On Ponzi schemes

So we found out that hedge fund manager Bernie Madoff caused many people to lose mucho dinero. And no, I'm not gonna use the over-used pun of "Bernie Madoff made off......Bwahhaahahaaha!" Not gonna happen.

Anyway, well known high rollers like Mort Zuckerman, Steven Spielberg, and Michael Bloomberg lost multiple millions. So I hope that all you Jew-haters out there will stop with the banking conspiracy theory nonsense. Jews lost millions of $$ because of a Jew. So quit it with the "Jews control our money" crap.

Why did these men, and the other investors, and the institutions, and the charities lose money? Because Bernie Madoff and his crooks for friends were running a Ponzi scheme.

Brief history lesson: In the early 1920s an immigrant from Italy by the name of Carlo Ponzi solicited people for money in an investment he guaranteed them would make 50% return in a matter of months. Well, it did make the investors 50% in a few months. He told the next set of investors the same thing, and it happened. The third, and so on. How did he invest their money to get a 50% return? Simple. He didn't. He kept getting new sets of investors into the scheme. Half of each new set of investors' money went to the set of investors before them, and the other half went into Ponzi's pocket. All this was working until the stock market crash of 1929, and Ponzi couldn't bring in a new set of investors to compensate the last. That's when the "Ponzi scheme" came crashing down.

Well, having been in Primerica for two years, I can tell you I know a pyramid set up when I see it. And the Ponzi scheme that really needs to be shut down or better regulated is Social Security. That's the biggest one of them all. Madoff is nothing compared to social security and what's gonna happen to the retirees who take benefits in and after 2042. The way social security works (at least today) is that those of us who work now are having money taken out of our paychecks and given to retirees and the disabled. We will be given benefits in the future based on what we put in now and in the forseeable future. There is no money sitting in a lock box somewhere with your name on it waiting for you to claim it at age 62 or higher, or upon disability. But the dynamic is different today than in 1935. Back then there were 13 workers for every retiree. Today there are 3 workers for every retiree. People are living longer due to medical breakthroughs and couples are having fewer children. Do you see where a problem is arising? And don't tell me that eliminating the Bush tax cuts will improve the situation. That's pissing in the ocean, to be blunt about it.

Say what you will about Bush, and I've said what I've said about him, but he was right on social security. But because the left is so beholden to AARP and so eager to spite the man for the 2000 and 2004 elections, they ruined our one chance to really improve the situation.

Can you tell I'm not a huge fan of the Democratic party?