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$how me the money

It used to be that once you spent a dollar, you never knew where it would end up. But the advent of the Internet Web site, wheresgeorge.com, has changed this forever. You can now track the whereabouts of every dollar you toss across a convenience store counter or slide inside a vending machine.

Enter your dollar's serial number and a list pops up onto the screen citing the past locations of your very own dollar that others have entered onto the Web site, such as "this dollar was found in the bottom of my laundry hamper and will be spent on new underwear."

If only we could do the same with our tax dollars. The site could be called "whatthehellisunclesamdoingwithourhardearnedmoney.com." You would enter a code from one of your paycheck stubs that has already been drained of its tax money. A screen would then pop up that says: "The income tax from this paycheck came from a pissed off American and will soon be deposited into a vast hole (a.k.a. the Social Security account)."

Social Security, along with Medicare, is where it's at: our money and every word of our politicians' rhetoric. Why? The answer is the AARP (American Association of Retired Persons), one tiny four-letter acronym that has an enormous influence on American policy making today.

This point was proven when Tucson's very own U.S. Rep. Jim Kolbe, a Republican from District 5, supported allocating $1.7 billion to spend on veterans' health care initiatives. In his Nov. 11 weekly column, posted on his own Web site, house.gov/kolbe, Kolbe stated, "Like all aging Americans, these brave men and women will have more chronic medical needs and require more health care services. Until now, the government's response to these needs has been haphazard."

Say what?

If anything, politicians today have made it clear that Social Security, Medicare and other entitlement programs geared toward the elderly are their most important items of their agenda. "We must save Social Security" has become the modern politician's mantra, regardless of his party affiliation.

This is largely due to the AARP, the largest and one of the most effective special interest groups this nation's government has ever seen. The group is enormous, organized and active in voting.

Tracing the trip our tax dollars have been taking from our paycheck to the federal government for the past few decades reflects this.

Take Medicare, for example. A recent article in The New York Times discussed Medicare's domination of the federal budget for the past 30 years. The budget's allocation of funds has increased every year since its conception in 1965.

Ironically, much fuss has been made over the yearly Medicare spending dropping by a mere 1 percent. The development is startling given how much emphasis Kolbe and most other Washington politicians have placed on it. But the facts reflect that Medicare is actually being used less.

According to The New York Times article, "Hospital admissions for Medicare patients have unexpectedly declined ... the severity of illness for the average patient has also declined. So Medicare is paying less for the average patient than it otherwise would."

Nevertheless, the budget will continue to have the noose of entitlement programs wrapped around its neck, and American taxpayers will continue to trace the whereabouts of their tax dollars to these programs.

For the AARP to be such a powerful interest group is somewhat frightening, but they are clearly the most vocal and active group of voters today. But modern politics continue to be dictated by a portion of the electorate that will not be around for much longer. Younger Americans, who often claim to be detached from the government, would benefit from following the AARP's lead and begin organizing.

They could start by building a Web site: "youthpissedoffthattheirfutureincometaxeswillpayforoldpeople'shealthcare.com."