Posted on 01/13/2005 2:37:24 PM PST by Congressman Billybob
Some of life’s turning points are obvious. Others come as a surprise, like being hit from behind by a truck. I had an obvious one last week. I became a coot.
I applied for early retirement on Social Security. That means I have to buy a beige cardigan and wear it with the buttons mismatched. I have to belt my pants ten inches above my belly button. I’ll start losing hair from my head, which will reappear in my nose and ears. I’m officially an old coot.
But that’s not what I came to talk about. I came to talk about the AARP (not just “retired” people) and Social Security. I’ve been a member of AARP for twelve years. They have a cadre of snitches to tell them when anyone turns 50. They grab people at that age, as coots in training.
AARP’s official position is there is no “crisis” in Social Security, that only small changes are needed to keep it financially sound. Its website article is entitled “Don’t Mess with Success.” It asserts, “there is no crisis and that moderate adjustments can keep the system sound.”
Anyone with a college degree, a hand-held calculator, and a demographic chart of US population knows the position of AARP is false. The Baby Boomers (my generation) are beginning to retire. When SS began in 1935 there were 16 workers for every one retiree. Plus, the average American lived less than ten years after retirement. Even though all the receipts from SS were sucked out of the trust fund and into the federal general accounts, the system was solid.
Today, there are only three workers for every retiree. Plus, the average American is living about twenty years beyond retirement. Plus, the payouts from SS are not just worker retirement. Disability and survivor benefits have been added. The final coffin nail is the retirement of the Boomers. As we retire, the ratio of workers to retirees will drop to two to one, and the system then fails.
The longest (and most optimistic) projection is that SS will not fail until 2042. However, an excellent article in National Review Online on 11 January, 2005, explains a closer failure. In 2009, the surplus from SS that goes into the federal general account will begin to decline. At that point, not 2042, Congress will be compelled to raise taxes, or cut SS benefits, or cut other programs to make up for the SS shrinkage. Forcing Congress to chose among those drastic alternatives qualifies, I think, as a crisis.
AARP is the largest political organization in the United States, with the greatest interest in SS. If it cannot get the facts straight on this subject, we are all in trouble.
AARP sets its policies through its 21-member Board. While AARP claims input comes from the bottom up, the Board holds the whip hand. New Board members are nominated by a ten-member committee, chosen by the Board. Three members are on the Board. Five are chosen from AARP’s operating regions, two at large.
One-third of the Board are replaced every two years. Any of the 35 million members of AARP may throw their hat in the ring. But the nominating committee culls the names to about 17 deemed acceptable to the Board. The Board then chooses the seven replacements each year.
There is no petition or nominating process by which anyone at odds with the current Board could get elected. The process is incestuous. If government in America had been reelected like the Board of AARP is now, we would be playing “God Save the Queen” before the Superbowl.
As Professor Peter Drucker pointed out with both cynicism and accuracy, “No matter what its original purpose, once any organization grows beyond 1,000 in staff, its main purpose becomes self-preservation.” That is AARP today.
Twenty of the twenty-one Board members of AARP either had long careers in AARP, or are on public payrolls at the state, national, or international level. Only one has experienced fully private employment. This explains much about the liberal bias of AARP. It is an eye-opening experience to read the biographies of the Board.
If AARP’s members ever decide that it is wrong on Social Security or other issues, it’s hard to see how they can express that except demonstrating outside AARP’s marble palace in D.C. There ain’t no democracy in AARP.
By the way, many of you reading this are coots, or coots in training, or have coots in your household. To deal with that unfortunate situation with good humor, I recommend the book “Coots,” by Mike Dowdall and Pat Walsh. The text is delightful and the illustrations are priceless.
About the Author: John Armor is a First Amendment attorney and author who lives in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina. CongressmanBillybob@earthlink.net
Has the lovely Felicity sized you for a set of coveralls (not overalls) yet?
They seem to be another of the distinguishing characteristics of coothood.
Nononono.
COVERALLS.
Those one-piece garments that zip up the front-
predominantly worn by pilots, auto mechanics and COOTS.
You ain't a real coot until you've gone out to the salad bar at the Sizzler (before the natural dinner hour, of course) in coveralls.
welcome to cooterhood, John. That wonderful time of life we all look forward to, when at long last we finally know all the answers-unfortunately we have forgotten the questions.
The Democrats are as clueless about the need to fix Social Security as they are about the threat of terrorism-their haven from reality, like that of the Ostrich, is to stick their collective heads in the sand, or whatever other dark place may be convenient.
They would rather portray Bush as a paranoid opportunist than admit a problem actually exists and Bush has the cure, while they themselves are too d*mn stupid to fix it and too d*mn stubborn to allow anyone else to fix it.
BTTT
Came across your comments...doing research on MALDEF, LULAC and AARP...
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