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To: James F. Hopkins who wrote (3011)	12/28/1998 9:38:00 PM
From: Carl R.	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 99985

Actually I thank the founding fathers for this travesty. They wrote a fine constitution, but left one loophole - they forgot to list how many justices are to be on the supreme court. They realized that the downfall of a republic is that you eventually get professional politicians who stay in office by creating as many people as possible who are dependent on government handouts. They realized that there were only limited ways to prevent such an ultimate self-destruction. The first method was to give the government only limited ability to raise money, banning broad based taxes such as income taxes - oops we blew that one paying for WWI. The second method was the to limit the power of government to specific enumerated powers including the postal power and the power to regulate commerce among the several states - but of course since 1937 ("a switch in time save nine") the meaning of that later phrase allows the government to regulate anything since picking up a leaf in your backyard might require the purchase of a garbage bag, which could have been made in another state. Now all we have left is the third and weakest constraint, the separation of powers. (Oops, I revealed my libertarian leanings). So we apparently agree that SS is welfare, but I believe that it was originally intended as such, along with the alphabet soup of programs passed in the 30's. The insidious thing about SS is that because it is funded with a specific tax, it is a special type of entitlement, one that is "earned", and can never be eliminated. Carl