Poetry, punditry, and punniness

by Bob Dylan

Oh the time will come up
When the winds will stop
And the breeze will cease to be breathin'.
Like the stillness in the wind
'Fore the hurricane begins,
The hour when the ship comes in.

Oh the seas will split
And the ship will hit
And the sands on the shoreline will be shaking.
Then the tide will sound
And the wind will pound
And the morning will be breaking.

Oh the fishes will laugh
As they swim out of the path
And the seagulls they'll be smiling.
And the rocks on the sand
Will proudly stand,
The hour that the ship comes in.

And the words that are used
For to get the ship confused
Will not be understood as they're spoken.
For the chains of the sea
Will have busted in the night
And will be buried at the bottom of the ocean.

A song will lift
As the mainsail shifts
And the boat drifts on to the shoreline.
And the sun will respect
Every face on the deck,
The hour that the ship comes in.

Then the sands will roll
Out a carpet of gold
For your weary toes to be a-touchin'.
And the ship's wise men
Will remind you once again
That the whole wide world is watchin'.

Oh the foes will rise
With the sleep still in their eyes
And they'll jerk from their beds and think they're dreamin'.
But they'll pinch themselves and squeal
And know that it's for real,
The hour when the ship comes in.

Then they'll raise their hands,
Sayin' we'll meet all your demands,
But we'll shout from the bow your days are numbered.
And like Pharaoh's tribe,
They'll be drownded in the tide,
And like Goliath, they'll be conquered.




I listened to Paul Krugman talk about Bush's Social Security plan right after I had listened to a speaker from the CATO institute do the same. I was shocked that the CATO guy could get away with obvious lies in a National news forum like that.
He said , "...there are no real assets in the Social Security trust fund."

Krugman, when his turn came, went on and on, patiently explaining the mechanics of SS and the lunacy of the President's plan, nicely contradicting nearly everything the Cato guy had said. What he should have been doing is stating emphaticly that the guy was lying through his teeth!

"There are no real assets in the Social Security Trust fund! Congress spent the money! Social Security will be bancrupt in 15 years!"

All of these statements have also been stated repeatedly by President Bush and they are all lies! Fact is, the first time George W. Bush publicly stated that SS would go bust in ten years was in 1978, when he was running for the House of Representatives. Most Americans are aware that SS did not go bust in 1988 and that in fact, there are not and have not been, for the last ten years, Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq!

I would bet you dollars to corn flakes that George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, and that guy from the CATO intitute all have, in one form or another, exactly the same "real assets" as the Social Security Trust fund in their own portfolios! They are called United States Treasury Notes, and they are as real as a real asset gets in the financial world. They are guaranteed by the United States of America. Want to know who holds the most US Treasury Notes?

Japan, China, and Saudi Arabia buy more each day than all other purchasers combined.

What George W. Bush may be saying is that, sure you and I have paid billions of dollars in taxes into the trust fund but he intends to steal it. He isn't going to pay it back to America's retirees. If he were to say that to China, or Saudi Arabia, the economy of America would be instantly destroyed.

One can only ask if that is what President Bush actually wants?

I am starting to think this could be!




OK, Now...


Folks, Social Security is not an investment plan in the first place. it is actually called, "Old Age and Disability Insurance." This is a very different thing from what Bush is claiming it is. Only one third of SS payments go to retirement...One third goes to pay a poverty level wage to people who get disabled, and one third go to the spouses and minor children of workers who die prematurely. The tax deffered retirement plan is the 401k and the IRA. Got that?

Peace,

Steve