The other day I heard Garland Robinette interview Loyola economics professor Bill Barnett on the WWL Radio mid-day ignorance show. These two luminescent intellects were attempting to enlighten the rest of us on the subject of social security by explaining that it is going broke ( at least according to them, it's really not ... but that's for another post) because, over the long haul, recipients take out much, much more than than the amount of money their individual contributions plus a fair market rate of return would have produced. They were chuckling and wrongly disparaging the most successful and important element of our social safety net in this manner so as to persuade us that it is unaffordable and must be gotten rid of, and that if you don't see it their way you are just greedy.
Oh, really? I remember these same two dim bulbs agreeing on something quite different back during the time when George Bush was trying to persuade us to privatize social security. Then, they were telling us that we would be better off (that is, they were appealing to our greed) by privatizing the program, because we would receive a greater benefit from our contributions plus a fair market rate of return.
Talk about drowning in your own logically lethal box, Houdini couldn't get out of that one.
And Robinette has the gall to call his ignorant show, "The Think Tank." Think about that.
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