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Edited on Sun Jan-16-05 01:34 PM by dolstein
Emmanuel wasn't prepared to give a straight answer to any of Russert's questions about social security. Here's what I would have said:
1. Is there a social security crisis?
No, Tim, there isn't a social security crisis. Social security faces a long-term funding challenege, but there are some simple and relatively modest actions we can take now to deal with that. If you want to see a crisis, all you have to do is look at the budget situation or Medicare. This president inherited huge surpluses, but because of his reckless approach to fiscal policy, we're now facing record deficits. And what's the president's solution? He wants to make his tax cuts permament, which will end up addid trillions of dollars more to the national debt. And look at Medicare, which is in far worse shape than social security. What's the president's solution? A bloated, expensive prescription drug program that showers tens of billions of dollars on the pharmaceutical industry without doing anything to control drug costs. This administration has displayed a pattern of behavior where it ignores the real problems, creates a fictional crisis to further their own narrow ideological agenda. Their current scare tactics with regard to social security represent a continuation of this pattern.
2. But didn't Bill Clinton say there was a social security crisis?
Look Tim. You and I both know that President Clinton used social security as a political tool to beat back attempts by the Republican Congress to pass unaffordable tax cuts. And he was right. We stopped the Republicans, and in doing so we were able to balance the budget and start paying down the national debt. Unfortunately, the current president pushed those same tax cuts through Congress and now, instead of paying off the national debt, we're adding trillions to the national debt.
3. So what to the Democrats plan to do to fix social security?
Tim, if you listen to the experts -- the ones without an ideological agenda -- they all say that the long-term funding challeneges can be addressed, and social security's solvency can be extended well into the future, by making modest and gradual adjustments to the social security payroll tax and the benefits formula. And the Democrats will come forward at the appropriate time with a proposal to do just that. But what Democrats and Republicans can both agree on right now is that the private accounts being proposed by this administration will do NOTHING to ensure the solvency of social security. In fact, private accouts will make matters worse by diverting trillions of dollars that would otherwise go to pay benefits.
And how does the administration plan to make up this difference? As we saw with your last guest, Tim, it's hard to get a straight answer out of the administration. But Tim, you and I both read the papers, and I'm sure your hearing the same things I am. Some people in the administration want to borrow money to cover the transition costs. That would up to $15 trillion to the national debt over the next 50 years. Others in the administration would cut guaranteed benefits buy as much as 40%, in effect taking the security out of social security. I don't think the Republicans on Capital Hill are going to be particularly happy with the idea of tripling the national debt, or making steep cuts in social security benefits.
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