To the editor:

Before any discussion of social security "privatization" or "ownership" it is crucial to remember one thing: Republicans have been against social security since its inception and have spent the last 60 years looking for ways to dismantle it.

Just as they did when they were selling the Iraq war, Republicans will seek to convince us that there is a "crisis" in social security and that its current path is untenable. Reality makes a lie of this oft-repeated talking point. The only danger facing social security is the Republican plan to dismantle it in favor of some sort of personal investment accounts.

There are $1.8 trillion dollars in U.S. treasury securities in the Social Security Trust Fund. Assuming we don't default on this obligation that we owe to ourselves, the Social Security Trust Fund is in fine shape. Of course the federal government should be paying down debt, not running $412 billion deficits so we will be able to pay off that $1.8 trillion, but that's an argument for another time.

Social security should be one element of a multi-part retirement plan with calculated risks and benefits. The definition of social security is that it is risk-free; it will be there for us when we retire no matter what happens to the stock market or the economy, hence the security part of social security. Allowing workers to invest their social security funds in the stock market will simply make it into a mandatory investment portfolio, with all the risks that go along with them.

Social security works as it is set up right now, the reforms of the 1980s ensured its solvency far into the future. Don't be fooled by these radical right-wingers screaming about an impending day of reckoning for social security, they're the same people who were talking about mushroom clouds over New York from Saddam Hussein's nuclear weapons. We all know how that turned out.

Max Dubler

26 Alfred Drown Road