RALEIGH – I wrote yesterday that the federal debt-limit debate of the past few weeks was a political play – a scripted drama that was intended to set the stage for the presidential and congressional elections of 2012.

To describe the controversy as one of political theatrics, however, is not to diminish its importance. After all, theater is important. Great works of drama don’t just entertain. They instruct and inspire.

Here are three key lessons that attentive audiences have learned from the Great Debt-Limit Debate of 2011:

• The Social Security Trust Fund is an accounting fiction.

Remember last week when President Obama warned that a failure to raise the debt limit by August 2 might imperil the issuance of Social Security checks? If you were ever under the impression that Social Security was financially secure for decades, because of its massive trust fund, perhaps the president’s own panicky announcement has shaken your complacency and opened your mind to the truth.

Yes, the Social Security trust fund has accumulated trillions of dollars in notional “assets,” in the form of non-transferable federal securities. And, yes, the federal government’s credit is good.

But no matter how good your credit is, you can’t make yourself richer by writing yourself checks. When the Social Security system needs more cash to pay benefits than it receives in payroll taxes, it will need to “redeem” its trust-fund assets by demanding payment from the federal treasury. The treasury can make good on its securities in one of three ways: 1) transfer cash originally intended for other federal programs, 2) obtain more cash through congressionally enacted tax increases, or 3) have the Federal Reserve inflate the currency, which is just another way of raising taxes (by reducing the value of the private incomes Americans receive).

Now imagine that the Social Security Trust Fund didn’t exist. How would the picture be any different? The federal treasury would have exactly the same options.

• You can’t separate the federal fiscal policy from state and local fiscal policy.

One of the many arguments that liberals are making against the Republican plan to “cut, cap, and balance” the federal budget is that it would prevent future federal bailouts of state and local governments.

Yes, it would. That would be good.

State balanced-budget requirements are fine up to a point. I’m glad they exist. But if states (and their localities) always have the option during tough budget times of rushing to Washington for a debt-financed bailout, there isn’t really a legally enforceable requirement for these governments to balance their operating budgets.

A large share of the Obama administration’s “stimulus” program in 2009 consisted of state bailouts. As happened in North Carolina and other states, the federal funds simply delayed the need to bring state expenditures in line with state revenues. It would have been better to go ahead and get it done in 2009 rather than in 2011.

A related matter is the relationship between federal and state tax burdens. Ultimately, all taxes are paid from the same source: the earnings of private households. All taxes are income taxes. It is another accounting fiction to pretend to keep state taxes low by using federal taxes or borrowing to pay the bills of a state. We are all federal taxpayers, too. And federal borrowing today means higher taxes tomorrow.

• Debates about federal debt and deficits are really debates about the definition of government itself.

If you think “government” is a term that means the same thing as “society,” then the conservative case for balancing the federal budget through spending cuts sounds mean. Why cut health care and education? Don’t most Americans believe them to be valuable services?

If, on the other hand, you think “government” describes a particular type of social institution based on the use of force, then the liberal case for balancing the federal budget through tax increases sounds mean. What right do you have to steal additional resources from one person to transfer to someone else?

Hood is president of the John Locke Foundation.