In theory, they're held in trust by the government. But it's not as if your money sits there in the Social Security trust fund waiting for you to retire. After current beneficiaries are paid, surplus dollars are used to buy bonds from the U.S. Treasury. So the trust has the bonds, but the money is now in the Treasury, where Congress can use it for any purpose."The Social Security trust fund is ... a piggybank holding paper IOUs from Congress," Stumpf says.

This is the first year that Social Security has had to cash in one of those bonds in order to meet its payroll, says Stumpf.

"From this point forward, an increasing number of those bonds will have to be pulled out every year -- and Congress is going to have to find a way to come up with all that money," he says.


Read more: 5 little-known facts about Social Security http://www.bankrate.com/finance/retirement/5-little-known-facts-about-social-security-1.aspx#ixzz1K7hMAujQ[/quote]

And this my friends is why SS will be in a crisis by 2037 if not sooner.... Oh and this is where that 20% of tax revenue is going.

The current global peace keeper that interrupts the "mass-murdering genocidal immoral destructive bad guys" happens to be the United States.

That's your minority's point of view. Another point of view is that the US happens to be these bad guys, and their multi-million body count needs to come to an end.

You simply can't have a global body taking hard action against "the bad guys" when the bad guys are the good guys are the bad guys are the good guys. This whole "world police" thing is a fantasy. A nonjudicial force acting out of self interest is not a police force. Your tax dollars aren't going towards righteously policing the world, they're going towards the great game.

[quote name='frob' timestamp='1303353375' post='4801054']
The current global peace keeper that interrupts the "mass-murdering genocidal immoral destructive bad guys" happens to be the United States.

That's your minority's point of view. Another point of view is that the US happens to be these bad guys, and their multi-million body count needs to come to an end.

You simply can't have a global body taking hard action against "the bad guys" when the bad guys are the good guys are the bad guys are the good guys. This whole "world police" thing is a fantasy. A nonjudicial force acting out of self interest is not a police force. Your tax dollars aren't going towards righteously policing the world, they're going towards the great game.
[/quote]


I disagree.


As I said in most of my posts, this is a morality issue. As as been discussed many times, morals and ethics are not concrete rules and therefore subject entirely to the individual perceptions.

Application of military force, especially in outright war, is not a civil issue. It happens after civility has passed and can only hope to be justified by common moral sentiment, if ever.


Perhaps your view of the morality of the situation is different than my view, and that is fine. Perhaps you agree, and that is fine too.


I wonder, though.... Is it more appropriate for a nation to drop bombs on its own civilians, or for a group of nations to drop bombs on them in an effort to stop it? Is it more appropriate for groups to train and plan terror attacks against non-combatants in another nation, or for the other nations to commit organized attacks on those groups? Is it more appropriate for a nation to invade another's boundaries and declare ownership of the territory, or for other nations to counter-attack and push the forces back to the earlier borders? When farmers grow and sell drugs that are heavily restricted across the globe, and misuse of those drugs destroys lives, is it ethical to destroy the financial base of those farmers and their livelihood to stop the unlawful production of those drugs?

As real life situations appear the problems become increasingly complex. I don't pretend to know the authoritative answers; I do have my own personal views and am perfectly willing to allow you your own.

I wonder, though.... Is it more appropriate for a nation to drop bombs on its own civilians, or for a group of nations to drop bombs on them in an effort to stop it? Is it more appropriate for groups to train and plan terror attacks against non-combatants in another nation, or for the other nations to commit organized attacks on those groups? Is it more appropriate for a nation to invade another's boundaries and declare ownership of the territory, or for other nations to counter-attack and push the forces back to the earlier borders? When farmers grow and sell drugs that are heavily restricted across the globe, and misuse of those drugs destroys lives, is it ethical to destroy the financial base of those farmers and their livelihood to stop the unlawful production of those drugs?

Aahaha, in the context of US foreign policy, that's a good one

[quote name='frob' timestamp='1303362814' post='4801101']
I wonder, though.... Is it more appropriate for a nation to drop bombs on its own civilians, or for a group of nations to drop bombs on them in an effort to stop it? Is it more appropriate for groups to train and plan terror attacks against non-combatants in another nation, or for the other nations to commit organized attacks on those groups? Is it more appropriate for a nation to invade another's boundaries and declare ownership of the territory, or for other nations to counter-attack and push the forces back to the earlier borders? When farmers grow and sell drugs that are heavily restricted across the globe, and misuse of those drugs destroys lives, is it ethical to destroy the financial base of those farmers and their livelihood to stop the unlawful production of those drugs?

Aahaha, in the context of US foreign policy, that's a good one
[/quote]

good in that it is accurate or good in that you like to think of the US as the bad guys because, while you do not condone the evils it has stopped, you don't want your country to actually do anything about them?

Good as in it's a good joke to suggest that the US is only on one side of all of those descriptions, instead of having done all of them.
Helping countries attack their own civilians? check.
Stopping countries attack their own civilians? check.
Training for and planning terror attacks against non-combatants in another nation? check.
Using organised attacks to stop terror plots? check.
Helping nations invade other's boundaries and claim territory? check.
Helping nations push back invading forces to earlier borders? check.
Helping farmers grow and sell drugs that are prohibited across the globe? check.
Destroying farmers who grow and sell drugs that are prohibited across the globe? check.

It's a pretty good laugh to pretend that only every second item on his list applies.

[font="arial, verdana, tahoma, sans-serif"]Get off my lawn.[/font]

Ah, you're one of those people. Carry on.

Aahaha, in the context of US foreign policy, that's a good one

Let's work on some argument and debate skills for a moment. Productive discussion and debate involves claims, support for the claims, and warrants that connect them.

Making a comment like "Get of my lawn" or "That's a good one" is a discussion fallacy. It detracts from the discussion rather than contributes. It is irrelevant. It does not refute or support a position. It is akin to a school child announcing "I know I'm right so ptttthhhh." That may work for those school children but it is not how grown-ups have discussions.


For example, you might have said: "The US foreign policy doesn't follow that kind of rules. Look at the attacks they have made. In 1990 they did ...., in 1991 it was .... It continues in 2003 with ...., and again in 2005 with ..., and now 2011 with ... "

Then the other side has an opportunity to refute any of them, agree with them, or even add support to any of the discussion points. They may refute the support with a counter-argument such as "The 1990 case had a totally different situation, <support> <support> <warrant>."

It continues this way, back and forth discussing actual claims and actual supporting arguments and refuting arguments until the discussion is complete. Generally it ends when both sides come to a consensus or decide that no consensus is reasonable or acceptable (typically called losing a debate). Generally when educated people argue and debate they reach a solution where everybody comes out better for participating; it doesn't matter if they won the debate, lost the debate, found it irreconcilable, or just watched the debate, they can benefit from it.

It's a pretty good laugh to pretend that only every second item on his list applies.

[color="#1C2837"]I can debate either side. I wrote the list, and intentionally chose items which are rather complex and have no clear answer.

[color="#1C2837"]It is generally an easier argument that the rights and protections of the many are better than the rights and protections of the individual. Yet there are also very strong arguments favoring the rights and protections for the individual.

[color="#1C2837"]For example, one of them listed the morality of destroying the livelihood of the drug farmer as a protection against the morality of the lives of those who use the drugs.

[color="#1C2837"]There are strong arguments that you don't need to destroy the lives of the drug farmers. There are also strong arguments that the stopping one farmer does nothing, and is therefore not the solution to the problem.

[color="#1C2837"]Consider Afghanistan's poppy fields. Simply burning the crops and leaving the family without income is a horrible action. The people need income, and that needs to be replaced. The farmers need crops that they can grow in replacement, and they need the knowledge to grow the crops, and the tools to harvest, and the supply chain to sell them. The people are addicted to the drugs themselves and need to overcome it. We can argue about how it is mostly Afghan police forces, not the US military, that is in charge of the action, and discuss if Afghanistan would have chosen the action without intervention from other nations. Further, we can discuss how without addressing the global addiction to the drugs, the opiates market will continue to draw new farmers to the crop as it becomes more profitable from higher demand.


These can be followed up with real examples of how the nation has been working with many others in reducing the drug fields without destroying the farmers, talk of the various crops are able to grow in the rugged terrain of the nation, crops that have been grown before the drug trade, and crops that were grown when the nation clamped down hard on poppies about thirty years ago. [color="#1C2837"]This also proceeds to an argument on the other side, regarding reduction of the drug use problems in the nations which fund the labor-intensive crop, and also how the funds travel through various organizations, including organized crime.

[color="#1C2837"]That type leads to further debate and a better conclusion that the problem needs to be addressed on BOTH sides, not just one. You need to reduce the supply and also reduce the demand, and doing so is a difficult task. Finally, that would bring the argument back to the start about how the US military, or any nation's military or an international coalition, ought to be involved in the process.

ok