Senator Peter Fitzgerald (R-IL) told Mr. Lay: "I'd say you were a carnival barker, except that wouldn't be fair to carnival barkers...A carney will at least tell you up front that he's running a shell game."

Now, let's take a look at Senator Fitzgerald's own remarks on the Senate floor during the lock-box debates. In May of 1999, HR-1259 passed the House of Representatives by a vote of 416-to-12 and was sent to the Senate. In the Senate, it was filibustered by the democrats, retired to committee, and has never been heard of again. The same is true of several other lock-box bills that passed the House by even greater majorities. The only House member voting against all of them was Jerrold Nadler of New York.

Nevertheless, here is what Senator Fitzgerald had to say about the first bill:

A few years back Congress passed laws making it illegal for State and local governments to plunder the pension funds of their employees. But during all this time, where Congress has put these laws on the books and made it illegal in the private sector and at the State and local government level to plunder pension funds, we have gone on and on in Washington taking all the money that goes into the Social Security trust fund, taking every dime of it out, and spending it on some other program.

As a result, as I speak now on the Senate floor, there is no money in the Social Security trust fund. All of it has been taken out and spent on other programs. They have put meaningless, nonmarketable, nonnegotiable securities in the Social Security trust fund, securities that have no economic value because they cannot be sold to raise cash.

Right now our Government is building up, theoretically, surpluses in the Social Security trust fund, but they are taking all that money out and spending it. So when we actually need it to pay benefits, beginning in the year 2014, there will be no money there. No matter what the balance of those bogus IOUs is in the Social Security trust fund, in the year 2014--whether that balance is $1 trillion or $5 trillion--they are of no assistance in paying benefits to those who depend on Social Security. The country will either have to raise taxes or cut benefits to make up for the shortfall that is anticipated after the year 2014.

This legislation is basic, decent common sense. We should not allow Congress to continue frittering away the Social Security trust fund. I urge all my colleagues to support it and end this outrageous practice of plundering the Social Security trust fund, to the detriment of our Nation's seniors and those who will be desiring to live on Social Security benefits in the next century.

Is this supposed to be a carney telling us up front that he's running a shell game? Can't be. Stealing Social Security funds has been going on much longer than from 1999. It was turned into a wholesale rip-off in 1983 when payroll taxes were increased far beyond what Social Security needs even to this day. Thanks to Daniel Patrick Moynihan, Bob Dole and Alan Greenspeak who skyrocketed the slush fund.

Talk about shell games. Senator Fitzgerald and a preponderance of our elected representatives inside the Beltway are lawyers. They know what trust funds are. They should also know that just because you tack the name on an account, it doesn't make it a real trust such as their own Thrift Savings Account. How can they pretend not to know the difference?

The Social Security Trust Fund, and about seventeen other entitlement accounts, never hold any real cash. The money doesn't go into a trust fund just so it can come back to the Treasury the next day. That would be silly.

The money stays in the Treasury's General Fund where it belongs, and yes, it is spent as fast as it comes in, every dime of it. The debit black hole account that these con artists call a "trust fund" is then credited with bogus nonmarketable bonds. Annual interest is also awarded just as quickly and at no cost to the pirates who just hand the trust more bogus bonds.

You can follow all this in the Treasury's Monthly Reports or where I've summarized for you for the past two years. (see: Raiding The Trust)

All talk about "protecting the Social Security surplus" is just that, nothing but talk. Bald faced lying that plays off the common understanding of trust funds. If they were real trusts, you wouldn't need to talk about lock-boxes. Real trust funds are lock boxes.