Supposing Sears had an easy chair recliner that you wanted. You put it on lay-away, paying them a little at a time until finally you make the last payment. Expecting it to be delivered you wait and wait, but it never shows up. When you call them to complain they tell you that they "borrowed" the money you sent them as it came in, paying for expansion, store renovations, employee benefits, and reducing their debt. But not to worry, they set up an account in your name and have been adding interest.

When you say "OK, send me my chair, I'm entitled to it," they tell you to send them the money first, clear your tab, then they'll ship it. Wouldn't you blow your stack? How long do you think Sears would stay in business?

Well, why aren't you blowing your stack. That's exactly what happens to all the extra retirement and health care money that you give the government. Your surplus Social Security and Medicare money is spent by the government as fast as it comes in. It's gone. Blown, never to be seen again. Your balance is nothing, zero, zip, zilch, nada, squat. You're at ground zero.

But the government went on to set up a phony trust fund that is really a debit account. In this debit black hole, they record "special obligation nonmarketable bonds" for every dollar they took. Like all Treasury securities, these bonds that you never asked for or contracted for, can only be paid off with taxpayer money. If and when Social Security or Medicare requires funds beyond current receipts, you will pay the same taxes again, a second time. Because of this account, you are 100 percent in the hole.

The Beltway Bandits do not have the integrity of ordinary thieves or pickpockets who just steal your money. Instead, they come back again for a double whammy, making you or your children pay the same taxes again, a second time.

Making matters even worse, and to carry out the charade of "borrowing," the government adds annual interest to these black hole accounts. There's no money involved. They simply hand the trust more bogus bonds. This interest compounds to put you more than 130 percent in the hole, a percentage that's growing all the time.

Working Americans would be better off with Enron stock. They would be better off if they walked to the ocean like Ghandi and threw their extra payroll taxes in the ocean, giving the money to other bottom feeders. That way, you or your children would not owe the same money again, plus interest. All while continuing to pay the normal entitlement overcharges.

Only a government could do this. Only a thoroughly corrupt government would continue to do it. If you can call this borrowing, you're a better man than me Charlie Brown.

Last year, the pirates took $98.7 billion from Social Security. And that was an increase over the $95.4 billion stolen in 2000. One billion is a thousand million. Try counting to a thousand.

As of December 31, 2001, the Social Security Trust Fund stood at a grand total of $1.2 trillion, 20.4 percent of the national debt at that time. All entitlements together, and they are all robbed with equal impunity, account for 37 percent of the national debt.

Taking all entitlements together, that's an average of $1,148 from every working American last year alone. Oh well, you didn't need that money did you? Get ready to pay it again whenever the government wants to call in your tab. Be sure to re-elect these bums.