Social Insecurity
It happened to me.
When Elon and his hench-fiends started dismembering the government, I imagined that I would not feel the consequences for a while. I’m a retired white guy with an abundance of privilege, and I thought that other people would feel the trouble first. They would be the ones turned out into the cold in a company town like Washington, D.C. where everyone was being fired at once. This made me crazy, but not personally crazy. I figured the rest would come, but not in February or March.
My wake-up call came earlier today. I got an incoherent letter from the Social Security Administration that seemed to announce good news for our family: because of the economy, my benefit would increase. It had already increased in January 2024, but now it was scheduled to rise again. I would also get a check for some obscure cause, but it would not arrive until the end of the month. Then in April, my benefit would drop for reasons that I cannot begin to fathom.
Like anybody else, I got a little agitated, so I decided to call my local Social Security Office. We used to have two offices in Tulsa, but now there is just one on the far east side. This was long before the current administration, so I regret to say that I cannot blame it on Musk and His Hench-Fiends. Although it was only a few minutes before 4:00 p.m., that office was closed.
I then noticed that there was a national office that took calls from citizens until 7:00 p.m. Things had been down, but they were now looking up. Unfortunately, they immediately looked down again. After a long, recorded prelude, the Muzak began, until it suddenly ended with a message from a different droid. My call would be answered, but my estimated waiting time was somewhere in the vicinity of a hundred minutes. For those who struggle (as I do) with arithmetic, I should prepare to settle in for over an hour and a half.
At that point, I felt something crack open inside of me. I’m a Midwestern American and I try to concentrate about the basics. I like surface parking and I like it free. Nothing below ground and no grimy little kiosks. And I don’t like to wait in line for anything. I’ve got a personal Starbucks where there is never a line, and my matcha latte is out the window in a flash.
The idea that I would have to wait for Social Security tech support was somewhere between a personal affront and a betrayal of my birthright as a native Midwesterner.
It was also a sign that there is much worse to come. My wife just told me that at the end of March, there will be no phone support for Social Security at all. Gone into the sewer of the Monsters of Musk. The government is being shredded before our very eyes. Thousands of people who used to provide service are no longer working where they were in January. They are gone for good and they will not be replaced. To do so would prevent the new administration from offering tax cuts to the very wealthy whose Social Security benefits do not matter in the least. You also have to kill something before you declare it dead.
The rest of us better start making our own matcha lattes. At almost $5 a pop, they will soon be unaffordable.
Sorry to be posting so late in the day. Internet service was out in our neighborhood and just switched on about an hour ago.