My name is Scott and I am lifelong conservative republican.

Social Security

Taking Social Security out of government control according to the democrats is a dangerous idea. I say having it in the hands of the democrats is very dangerous. In 1968 the democrats under Lyndon B Johnson a democrat president took the social security trust fund and put it in the general fund to make their deficit spending look less. It has been there since. They keep warning us it will be insolvent in the 2030s but are doing doing nothing to fix it. They have raised the retirement age from 65 to 70. The biggest problem is the national Debt which I will cover next.

Economy

Looking at the debt clock the national debt was $31,153,037,460,437 as I wrote this and is ticking up $29,000 every tick of the clock. That is $93,487 of debt for every single person in America, $247,345 per tax payer. The debt has been increasing for a long time. But under president Obama we spent more than all the previous presidents before him combined. when he was inaugurated the debt was $10.626 trillion, when he left office it was $19.947 trillion. In 2011 for the first time ever the credit rating of the United states was degraded from a top rating. Since then congress has continued spending so much money that other countries will not loan us any more money. Since 2007 the federal reserve has been “quantitative Easing”, basically they bought the public debt to reduce interest rates and printed dollars to cover it. That is why we have 15% inflation was last number I heard. The more they print the less the dollar is worth, the more currency in circulation the less it is worth. Spending because of COVID and since Biden and both the House of Representatives and Senate (Congress collectively) are controlled by the democrats has increased the debt to 31 trillion. They wanted to spend 3 trillion on the green new deal alone. What we really need is a balanced Budget amendment. Do you trust these people who can not control their spending with Social Security? I don’t.

Privatizing Social Security

Mark Kelly the democrat senator who has voted with Biden on 94% of everything is calling Blake Masters his Republican opponent dangerous because he suggested we privatize Social Security. Getting Social Security out of hands of the irresponsible people in congress is a good idea. If the money that has been taken out of my pay for SSI and Medicare had been invested in a IRA for retirement and another for medical care would be worth over a million dollars if invested in a conservative mix of bonds, treasury notes and mutual funds over a lifetime would on average earn 5%, you will get maybe 1.2% from social security assuming it will not go bankrupt in the next 10-15 years. The difference is SSI maybe $200k which when you die will stop and not go to your survives/heirs. An IRA is YOURS, and it can be inherited by your spouse or your children after you pass.

Abortion

If you support limiting abortion which is the murder of an as yet to be born child you will be called dangerous to women health care. Vast number of abortions are NOT for health care reasons and are birth control which is evil and wrong. I have not heard anyone seriously saying stopping medically necessary procedures. But the democrats accuse the republicans of that. The main reason Planned Parenthood which does nearly nothing else but abortion gets lots of money from the government and then turns around and gives some of it to the democrats is why they defend it so vigorously. They care nothing about children.

What are the democrats for?

This election season mainly all their ads are accusing Republicans of being dangerous. But what are they for?

Open boarders allowing million of migrants, criminals, terrorists come across our board uncontrolled. We have an immigration system but the democrats are ignoring it allowing anyone who can cross the boarder in hoping they will be future democrat voters. If they thought these people were voting for republicans you can be sure it would be stopped.

Gun control or in other words violating your second amendment right to defend yourself. We can not put criminals in jail or police officers in gun free school victim areas but we can sure prevent law abiding citizens from buying an AR15.

Green New deal, basic science when I was a kid, all animals breath in oxygen and breath out CO2. Plants take in CO2 and produce oxygen. Only a very small portion of the atmosphere is co2 trace gas and it is NOT causing global climate change. When I was a kid they were predicting an new ice age in the early 1970s. All their predictions from the ice poles melting by 2010 and polar bears dying off (there are more now than since we started counting in the 1950s) etc, ALL their predictions have been wrong. Now California has mandated all cars must be electric by 2035. But now California is telling people to not charge their electric cars because they don’t have enough electricity. Current wind and solar technology can NOT replace conventional power plants which the idiots are trying to shut down. It is not about climate control, it is about controlling your lives and taxing everything you do and have.

The democrats have deliberately driven up gas prices to get you to buy a useless electric car, they will usually deny this but they have. Gas was $2.38 when Biden took office, in Phoenix it is $4.99 average currently. First thing Biden did was cancel the Keystone pipeline from Canada, costing thousands of jobs. Under Trump we were exporting oil instead of buying it. Biden had to undo everything Trump did and canceled oil leases, off shore drilling, shale oil and started buying oil from our enemies. He was recently begging opec to increase production but they have decreased it.

Right to Vote, just watched an ad on TV from the democrats saying the republicans are dangerous to your right to vote. Some how requiring ID is dangerous. I have had to show my ID every time I go into a bank or Doctor office. Every voter should be verified, the only reason democrats are against this is they are trying to cheat. Mark Finchem is dangerous running for Secretary of State because he is a republican. Adrian Fontes the democrat has screwed up the last two elections. Several vote centers in the primary election were short republican ballots. Fontes as county recorder “One of the facts Stevens cites to support his concerns is that Mr. Fontes concocted a plan in 2020 to print and mail nearly 200,000 early ballots to individuals who had not legally requested the ballots, despite the fact that Secretary of State Katie Hobbs told Fontes it was a violation of state law.” He also opened emergency vote centers in all democrat voting areas in 2020. Google is making it very hard to find any of this information only showing official candidates websites even when searching for “Adrian Fontes election mistakes” I had to go through several pages of search to find these few.

I fully support the republican candidates for Arizona offices anyone claiming to be republicans against them are liars. In particular I support Kari Lake as Governor, Mark Fincham as Secretary of State and Abe Hamadeh as Attorney General, Kimberly Yee State Treasurer and Tom Horne as Superintendent of Public Instruction. I vehemently oppose their democrat opponents who have been running lying ads against the big 3.

If Social Security is your issue then you should be informed about what is really happening and not the media reporting the Democrats scare tactics in order to get people to vote for them. Just like no one is trying starve anyone, as I’ve heard some Democrats claim, there is NO ONE trying to take social security away from Seniors or anyone else. Anyone who says so or implies that is going to happen because Republicans are elected is a liar. Something MUST be done or the system will fail and then their will be no social security for anyone for sure.
I’m all for Social Security reform and allowing people to invest at least some of their money. I don’t plan on it being around when I retire in 20+ years, especially if the politicians keep screwing around and do nothing about fixing the problems. If I had the money I was paying into Social Security and what my employer was matching (they are required to pay half the tax, so what you get taken out of your check is the other half) now and put that into my 401K along with what I currently contribute it would be about $500 a month. I’m sure I’d have enough to retire early if I could put that much in my plan.
If I only had the money that has been taken out of my pay and from my employers for SSI since I started working 25+ years ago and had invested it, I probably could have retired very comfortably by 50.
If you have a 401K or other plan at work you are an extreme fool if you are not contributing to it at least up to the employer match. I started doing that when I became employed by a corporation. Later playing with Quicken Turbo Tax it suggested if I put 14% instead of 5% in my 401K since it comes out of my check pre taxes would reduce my taxes enough that it made no difference in what I got to take home. Which to me is 100% WIN – WIN! Giving the government less and save more for retirement is definitely a great thing.
If you don’t have a 401K or other employer sponsored plan then I highly recommend starting an IRA, maybe in addition to your employer’s plan. I highly recommend you avoid individual stocks, even if they the company you work for. Look at what happened to the people who worked for Enron.. Invest them in good Solid mutual funds which have good long term track records. The sooner you start the more you can enjoy yourself when you retire.

Some links to get you started.

Dave Ramesy’s Financial Peace

Financial Peace Baby Steps PDF

What Would Dave Do

IRA.COM

Provident Living Home

Provident Living Resource Management

Some facts about Social Security

This is from the Social Security Administration website
2006 Trustees Report Long-Term Financing Challenges Remain

http://www.ssa.gov/pressoffice/pr/trustee06-pr.htm

I haven’t quoted the whole report but here are some of the scarry facts.

“The 2006 Social Security Trustees Report shows little change in the projected financial status of the Social Security program over last year. The Trustees Report projects that the Social Security Trust Funds will be exhausted in 2040 one year sooner than last year’s projection. And, as they have done for more than a decade, the Trustees recommend that projected trust fund deficits be addressed in a timely way to allow for gradual changes and advance notice to workers.

In the 2006 Annual Report to Congress, the Trustees announced:

The projected point at which tax revenues will fall below program costs comes in 2017 — the same as the estimate in last year’s report.
The projected point at which the Trust Funds will be exhausted comes in 2040 — one year earlier than the projection in last year’s report.
The projected actuarial deficit over the 75-year long-range period is 2.02 percent of taxable payroll — up .09 percent from last year’s report.
Over the 75-year period, the Trust Funds require additional revenue equivalent to $4.6 trillion in today’s dollars to pay all scheduled benefits. This unfunded obligation is $600 billion higher than the amount estimated last year.”

“More than 150 Congressional Candidates Pledge to Reform Social Security

http://www.socialsecurity.org/

With the mid-term elections rapidly approaching, more than 150 candidates have signed a pledge being to “work toward a bipartisan solution to strengthen Social Security for the long-term by putting aside partisan politics and seeking common ground.” The pledge is being circulated by For Our Grandchildren, a grassroots advocacy organization that has long supported Social Security reform, including personal accounts. Although the pledge itself does not mention any particular option for reforming the failing Social Security system, For Our grandchildren calls for reform based on five key principles: 1) We must guarantee the promised benefits for the current and nearly retired. 2) Workers should have the choice to put a portion of their payroll taxes into prudent diversified investments. 3) Workers should own their own accounts – not the government. 4) A government safety net should ensure a minimum retirement benefit. 5) There should be no payroll tax increase.”

“It’s Your Money

http://www.socialsecurity.org/toolkit/community.html

The debate over Social Security reform has generated many competing claims and confusing projections. But the most important issue is this: Will the current Social Security system provide our children and our grandchildren with a secure and comfortable retirement? Since the answer to that simple question is no, there’s no denying the need for reform.

This booklet explains the state of the Social Security system today and describes how we can fix the flaws in its structure that, if left unchanged, will burden our children and grandchildren with unnecessary debt and taxes. The good news is that, with revisions to the Social Security system, we will be able to provide future generations with a program that actually accomplishes more successfully what the creators of the original Social Security program hoped to achieve real retirement security.
Full text of It’s Your Money (PDF, 43 pp, 647 Kb)
For a list of candidates who have signed the pledge, click here.”

This page goes to a long list of links to websites of organizations supporting Social Security reform.
http://www.socialsecurity.org/toolkit/links.html

A few facts from the White house site on Social Security reform

http://www.whitehouse.gov/infocus/social-security/

“President Bush has discussed the importance of Social Security and the need to fix the Social Security system for future generations of Americans. The President has assured Americans that he will not change the Social Security system in any way for those born before 1950.

Social Security was one of the great moral successes of the 20th century by providing a critical foundation of income for retired and disabled workers.
For one-third of Americans over 65, Social Security benefits constitute 90% of their total income

Background on Presidential Action

Social Security is sound for today’s seniors and for those nearing retirement, but it needs to be fixed for younger workers our children and grandchildren.

The government has made promises it cannot afford to pay for with the current pay-as-you-go system.

In 1950, there were 16 workers to support every one beneficiary of Social Security.
Today, there are only 3.3 workers supporting every Social Security beneficiary.
In 2008 just three short years from now baby boomers will begin to retire. And over the next few decades, people will be living longer and benefits are scheduled to increase dramatically. By the time today s youngest workers turn 65, there will only be 2 workers supporting each beneficiary.
- Under the current system, today’s 30-year-old worker will face a 27% benefit cut when he or she reaches normal retirement age.”

Wikipeda on the Social Security Debate

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_Security_debate_%28United_States%29