What we’ve got now is a Bush third term

To the editor:

Byron York's Wednesday commentary on Democrats being ungrateful for President Barack Obama's achievements proves he doesn't get it.

As one of these ungrateful Democrats, I, too, wanted health care access. President Obama took the issue, tinkering and compromising with the insurance industry to arrive at something far less than health care.

Democrats also wanted our forces out of Iraq, but we didn't want them recycled into other places in President Bush's "endless war." President Obama has given us a Bush third term, and I certainly didn't vote for that.

I'll give Mr. Obama some credit for getting Osama bin Laden, but America was denied justice. To shoot an unarmed, wanted man and dump his body at sea is the best that we can do? I don't think so.

In summary, "ingratitude" isn't the correct word to use. "Betrayed" is more appropriate. Mr. Obama listened to the masses to get elected, but he stopped listening and started compromising the day he was sworn in. He compromised away the left's collective opportunity to make the post 9-11 world right.

Liberals like me feel betrayed because we proved "we can" get one elected, but we can't get one to lead the world in our direction. This opportunity won't come again until a woman is ready for the White House.

Yes, Mr. Obama has been a disappointment, but we can fix the mess created by a Bush third term. The Obama Compromise has been nothing less than four more years of George W. Bush. I'm ungrateful, and I feel betrayed.

Cecil R. Jones

North Las Vegas

Not in Kansas

To the editor:

I very much enjoyed magician Penn Jillette's commentary published in Sunday's Viewpoints section. There is no better example of his vision of the "real illusionist" than Charles Krauthammer's Ponzi scheme narrative, published in that same section, regarding the disappearing act that is Social Security in America.

I respect Mr. Krauthammer and am a real conservative, much to the right of the Republicans who participate in "asking us to suspend our disbelief" with this explanation. In this case though, Mr. Krauthammer plays the role of the pretty girl who distracts us from the real truth.

The history of Social Security is anything but a Ponzi scheme. It performed so well that by the 1960s it was flush with cash. When the magician, our government in this case, turns the control card up and it says "Ponzi," we nod and become divided, a division Republicans hope to use to gain more control of the overall government.

The prestige is achieved when we look away from the truth that our own government took more than $5 trillion of Social Security funds and used it for other things, dooming the program with phony "intergovernmental loans" that can be repaid only if we are taxed again for the same thing.

We are asked to believe that it is vital we do something now to protect a happenstance, if at all, at least 30 years into the future -- if the money were still there -- but never reconciled to the truth that the money is actually gone because they took it.

It comes as no surprise that public employee unions dumped Social Security at about the same time, setting up state-run pension funds, a hugely self-serving system of guaranteed salaries for life at ridiculous levels, sometimes allowing participants to retire as early as age 48. Much like the workhorse Boxer in George Orwell's "Animal Farm," we are forever being asked to work even longer, now to age 67 and certainly even later in the decades to come. I often wonder how much Social Security money wound up being invested in these other systems?

It would be very interesting to apply Mr. Krauthammer's "means test" to the 48-year-old retired fireman here in Henderson who now is "earning" more than $150,000 a year for life.

Where is Toto when you need him to pull the curtain and expose this wizard?

Lloyd Wendell Cutler

Henderson

Secure program

To the editor:

In response to Charles Krauthammer's Sunday column, "The great Ponzi debate":

I have always held Mr. Krauthammer in high regard as a political analyst, but his views on Social Security bear some scrutiny. He lists four examples of why he thinks Social Security is a "Ponzi scheme." I can list one that distinguishes it from a "Ponzi scheme": It is an insurance program with a trust fund overseen by trustees.

According to the trustee report (published annually) the fund collected $0.781 trillion in 2010 and disbursed $0.713 trillion to recipients -- leaving a surplus of $68.6 billion in the fund. The current balance of the fund is approximately $2.43 trillion. This amount, of course, is not cash. It is in U.S. Treasury bonds. When income cannot cover expenses, these bonds must be redeemed.

Mr. Krauthammer states (incorrectly) that, "The Treasury already steps in and 'borrows' the money required to cover the gap between what workers pay into Social Security and what seniors take out." There have been occasions in the past when this occurred, but not recently. The Medicare Trust Fund fell short in 2010. If the Treasury needs to dip into the assets of the Social Security Trust Fund (currently $2.43 trillion) and redeem bond holdings, I do not think that this should be considered borrowing.

Mr. Krauthammer did not once mention the trust fund, and one would get the idea from his column that the program he calls "pay-as-you-go" is funded only from current worker contributions and that there are zero assets in the fund. But as I pointed out, the contributions last year exceeded the payout.

He and other conservatives are correct that the program as structured is unsustainable and must be modified -- probably as he enumerated in three easy steps: adjusting the age limit, means testing and reforming cost-of-living adjustments.

ANTHONY J. MARINELLI

LAS VEGAS