Posted on 05/10/2002 7:03:17 PM PDT by Mad Dawgg
Today I started reading (for the umpteenth time) "Atlas Shrugged" and as chance would have it on this very same day my spouse received in the mail that wonderful bit of propaganda that is sent out annually by the Social Security Administration. You know the one… it tells you your annual contribution amounts, your monthly payout if you retire at such and such an age, etc. Anyhow as oft times happens two unrelated items occur, it gooses the muse, and Bingo a “Brilliant Idea” vomits forth from the depths of whereverthehell “Brilliant Ideas” come from! But first let me set up my premise.
Social Security sucks, for so many reasons they are too numerous to list! But, I will touch on one major reason… Politicians! Let us take and aside here to list the first and most important of Mad Dawgg’s Laws of Reality:
Law 1: All money sent to the Federal Government of the USA and without regard to party affiliation, religious denomination, or sign of the zodiac of the senders and/or the receivers of said money will in fact be spent in the most wasteful manner possible and most likely will end up spent on a totally different issue than was intended by the sender of said money!
Which perfectly illustrates the dilemma of Social Security! If you are of the belief there is a Social Security Trust Fund, stand back cause I am about to drag you kicking and screaming into reality… (If that word can even be applied to anything dealing with that section of real estate known as Washington DC) See normally in a Retirement System, such as one finds in the private sector, money you pay into such is placed in some sort of financial account with your name on it and as such this account is subject to rules and regulations on what can be done with it by the governing body of that Retirement plan. Unless of course you are a Politician in the Federal Government of the USA and you want to play around with the money in that retirement system like say Social Security. See the congress critters just take the money you pay into SS and write you and millions of other Americans an IOU (Government Bond) and Spend the Money on whatever they think will get them re-elected like giving financial aide to Saudi Arabia (yup the same guys that sell us oil for Billions of dollars a year) or wonderful programs like the Osprey; that magnificent ground-breaking tilt-wing aircraft! (Which is literally true, the Osprey literally lifts into the air, then the tilt-wings literally tilt, and then the Osprey literally “Breaks” when it hits the “ground”!) And here is the really fun part… See no one can really stop these guys from spending your Social Security money in these fun and amusing ways because… THEY MAKE THE RULES! So that brings us to my Brilliant Idea!
Let’s Shrug! I say to all you hard working Americans out there who are tired of hearing how the Republicans are trying to destroy Social Security or the Democrats want to raise your taxes to “Fix” Social Security, let’s just all take our ball and go home! Let’s get us an excellent Lawyer and bring a Class Action suit against the government to allow us to opt out of the Social Security system! Of course we will have to give up something, like maybe the money we already paid into the system but hey since I seriously doubt I will ever see a penny of the dough I sent to those blood-suckers err I mean Politicians I figure it is worth the price. Or in other words I am willing to give those ninnys all the money they took and don't plan on giving back because, Damn it, I am on Strike from the Social Rip-off System!
Why dont we all not pay taxes? All at once? Just like that Cant arrest all of us.
Good Idea but very hard to implement...
On the other hand a Large Class Action on behalf of people who believe their Social Security Money is being "Enroned" would not only make headlines, it might actually work if you could get it to the Surpreme Court!
How good of you to attribute lying to senior citizens who would rather do something useful than sit around the house watching Judge Judy all day. You'll find out for yourself when the time comes.
Who is John Galt?
About 35 years ago armed with an MBA degree from a well regarded university, I hit the working world ready to work hard and make my mark. In a few years, hard work was paying off with promotions and raises. But there was an unwanted partner in this endeavor who was sharing in the fruits of my labor -- the government. Both the Federal and State government had their hands in my pocket, BIG TIME. They had hatched all sorts of schemes to empty my pocket -- income tax, Social Security tax, Medicare tax, unemployment tax, and disability tax. Rather than resign myself to this taking or rage against it to no effect, I hatched my counter scheme to end this extortion.
Thanks to a thrifty nature and educated in the mysteries of finance, within 10 years, I had accumulated enough assets to leave the working ranks and become a bona fide Capitalist. No bosses, no clients, no customers. Just plain assets that generated sufficient income to live debt free with the ordinary comforts. All my income had now been reclassified into that category the IRS terms 'UNEARNED' as if it were a guilty theft. HA! In your face, taxman. All the payroll taxes were now gone and my penchant to save remained unabated. There was still one monkey to be thrown off my back -- the income tax. Within ten more years that was gone too by selling assets which generated taxable income and purchasing tax exempt bonds. Be gone taxman forevermore.
Who is John Galt? A friend of mine.
You are in for an awakenening. Trust me when I tell you this, that there will be parts of Atlas Shrugged that you'd rather skip over because it's long, dry, and you get sick of reading the same descriptive words over, and over, and over.
Resist the temptation to skip part of the book. Resist the temptation to give up.
When you complete Atlas Shrugged, you never look at the world the same way again. I first read it all the way through in 1993. What an eye opener. Many of my personal views and convictions were formed as a result of Rand. My strict adherence to personal responsibility and accountability, my view of "leeches" on society, and my views towards government and "moral obligations" dramatically changed.
I'd love to chat and exchange thoughts once you complete teh book. :)
May be. But he's not all of them.
a.cricket
Let me boil it down for you:
All the good guys have neat names, are beautiful, smart, and enjoy violent sex (which they consider to be a philosophical statement). They have no apparent sense of humor, but do seem to enjoy venomous discussions of money and cigarettes. Everything they do is perfect. They can and do invent calculus at an early age.
The bad guys have awful-sounding names. They are rather shapeless, stupid, greedy, and envious in nature. They are liver-lipped, have ugly, watery eyes, and if they are female they wear things like knee-socks. Sex (if they have it) is apparently based on mutual loathing. Nothing they do ever works, except somehow they have always been able to outsmart the smart people.
To be honest, I used to think it was a great book. I read it about 10 times. Halfway through #11, however, I realized that it is not a great book at all. It's dull. Its characters are charicatures, and not very good ones, at that. Ayn Rand's ideas about sex are simply ludicrous.
For a classic review of the book by Whittaker Chambers, go here. It's about half-way down the page.
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