According to this morning’s Politico, the Republican Senators are now sucking Trump’s..uh..toes, again..No need for sanctions – Trump has sanctioned Turkey’s steel – you know, the commodity that represents 1/4 of 1% of all our imports and 7% of steel imports. In other words, no biggie..nothing to see here..move along.

Somehow I knew this plot line in Survivor in the West Wing, the current reality series we’re living in, would be a bust; we’ll move on to something new: how all these ‘windtalkers’ at the impeachment inquiry will be punished for their disloyalty. That got me thinking about something a little closer to home..the fact that Erik and I as retirees, collectively get a little less than half our retirement income from Social Security. What if that were to go away – how long could we last and what would we do?

These issues are addressed a bit in my second book of the pentalogy; the one called And Forbid Them Not. My protagonist is musing over a similar situation.

“Julia realized at once it was likely all the government’s departments were now putting out bogus information – and had been for months.  But she wasn’t going to talk about that with Nate – even though he was a friend.  She worried that her government pension checks might mysteriously go awry – and an investigation would likely take a long time .. if not forever.  She smiled at Nate as he was wrapping up her two hoses.  “Maybe things will get better.”

How many times have I heard my family and friends say that? Erik always references the 60’s and Viet Nam as a worse time in America. But we were young then, more worried about the draft then the fate of democracy. Joining a protest could get your head bashed in – or maybe get you shot & killed like at Kent State. But as youngsters, we didn’t take it too much to heart. Somehow we always knew things would get better.

But now we’re old and reliant on the government. If half our income could disappear – through changes in legislation or just plain snafu – then we need an escape plan. We could sell our house, but could we live on the proceeds in relative comfort for the rest of our lives? If Medicare went away, could we afford decent health care? Guess this harkens back to my previous post: there, but for fortune, go you or I. But fortune in the current regime could and is likely to disappear. When the growing deficit makes the rest of the world less likely to buy our debt – or worse, decide to sell it en masse, austerity would be forced on us. And the easiest cuts to make? Raid the Social Security trust fund and cut or eliminate Medicare. Since boomers are no longer the biggest voting block, who would push back on that? Certainly not millennials, who are keenly aware that by the time they reach retirement age, the fund will be bust.

So this could – and will likely – happen. Ouch. Children – we’re moving in with you. It’s payback time.