The government is organized crime

I was watching the UFO documentary "Unacknowledged" and it made some pretty serious claims about the nature of our government. So I started thinking a couple of things. I was thinking if so much money is being spent on black operations, that money could be used to pay lobbyists in order to control public policy. Then I was thinking how bad can the budget for black operations be. So I looked up the numbers and it's about the same as the Welfare program and about the same as OCO spending. So I was thinking it's probably not so bad. But still since it has no oversight it's probably just socialism being spend to so called "contractors" so they can line their pockets with money and with no real benefit. But I tend to think the worse about people's human nature when it comes to large sums of money with no accountability. So maybe it's not as bad as I am thinking but who knows!

I was thinking if there were massive amounts of black ops spending going on the national debt numbers would be higher than adding up all the deficits every year and there were would be some kind of conspiracy going on. But the national debt grew pretty much equal to the deficits summed up. I ended up on this old page that probably most people have seen:

Expenditures in the United States federal budget

So then I started thinking about SOCIAL SECURITY spending.

The way people talk about Social Security spending has always bothered me. When people talk about the US budget, they always include social security payments under the title "entitlements". This really bothers me because social security is not-for-profit annuity type payment. A lot of the funding is coming from payroll taxes that are no part of the general fund. So it seems disingenuous to me to imply social security spending adds to the deficit. So I did some research and this is what I found:

"Social Security is financed through a dedicated payroll tax. Employers and employees each pay 6.2 percent of wages up to the taxable maximum of $128,400 (in 2018), while the self-employed pay 12.4 percent."

We all know about the 12.4 percent. And then this:

"In 2017, $873 billion (88 percent) of total Old-Age and Survivors Insurance and Disability Insurance income came from payroll taxes. The remainder was provided by interest earnings ($85 billion or 9 percent) and revenue from taxation of OASDI benefits ($37.9 billion or 4 percent), and less than .01 percent in reimbursements from the General Fund of the Treasury."

How is Social Security financed?

When I look at the budget pie diagrams they NEVER show social security as "0.1 percent" as quoted by the SSA.GOV website. Why is this?

I think it is because if they did not make the impression social spending is more than military spending people might start to wake up!

Here is the US military budget with OCO and Emergency socialism fund:

(Discretionary Budget Authority) + OCO + Emergency FY2019
Military Personnel $152,883,052
Operations and Maintenance $283,544,068
Procurement $144,340,905
RDT&E $92,364,681
Revolving and Management Funds $1,557,305
Defense Bill $674,690,011
Military Construction $9,801,405
Family Housing $1,582,632
Military Construction Bill $11,384,037
Total Base + OCO + Emergency $686,074,048

The US budget has always been higher math but I bet you if you take out social security or represent is accurately in the pie diagram public policies favoring military spending would come under pressure to be cut.

Truth. The government is a monstrous protection racket.

a reply to: dfnj2015

Anything that uses fear and extortion as it's MO is either criminal or terrorist. There are always punitive financial or incarceration type punishments involved with these twats, even for issues like taxation. I can understand murder, rape, etc, requiring incarceration, but taxes? That's just protection money.

Cheers - Dave

Isn’t that why people voted Trump?

I'm in my early fifties. My perception, since an adolescent, is the United States Government is most certainly an organized crime ring with the ability to legitimize its nefarious dealings through policy and legal engineering. However it still comes down to the one in the mirror. We the people have created this with our lackadaisical interest in vetting those we choose to represent us. Yes we have created the monster and we the people need to slit its throat.

It isn't a dem or repub thing its both parties. Two sides of the same coin. Political theater for the plebs! The power is with the people and ALWAYS has been however most people are so disinterested in participating in the process this is the result. A political class bent on enriching themselves and their cronies through the machination of government control.

Freedom. True freedom requires work and effort on the part of the electorate to make the right choices and to monitor their choices at how they represent you the voter. Yes life is busy and it takes some effort to be a real participant in this great republic. We the citizens of the United States have been given something wonderful in the form of a Constitution and Bill of Rights by our forefathers which requires a certain amount of diligence on our part to ensure its success.

We have failed ourselves as we devolve into a miasma of demonizing each other over our political stance. The framework is there in black and white and any deviation is a failure on our part! We need to demand more of our representatives in congress. We need to have term limits. Which without we have created a political class.

However it seems to me in the end human beings aren't mentally strong enough to deal with true freedom. There are far too many of us who shirk personal responsibility which is paramount to living an effective free life. All too ready to let someone else do it or put on blinders and deny a reality. To willingly give up an individuals power to live a more fulfilling life. We are doing it to ourselves and I for one am convinced we the United States citizens have missed the ball one too many times . We are on our way to striking out.

a reply to: americanbuffalo1

Truth. Well-said, sir, well-said.

a reply to: The GUT

Thank you however I think I have veered off topic. It needs to be said though over and over if we want to continue the 'Great Experiment'.

Yeah, but for instance, they can actually help help lower our health insurance costs.

Oh wait, they want another 3.7% tax hike, on top of Wellmarks 12.6% , my bad.

Sorry, nothing good to add.

a reply to: dfnj2015

You said lobbying, , I found some lobbying.

originally posted by: worldstarcountry
The Libya Times published a set of scans showing a public strategy firm, Mercury llc, lobbying on behalf of the GNA interests, including an article in the Wall Street Journal.

In GNA’s second contract with a US PR firm since Trump announced his support for Hifter, Misrata’s Ahmed Maiteeg, deputy PM of #Libya’s UN-backed govt, hired US lobbying firm, Prime Policy Group, to introduce him to members of Congress and administration officials.

Last month, following Trump’s statement in support for Hifter, the GNA signed a $1.8M contract with the US lobbying firm Mercury Public Affairs and payed a $500K upfront fee. #Libya

The opinion piece placed in yesterday’s Wall Street Journal under Fayez Sarraj’s name is believed to be part of Mercury’s paid PR service. #Libya

I guess they are butting heads at the White House again.

a reply to: dfnj2015

I disagree - Big Business is organized crime, government is just their enforcer.