>>Of course, this depends on your definition of success. I assert that mandatory participation in the redistribution of private property from one private party to another is unconstitutional. In this I side with Madison and Locke over Hamilton.

My only point is that it works. In real life. If the only objection to a solution that works in real life is "the law", then I agree with Bumble's description of the law in Oliver Twist. Laws of Constitution are not laws of nature, they're man-made and they're supposed to benefit society.

May I also remind you of what Thomas Jefferson had to say about tax?

"Another means of silently lessening the inequality of property is to exempt all from taxation below a certain point, and to tax the higher portions of property in geometric progression as they rise”.

Unconstitutional? Marxist? Immoral redistribution of wealth? Jefferson didn't seem to think so, but what would he know.

>>If I accept the premise that mandatory confiscation and redistribution of wealth is Constitutional then I agree that the Australian, or Chilean or British or Singaporean models are superior to the United States. I would argue that their success has more do to their privitization rather than the mandatory participation. After all, even if SS monies weren't succeptible to Congressional raid, SS would still have much less return than the partially-private examples and would still be facing insolvency due to demographic realities.

SS and Medicare are underfunded because the boomers punished anybody who proposed taxes to build the necessary base. I've no doubt that terms like "mandatory confiscation" and "redistribution of wealth" featured prominently as the electorate sought to avoid contribution. The result is entirely predictable: the elephant in the room grew so big that it's going to blow the room apart. As they fly through the air, some will still insist they haven't noticed anything.

>>I understand that people get the government they deserve and that the US fully deserves the mess it's put itself in.

Deserves? No, it's just a shame that boomers still pat themselves on the back for their thrift and success, apparently ignoring the huge price that they will vote for somebody else to pay. I'm reminded of an African experience where some tribesmen caused hundreds of thousands of dollars of damage by harvesting copper phone cables that they sold for scrap. To them it was a wonderful success.