone trust him after what he’s done?

I also think it was a really dumb and malicious idea to put ex-senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan in charge of his 2001 commission to study Social Security after Moynihan and Bob Dole were almost single-handedly responsible for raising payroll taxes far beyond necessity in 1983, causing the enormous surpluses the government has been stealing ever since. It was the equivalent of putting the fox back in the chicken coop. And if the commission’s final report is the Bush plan, then I’m definitely against it. It produced nothing but cockamamie ways to force personal accounts down people’s throat. In the end, even Moynihan wouldn’t sign off on it.

The two things you can be sure of are (1) the federal government is desperate for money and (2) the more Social Security stays on the front burner, the more likely the entire $3.2 trillion trust fund scam will come out in the open. Go George, go.

I can also guarantee you that any plans the democrats come up with will be attempts to increase the booty, the billions they malappropriate (steal). They can’t stand the fact that the cash cow’s surpluses have been declining due to the job market and their own fiscal irresponsibility.