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President’s Threat Reveals Democratic Lie on Social Security

Wednesday July 13th, 2011   •   Posted by Paul Theroux at 7:18pm PDT   •   9 Comments

Yesterday, President Obama threatened that if the debt limit is not raised by the August 2 deadline, he can’t guarantee that Social Security checks will go out.

However, for years Democrats have argued that Social Security is on strong fiscal footing, and reform is unnecessary. The argument is that over the years the government has collected more in Social Security taxes than it has paid out in benefits and that these “assets” have built up in a “trust fund” and will be enough to sustain Social Security for decades, even if it runs deficits for much of that time. For example in January 9 of this year Harry Reid argued that Social Security is “fully funded for the next 40 years.”

This begs the question, if Social Security is fully funded and not in crisis, why is it necessary for the government to go deeper into debt after August 2 in order for recipients to get their checks?

The reality is that the money in the trust fund was replaced with Treasury Bonds and spent almost immediately on other programs. The government must tax or borrow more to make good on the promises. A trust fund filled with IOUs for money the government owes itself is the same as having no trust fund at all.

Obama’s threat proves that.



9 Responses to “President’s Threat Reveals Democratic Lie on Social Security”

  1. Brenda says:
    July 14, 2011 at 9:53 am

    If a decision is not met by the republcans there will be a shutdown(no money will go out to disability checks & etc) open this file for further details.

  2. GBunch says:
    July 14, 2011 at 10:40 am

    This is what I think the Obama administration is thinking:
    What it looks like is that they see a honey pot of money that they can use on their little projects and they figure that the people can just kiss off, they are old anyways and will die soon so they will just be wasting all that gold. They are doing the same thing with Medicare. My mother is diabetic, they give you a meter to read the blood sugar and expect you to pay $1.00+ for each strip. She has to take her blood sugar reading 4-5 times a day ($5.00 per day x 30 = $150.00 per month). She gets around $800 from SSI then you add in other meds she needs $300+ that gives her a total $350 per month for food and other bills. Can Obama live on that??? She worked all her life and raised 5 kids on her own. She like others have earned her SSI.

  3. dennis reeves says:
    July 14, 2011 at 12:53 pm

    Exactly since Johnson, the feds have taken the money out of trust fund to pay other stuff, Washington D.C.’s Congress & Senate have made those i.o.u.’s worthless. I’ve wondered since I came home from Vietnam, why the American people allow the feds to do the things they do? Are we really that selfish, that bottom line is that we do not care about our fellow Americans? We say we love God and Jesus, but we do not follow the teachings, “love thy neighbor as thyself.” and we wonder why the rest of the world hates us as they do!!??

  4. ChillytheAlaskan says:
    July 14, 2011 at 11:24 pm

    So Obama is threatening to spend the revenues on welfare, unemployment, supporting illegal aliens and giving them health care, implementing Obamacare that no one wants, will likely be ruled unconstitutional, and will cost an ADDITIONAL TRILLION in 2013, spending the failed stimulus which is really redistribution to his cronies, and the government programs he likes and supports, instead of paying the bills, paying social security, the military, the interest on the debt, and then laying off unessential government employees?

    How long do you think he is going to get away with this irresponsible out of control behavior before he is impeached, arrested for treason and deliberately attempting to crash the economy, and placed in prison along with the traitorous Marxists he has placed in high offices to help him?

  5. Carol Cumbie says:
    July 15, 2011 at 3:00 am

    If the cheques don’t go out it will be Obama’s decision. They have to money to pay the debt. When are they going to start looking into Obama and all his cronies? When he destroys America. Obama has spent more in 2 years than Bush did in 8years.We have the mafia living in the White House. When has he done anything that didn’t benefit him? I don’t know how he can hold his head high. Why do they need the extra trillions? They need to pay the debt. Then pay SS and military then decide about the rest. It will eventually get to where the USA will not have the money to pay the debt. This is insane.

  6. Darchi says:
    July 15, 2011 at 7:55 am

    Hey, comment number 2, SSI is need-based, not earned. While we are at it, the raising of grown kids is, and should remain, irrelevant to Social Security distributions. If you like your mom, why don’t you and your siblings show your appreciation by helping her out financially now that you are ostensibly a productive member of society.

    SSI is a kindness that I am glad has been put in place. But it is not a right, so appreciation rather than grumbling should be in order.

  7. Sombode says:
    July 19, 2011 at 5:38 am

    Sure are a lot of stoopid people on here. they all keep blaming Obama when it’s congress that’s to bleame for every bit of this. No president has ever sat on the Appropriations committee. they don’t control the laws or the spending. The USA is in the trouble it’s in primarily because ignorant citizens have allowed Congress to put us there. Quit blaming Obama for allof this when all he can do is sign or veto. Blame your members of Congress.

    Obama didn’t spend more in two years than Bush did in 8. That’s a bald faced lie. What he did do was put two wars that Bush ran Off Budget back on the budget so the people could see how much they cost. Bush just hid this entire expense. So it looks like Obama spent a lot when all he really did was tell you the truth about what Bush spent. IF you don’t believe me, look it up, but quit shooting the messenger. He only tried to tell you that you as a voter have a problem and you don’t want to hear it so you blame him. Why didn’t you blame Bush when he ran up the big bills? Oh yeah, because he hid the cost from you. Well, not really, it was in the news almost daily how many billions we were spending a week, but I guess you people thought that was being paid out of Monopoly money or something. Obama saved GM and millions of jobs. Nobody seems to even notice. All the people that think Obama screwed everything up don’t have a clue how bad things were when he took over. We were at the brink of global financial collapse. bush started the stimulus, I might remind you, although Obama gets blamed for hwo it was spent in spite of it all being committed before he took office. I personally think we’d have done better these past few years if we’d had a white man in the white house doing exactly what Obama has tried to do, because he wouldn’t have all the haters trying to make him fail and as a result our country would be a lot better off right now, but I don’t blame Obama for that....I blame all the Godly, Patriotic bigots in this country. I don’t believe they are either Godly or Patriotic but that’s what they want everyone to think. ans while I’m ranting, I haven’t seen anyone here that understands diddly about global finance but here’s a tip. If the USA doesn’t raise the debt ceiling it’s going to make the deficit a whole lost worse and harder to recover from. Yeah, Congress needs to cut and keep cutting for a decade or so as we work out of this recession, but last I checked Obama offered a pretty big package of cuts if only the super-rich have to pay a bit more in taxes. I don’t have a jet or an oil company so I can live with that to get the country on it’s feet but apparently the GOP can’t. Screw ‘em and kick ‘em out.

  8. David Theroux says:
    August 8, 2011 at 8:47 pm

    Sombode, Under Obama, federal spending and debt has increased at unprecedented rate in U.S. history. Moreover, instead of reducing foreign wars and defense spending, Obama has increased both. On this latter point, please see What Price War? Afghanistan, Iraq, and the Costs of Conflict, by Anthony Gregory.

  9. Hengki says:
    November 28, 2012 at 10:08 am

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