Are you telling me, our money for Social Security is not guaranteed? That is right. In fact, the Social Security funds are expected to run out within the next 10 years. Those who are age 52 right now, have a good chance of getting less or no benefits when they reach retirement age.

So how much money is in the government’s general fund, the U.S. bank account? Basically nothing. We are overdrawn. Did you know the government receives $4.9 trillion dollars per year from income taxes, excise taxes, tariffs, and payroll withholdings to name a few. The government spends $6.9 trillion per year, an amount that includes Social Security and Medicare benefits, along with national defense, and interest on our debt.

Translation: Each year we spend more than we take in, so we borrow to make up the difference.

Do you realize that even now, the United States government borrows to pay your Social Security benefits? This year, we will borrow $2 trillion dollars adding to the $36 trillion that we already owe. Of the $6.9 trillion we are spending, almost $1 trillion of that is interest on the money we have already borrowed to make ends meet. How long can this go on? Not long. If the borrowing continues, we will be bankrupt very, very soon.

Many in Congress say they will oppose any changes to the system in place. In other words, just let the orchestra keep playing while the ship sinks. The current administration is trying to right the ship, not just bale the water, but stop the leak. Thousands of illegal immigrants are getting a portion of the benefits that were supposed to be reserved for you. Thousands more scammers are getting checks through fictitious names, the unborn, and the deceased. We hear the words, “waste, fraud, and abuse.” Both parties say they want to see this stop. That is great to say, but it takes radical action to carry it out.

Many in Congress are grieving the reduction of 7,000 employees from the 57,000-employee workforce of the Social Security Administration. The average Social Security Employee makes $71,000 per year. The average recipient of Social Security receives $22,000 annually. With each employee reduction, our government is buying 3 more years of Social Security benefits for you. They are seeking to close 47 Social Security offices out of the 1,200 in the U.S. That will leave 1,153 offices. There will still be 50,000 working for the Social Security Administration.

The Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has access to the Social Security data? Yes, of course. If you want to find the theft and fraud, the cloak has to be removed, the light must be allowed to shine. No doctor operates on a patient with a blindfold. They have to see the problem to fix it. And yes, caution must be taken in who does the work. I don’t want the mail man to perform the surgery, but if the surgeon has the degree and skill set, then let him operate.

There is a promise that the United States made—to be fiscally sound and fiscally responsible to keep its commitments. If the work of the current administration does not continue, the promise will be broken, a nation destroyed, your future hopes dashed.

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Before long, yellow ribbons were placed on trees in front of our homes. Why yellow ribbons? There was a song sang by Tony Orlando and Dawn in 1973 which became Billboard’s number one song of the year. In the song, the guy coming home from prison isn’t sure if his family still wants him. He says he will pass by on the bus. If they want him home, to please tie a yellow ribbon around the old oak tree to show he is still welcome. If he sees no yellow ribbon, he will know he messed up and will continue his life elsewhere knowing it was his fault. Needless to say, in the song, he passes by on the bus and sees a hundred yellow ribbons around that old oak tree. They didn’t just want him home. They wanted him home with all their being. America wanted our hostages home with all our being—in every town, in every state, throughout the whole nation. Yellow ribbons adorned our landscape. Americans mattered.

It was during this time, we began to realize the weakness of our President, and the frailty of our military. President Jimmy Carter approved an attempt to rescue our hostages. The rescue mission was called Operation Eagle Claw. The attempt ended in tragedy. One helicopter crashed killing eight of our soldiers. Other helicopters did not prove flight-worthy. In the desert sand of Iran, lay not only our dead, but also a picture of how anemic we had become. Were our fellow citizens doomed in Iran? How soon before Russia or some other nation attacks us, seeing how weak we were? That was our question, our horror.

By God’s Grace, on January 20, 1981 after 444 days of being held, the hostages were set free just as President Ronald Reagan took his oath to be the 40th President of the United States. His election brought hope, a groundswell of love for our nation again, a new day. Indeed, it was a new day for all 52 hostages and their families. America really loved our own. We were a nation on the rebound. I remember thinking of taking an overseas trip a few years after. The memory of the hostages held in a foreign country bothered me. But then I remember a confidence came over me. If I were to be taken hostage, I firmly believed President Ronald Reagan would move Heaven and earth to get me home. I think we all felt that assurance. America cared for its own.

Roll forward to October 7, 2023. Hamas invades Israel. At least 32 Americans are killed in the attack. Why don’t we hear anything about them? Eight Americans are still held hostage. As you read this, they have been held for 325 days plus. Where are the yellow ribbons? Where is the television coverage on Nightline? Where is our concern with bated breath? Where is our government, President Biden, Vice President Harris, or our Congress in all this? Why isn’t this a political issue as it was in the 1980 election? Read the news, scan the headlines, never a mention of these eight, nor of their families, nor of the 325 days. Are they still alive? No one knows. Did we quit caring for each other? Does being an American not mean anything? Are we seeing the anemia of the late 1970s or have we left God to the point that human life no longer matters?

Jesus said in the 4th chapter of Gospel of Luke—Luke 4:18 “The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners… to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” If our government is of the people, by the people, and for the people, shouldn’t it get in gear and start caring for We the People? Please pray for our nation, for a National Revival, and for these hostages to be set free.

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Roll forward to the state of the United States government today. The subtle creep of past oppression has hardly been noticed by the citizenry at large. But what if Thomas Paine, the firebrand of the American Revolution, were to suddenly appear in his historic home in New Rochelle this July 4th?

Once Paine gathered his bearings, he would find his home in the condition as the day he left. He would be shocked to hear his front door being unlocked by a museum attendant. The attendant would be equally alarmed to see the author of Common Sense standing before her. After an awkward introduction, one could imagine Thomas Paine inquiring about the state of his nation 215 years after he had left.

In the research for my manuscript, Thomas Paine Returns with Common Sense (which I am currently shopping for a publisher), the complaints he made in 1776 against Great Britain are the very same he would voice today. Here are a few examples (Paine’s words italicized):

Government is a necessary evil
“Society in every state is a blessing, but Government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil.”

Paine said if people were pure, there would be no need for government. Since we are not, government is needed. But with government comes a trade of freedoms for security. A people must decide how much freedom are they willing to lose to feel safe. Because of the thirst for power, the government demands more with the promise of better care. Its driving force is a covetous belief that the citizenry has too much. The battle then becomes to get as much government as one can at the least cost.

Paine would submit today that we are content to give our freedoms away for a false sense of security. He would quote his contemporary, Patrick Henry, to us, “Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery?”

The Composition of the Least Oppressing Government
“A select number chosen from the whole body, who are supposed to have the same concerns at stake which those have who appointed them… prudence will point out the propriety of having elections often… [so that] the ELECTED might never form to themselves an interest separate from the ELECTORS.”

Since Government is a necessary evil, Paine suggested the kind of leaders to be chosen. He said they must come from the general population: store owners, farmers, blacksmiths, professionals, the rich and poor. He believed frequent elections were needed to hold them accountable. They should also return to live among those who elected them, to live under the laws they passed. They must be accessible. They must know they are no better than the people who chose them.

Thomas Paine would be aghast to find our representatives come from an almost exclusive profession with ample wealth to run for and hold office. He would be grieved to see they are inaccessible, and practically impossible to remove through elections because of the money required to oppose them. Like the far-removed parliament of his day, our government is an island in Washington, DC untouched by the struggles of the common people.

Under the rule of the British government, he complained the printers were carrying on the lies to deceive the public. The government and the media worked hand in hand. Paine would see the media in all its forms carrying on the work of the government today. It silences dissent. As a writer, the author of Common Sense would be shadow-banned to his disgust.

The Complexity of Government
“The more simple any thing is, the less liable it is to be disordered, and the easier repaired when disordered.”

Paine knew the more complex a government became, the harder it would be to correct. Appealing to the bureaucratic government of Great Britain was a foolish errand. Each official appealed to would direct the Colonists to some other branch. The abuses continued. The size of government provided cover.

Thomas Paine would find the acronyms of government bodies unanswerable to the people confusing. He would search for their source of power to find none granted by the people. The cancerous complexity neuters even the most zealous well-meaning elected official. Change is called for on our borders, on our debt, on the regulations and the loss of liberties. Yet all swear their innocence.

The Expense of Government
“The crown… derives its whole consequence merely from being the giver of places and pensions… which, in plain terms… impoverish the nation.”

Paine realized the only way King George could sustain power was to threaten force for obedience and give rewards to compliance. As a result, the nation took on substantial debt by giving gifts, taking freedoms, raising taxes, and reducing those who are able to pay.

To see a nation $34 trillion in debt by the same means in 2024 would bring Paine to the point of devastation. He would know this nation is not long for this earth. In his anger, he would demand an audience with Congress, but would be sent away. He would be too old, too poor, with no influence in the halls of monarchial power.

His only recourse would be to find some method to get an urgent call to the populace pleading they take a stand while there is still time to do so. He would quote Thomas Jefferson’s sad final solution, “Whenever any form of government becomes destructive… it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government”. May this be the election year where we the people take back the right of self-governance.

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