Reply #10: No, I'm not "confusing accounting with reality"

[AirAmFan]

The very fact we're having this conversation, and Dubya's decision to continue his Social Security Dismantlement Road Show, are signs that Social Security is in the gravest danger ever in seven decades.

True, the non-marketable Trust Fund bonds the SSA keeps in a file drawer in West Virginia are guaranteed by the full faith and credit of the US. It is fair to say that Social Security is NOT going broke--it's the COUNTRY that Republicans have driven from surplus to the brink of bankruptcy in just four years of fraud, waste, and job-destroying largesse for the wealthiest.

But, as the link in post #3 above shows, from the very beginning of the massive Greenspan Trust Fund, it was clear that this ostensible retirement insurance fund for seniors was subject to political manipulation. The securites are not marketable and thus could not be sold for cash or converted into non-Government bonds if its managers thought diversification would be wise. Even if Treasury defaulted openly on Trust Fund bonds, under the law any positive FICA cash flow would continue to be "invested" in Trust Fund Bonds. And there is no independent body managing the funds. They have been "loaned" to Congress with no guarantee that Congress will pay when due the benefits retirees are expecting.

Pay no attention to whar Republicans say about "saving" or "reforming" Social Security. They are interested in one thing only: extending past 2018 the time when the FICA cash flow turns from positive to negative. Follow the money!