Reflections From a Murky Pond

Some things money just can’t buy. Obama’s most recent campaign event in New York is, if one is an American in heart and soul, one of them.

Just A Short Subway Trip Uptown From OWS…

With millions of both Americans and Liberals out of work the narcissistic little boy decides to extend his Billion Dollar Campaign to NYC’s fashion district with a celebrity laden fashion show featuring high-end designer Obama merchandise.

I imagine Obama and his handlers are glad that Bloomberg finally cleared the OWS rabble out. He’d be a little hard pressed to shuck and jive his way out of that confrontation.

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In the wake of the lamestream media’s concerted attack upon Herman Cain “Cain-ing” should become a tropism and “to be Cained” and “he got Cained” should definitely become part of America’s lexicon.

Cain-ing

Function: verb

Date: 2011

Definition(s):

1. the act of using the publicizing of unsubstantiated allegations from less than credible complainants to erode perception of an individual’s character so as to weaken their position in matters not directly related to the allegations or complainants.

But the real question and the crux of issue at hand is why the lamestream MSM willfully chose to wage a war of character assassination against Herman Cain in the hopes of sandbagging his bid for the 2012 GOP presidental nomination?

Read the rest of this entry »

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Certain sorts of people are quite angry that GOP hopeful, Gov. Rick Perry called Social Security (SSI) a Ponzi scheme. Yet, despite their claims, SSI bears a great resemblance to a Ponzi scheme.

It’s Not Illegal When The Government Does It?

Most, though not all, of the arguments against Gov. Perry’s characterization of Social Security as a Ponzi scheme have their only objective basis in legalism and semantics, not factual analysis of the systems in question or their respective function.

The Securities & Exchange Commission (SEC) defines a Ponzi scheme as:

A Ponzi scheme is an investment fraud that involves the payment of purported returns to existing investors from funds contributed by new investors. Ponzi scheme organizers often solicit new investors by promising to invest funds in opportunities claimed to generate high returns with little or no risk. In many Ponzi schemes, the fraudsters focus on attracting new money to make promised payments to earlier-stage investors and to use for personal expenses, instead of engaging in any legitimate investment activity.

Fraud?

Fraud is by definition wrongful or criminal deception. Since the creation of SSI and all the changes to it since its inception were done through the law’s fiat, it can’t be fraudulent from a legalistic standpoint. There’s been a great deal of deception and disinformation about SSI’s solvency, independence from the government’s general fund, and trust fund operations over the years though.

As a matter of legality and semantics SSI doesn’t meet the fraud requirement of being a Ponzi scheme.  From an ethical standpoint however, the matter is in some doubt.

Promise Of High Returns

This is one point where SSI absolutely fails to meet the standards for being a Ponzi scheme. Social security doesn’t claim to generate high returns for it’s “investors” because the government doesn’t need to lure in new investors. Participation is mandatory and the rate of “investment” is completely controlled through force of law. The government has absolutely no need to lure anyone in.

Payment Structure

While SSI has “investments” they’re of limited return and 100% of them are in IOUs from the federal government, meaning that each new generation of forced investor is paying for the returns for the previous generation and all the taxpayers are making up the difference as needed.

Given that returns to existing investors are from funds contributed by new investors and there’s a certain lack of honesty in how SSI’s trust fund interaction with the federal government’s general fund is portrayed, there’s little functional difference on this point between SSI and a Ponzi scheme.

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What it boils down to is that SSI is what the average private sector fraudster wishes that they could turn a Ponzi scheme into. The real differences between the two things are all a result of the government being the promoter of the scheme in case of Social Security.

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