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On Fri, 11 Jun 2010 12:53:22 -0700, "nom=de=plume"
wrote:


wrote in message
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On Fri, 11 Jun 2010 10:56:15 -0700, "nom=de=plume"
wrote:

Funny how everyone slams "entitlements" right up until it affects their
social security, medicare, police/fire/infrastructure in their
neighborhood,
EMT availability, library access, etc. Then, it's don't touch. If people
don't want entitlements, then they should vote against them and vote out
any
politician that promotes funding them. So far, that hasn't happened, and
there doesn't appear to be any strong movement to do so.


We can look at Greece to get an idea about what can happen to
"entitlements" when they are unrealistic.
My Alexander Tyler quote still seems right

"A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as
a permanent form of government."

Sorry, but I disagree with Tyler. Firstly, democracy by definition isn't a
fixed object. It's an idea and it has endured in one form or another for
several 1000 years. Ancient Greece is a great example. That particular
culture failed, but not because of democracy. Our culture may fail, but
not
because of democracy.


Name the democracy that survived more than 200 years.

You can't say the US because we are a representative republic that is
only becoming democratic in the last 100 years. For most of our
history only rich white men could vote. Women didn't have the vote
until the 1920s and blacks didn't get the universal vote until the
60s.


"A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters
discover they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public
treasury."

"From that moment on, the majority always vote for the candidates who
promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result
that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy,
which is always followed by a dictatorship."

"The average age of the world's greatest civilizations from the
beginning of history, has been about 200 years"

"During those 200 years, those nations always progressed through the
following sequence:

1. from bondage to spiritual faith;

2. from spiritual faith to great courage;

3. from courage to liberty;

4. from liberty to abundance;

5. from abundance to complacency;

6. from complacency to apathy;

7. from apathy to dependence;

8. from dependence back into bondage"


We are at about #6 right now. BP would say we were closer to #8

Which entitlements don't you think are appropriate? I'm sure there are
lots
of example of things that make no sense, but there are many more that make
perfect sense and are appropriate and necessary. BP isn't a democracy.
It's
a for-profit corporation. It (and similar) need to be regulated, since
corporations don't give a fig about democracy or the public good. They're
only concerned with the corporate good. Capitalism, in its purest form, is
unworkable and must be tempered with social consciousness.



The problem is not entitlements per se, it is unfunded entitlements
and that includes SS and Medicare as of this year. We have done
exactly what Tyler predicted. We voted benefits in excess of the taxes
we are willing to pay. That is also what happened in Greece and most
of western Europe. It is an unsustainable system. 40 cents of every
dollar in my SS check is borrowed from my kids. You can't even prorate
that by the amount taken in by the FICA tax since LBJ put SS in budget
but even if you did, the check still includes some borrowed money
since FICA does not cover the outlay.


Well, if you're not willing to address even one of the major entitlements,
then there's no way to fix it. I agree, we're over-extended, but some would
lay that at the door of the current administration, when previous went wild
with spending and deregulation, then said, oh by the way, we're about to
have a financial meltdown, and tried to put the toothpaste back in the tube.
The current admin. has been attempting to do that since it got in power, and
it actually seems to be working. The next step will be to do something like
paygo, but what we can't do is tighten spending. That would result in the
same thing happening again.