I get forwarded conservative junk mail

Subj: FW: Shocking Senatorial Vote
Date: 9/13/2006 8:44:56 AM Pacific Daylight Time
From: ____________
To:___________
Sent from the Internet (Details)

Sent: Tuesday, September 12, 2006 2:27 PM
To: Undisclosed-Recipient:;
Subject: Fw: Shocking Senatorial Vote

A friend sent this to me.

Shocking Senatorial Vote

The following senators voted against making English the official language of America:
Akaka (D-HI)
Bayh (D-IN)
Biden (D-DE)
Bingaman (D-NM)
Boxer (D-CA)
Cantwell (D-WA)
Clinton (D-NY)
Dayton (D-MN)
Dodd (D-CT)
Domenici (R-NM)
Durbin (D-IL)
Feingold (D-WI)
Feinstein (D-CA)
Harkin (D-IA)
Inouye (D-HI)
Jeffords (I-VT)
Kennedy (D-MA)
Kerry (D-MA)
Kohl (D-WI)
Lautenberg (D-NJ)
Leahy (D-VT)
Levin (D-MI)
Lieberman (D-CT)
Menendez (D-NJ)
Mikulski (D-MD)
Murray (D-WA)
Obama (D-IL)
Reed (D-RI)
Reid (D-NV)
Salazar (D-CO)
Sarbanes (D-MD)
Schumer (D-NY)
Stabenow (D-MI)
Wyden (D-OR)

Now, these (listed below) are the senators who voted to give illegal aliens Social Security benefits. Regardless of political party, these
politicians need to be defeated in 2006, 2008 or 2010, whenever they come up for office. They are grouped by home state. If a state is not listed, there was no voting representative.

Alaska: Stevens (R)
Arizona: McCain (R)
Arkansas: Lincoln (D) Pryor (D)
California: Boxer (D) Feinstein (D)
Colorado: Salazar (D)
Connecticut: Dodd (D) Lieberman (D)
Del aware: Biden (D) Carper (D)
Florida: Martinez (R)
Hawaii: Akaka (D) Inouye (D)
Illinois: Durbin (D) Obama (D)
Indiana: Bayh (D) Lugar (R)
Iowa: Harkin (D)
Kansas: Brownback (R)
Louisiana: Landrieu (D)
Maryland: Mikulski (D) Sarbanes (D)
Massachusetts: Kennedy (D) Kerry (D)
Montana: Baucus (D)
Nebraska: Hagel (R)
Nevada: Reid (D)
New Jersey: Lautenberg (D) Menendez (D)
New Mexico: Bingaman (D)
New York: Clinton (D) Schumer (D)
North Dakota: Dorgan (D)
Ohio: DeWine (R) Voinovich(R)
Oregon: Wyden (D)
Pennsylvania: Specter (R)
Rhode Island: Chafee (R) Reed (D)
South Carolina: Graham (R)
South Dakota: Johnson (D)
Vermont: Jeffords (I) Leahy ( D)
Washington: Cantwell (D) Murray (D)
West Virginia: Rockefeller (D), by Not Voting
Wisconsin: Feingold (D) Kohl (D)


SEND THIS TO ALL YOU KNOW. THE ENTIRE POPULATION OF THE
UNITED STATES NEEDS TO KNOW THIS INFORMATION, UNLESS THEY
DON'T MIND SHARING THEIR SOCIAL SECURITY WITH FOREIGN
WORKERS, WHEN AMERICAN CITIZENS ARE BEING LEFT OUT!
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Of course I can't help not responding...

Hi _____,
(You don't need to read this response if you don't care to. I'm posting it to my blog, so I thought I'd write it here first. Wing 2 birds with one stone, so to speak. Don't worry, I'll remove all identifying traces.
If you do read this, and have some thoughts, I'd like to read them, because it helps me shape my own ever-changing opinions if I get some feedback. And if you like, send it to others who might get a charge from it.)

Here goes...
I happen to love the English language. But with white people having negative population growth, worldwide, but especially here in America, I don't think you can keep English the official language forever, any more than the Roman Empire could keep Latin going outside of church and castle. Just not realistic for the common tongue.
But guess what. You have hope and it doesn't come from Congress. English always seems to survive because it is the borrowing-est language ever devised. We borrow words from all other cultures and incorporate them into our language. So don't worry about having to learn to get by speaking only Spanish in your lifetime. Languages are bigger than borders, and living languages adjust naturally.

I think the Congress is waving a typical election year red herring.
To take your eye off of the guys picking your pocket.
And I don't mean immigrant workers.

The fact is, legal immigrant workers do pay into social security ...

Another fact is, employers who hire illegal immigrants are not being tracked down, charged, or prosecuted. The few instances of fines have been slaps on the wrist. Until the law starts to be enforced, we will have the problem.
I've said it before, the guys in charge (our government) don't want the system to work (by not mandating action, and by underfunding it) because immigration is a hot button issue they can use before elections to rouse their conservative voter base who are justifiably worried by loss of jobs, safety nets fraying, and so on. Although the same base also loves cheap food and bargain manufactured goods.

This is the result of the demise of unionism, and the rise of globalism, another word for a race to the bottom for average American wage slaves.

...which is pretty sad. Just remember, though, the Iraq war was sold to to us as as being both cheap and easy... on top of all the other lies they told us.
Remember when Bush fired Larry Lindsey for saying it would cost what, 200 billion, but respected economist Joe Stiglitz says the Iraq War alone will ultimately cost (without escalations to other countries) one to two TRILLION (that's a big gap between one and two trillion, but just getting to the first trillion is breathtaking.)

So how does immigrants collecting social security fit into this picture? We are already busted, Big Time. The immigrants are a penny pinching problem, while the war machine is taking half of the true budget, even during peace time. That means bricks of hundreds for contractors, not survival chump change.

You see, a while back Congress and the Executive branch started using the "lock box / trust fund" (baby boomer contributions) to pay for the budget. Once the baby boomers retire and need the extra to cover their cost it will be nowhere to be found except in payroll and income taxes.
Taxes, by the way, which large estates (over 4 million per couple) and corporations are sheltering and lobbying right now to escape paying. Most of the rich don't even earn money by labor, as well, it is capital from investment. Which leaves the tax burden on the middle class who labor for wages.
But surprise, surprise. Bush is not even funding this war with the regular budget. He's putting off all requests until the budget is set, then he makes extra requests, offsets, for war funding so it won't show up on the official budget. Have you noticed he puts off requests for additional war funds until after elections?

So the middle class in the future (our kids and grandkids) will be paying taxes for this war for eternity. They will wonder why taxes are so high, and see nothing in it for themselves (because it is paying interest, like on credit cards), and they will be spun by political pundits to blame social programs.
And do you wonder like I do, how much longer the Chinese are going to hold our debt? This supposedly conservative government has handed the taxpayers and financially unsheltered citizenry a pie in the sky with a ticking time bomb in it.

What I'm trying to say is social programs are not the biggest part of the budget pie. And think of this: all the money spent on social programs stays here to help people, although admittedly it is many ways spent wastefully. It isn't put into wanton destruction to control natural resources and markets for our corporations.

It's an election year, and the spinmasters know what you don't see won't hurt you. So they fix the numbers and the way they do the accounting. They are telling you a story to sway your emotions to get your vote.

I also remind you what Bush did when voters gave him a "mandate" in 2004, he went onto a "60 Town Meetings in 60 Days" Victory Tour (no Democrats allowed) to talk about his plan to privatize Social Security. He has stated that his mission is still to do this one thing for us.
If you don't think that is going to add a layer of expense to the system, I've got a bridge to sell.
And the R's in Congress and the right wing judiciary are making decisions every day to kill our private pensions that we have bargained for all these years.
We used to have a define benefit pension. No more. It was what we bargained for, and it was transmuted from gold to lead overnight.

So please don't base your vote on immigrants or saving the English language. Base it on something important.