Obama today agreed to create the Social Security Commission....

[Junkdrawer]

White House, Democratic lawmakers cut deal on deficit commission

Faced with growing alarm over the nation's soaring debt, the White House and congressional Democrats tentatively agreed Tuesday to create an independent budget commission and to put its recommendations for fiscal solvency to a vote in Congress by the end of this year.

Under the agreement, President Obama would issue an executive order to create an 18-member panel that would be granted broad authority to propose changes in the tax code and in the massive federal entitlement programs -- including Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security -- that threaten to drive the nation's debt to levels not seen since World War II.

The accord comes a week before Obama is scheduled to deliver his first State of the Union address to a nation increasingly concerned about his stewardship of the economy and the federal budget. After a year in which he advocated spending hundreds of billions of dollars on a huge economic stimulus package and a far-reaching overhaul of the health-care system, Obama has pledged to redouble his effort to rein in record budget deficits even as he has come under withering Republican attack.

The commission would deliver its recommendations after this fall's congressional elections, postponing potentially painful decisions about the nation's fiscal future until after Democrats face the voters. But if the commission approves a deficit-reduction plan, Congress would have to act on it quickly under the agreement, forged late Tuesday in a meeting with Vice President Biden, White House budget director Peter R. Orszag, and Democratic lawmakers led by Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (Nev.), House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer (Md.).

...

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/19/AR2010011903310.html

For more, see:

Social Security in America is about to become extinct.

[MannyGoldstein]

1. Going Into Overdrive So He Can FInish Off The Middle Class

before his single term is over?

I hope this ain't what I think it is.

[Junkdrawer]

4. Minor variation. The commission's findings is to be voted on by the next lame duck congress...

The Social Security Trust Fund is about to be put on ice...

[amborin]

23. +10000

[SammyWinstonJack]

24. Probably worse than what you think it is. I don't trust him on this AT ALL.

x(

[jonathon]

47. Of course not. Blazing policy that would have been mass protested under a Repuke

[SammyWinstonJack]

49. I suspect there will be mass protest if Obama thinks he gonna pull this off.

What a mistake!

[Better Believe It]

93. What? And risk having foundations cut off funding for groups/individuals who might object?

[tiny elvis]

119. only nixon could go to china

nixon had enough anticommunist credentials to allow him to reconcile with the communists
we will see if neoliberal bona fides give these guys enough cover to renegotiate ss
it could happen if they avoid the angry feedback of wbush's ss privatization campaign

[Name removed]

2. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[timeforpeace]

3. Be pretty ironic if he ended up doing what we were afraid the repukes were going to do.

[librechik]

96. ...but bracing. Maybe we won't be fooled so easily next time.

I'm actually laughing at that myself, a little bit. The American Electorate is SOOOOOOOooooo moronic,,,,
Scott Brown is a hunk. That's why he got elected.

[StarryNite]

108. He is a hunk...

a hunk of shit.

[librechik]

109. you got that right!

[rfranklin]

5. What Reagan, Bush, and Bush could not do....

will be accomplished under Obama--the recission of Social Security. After we paid increased rates to fund it into perpetuity, Reagan and the Bushes spent every single cent until there was nothing left but some "pieces of paper" as Shrub said.

[hollowdweller]

57. Reagan raised the payroll tax to keep it solvent.

How likely you think it is Obama would do that??

[SammyWinstonJack]

61. Not likely at all. I don't trust him to do anything but give what's left of it to Wall Street.

[Hannah Bell]

75. uh, no, he DIDN'T. He raised the payroll tax to generate 30 years of rising surpluses, so that

the federal government could borrow them to pay for TAX CUTS TO THE RICH.

And now they plan NOT TO REPAY WHAT THEY TOOK.

They're going to steal it, & make old people take less; which means they pay twice for nothing.

[hollowdweller]

77. Well Yeah That's how it turned out for sure

[Hannah Bell]

80. If mere solvency had been the goal, lower rate increases in line with historical

precedent would have been the requisite action.

Greenspan's BI-PARTISAN commission knew exactly what it was doing when they hiked rates above what was needed to maintain the old pay-go formula.

[glitch]

87. +infinity. nt

[truedelphi]

115. You have a way of cutting to the chase. Thanks. n/t

[Better Believe It]

94. He also increased the retirement age which cut benefits! Forget about that?

[OHdem10]

6. We elected Democrats to end SS. --I wonder about the Political

Sensitivities of the WH.

Springing this on top the HIR Debacle in Ma?????

New Democrats are more brazen than GOP--whew!!!

[Alameda]

7. We really need to keep on top of this!

[Junkdrawer]

9. I found it with a Google....

Extraordinarily important and getting little ink...

[Nite Owl]

8. Wow

don't know what more to say. If McCain had made proposals like he has the dems would be up in arms but let a dem prez do it and it's all ok.

[scarletwoman]

10. The only words that come to mind are these: "What fresh hell is this?"

Good grief. I think it's time to stock up on pitchforks and torches.

Or guillotines...

:mad:
sw

[mdmc]

14. what fresh hell indeed..

[Name removed]

15. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[dionysus]

51. executing the administration over a panel? over-react much?

:eyes:

[laughingliberal]

95. Uh huh. Well, we've heard all this before in the HCR debate

Just wait, there's no bill, yet! This is just the process, you have to let it work....blah...blah...blah

And, in the end, the corporate blow job bill emerged worse than we actually had expected. Sit down and shut up does not work. The purpose of this commission is to find a way to steal the trust fund for the Wall Street gang. And if the HCR bill goes down the insurance companies need us to privatize Medicare cause they have no way to increase their customer base without that mandate.

[Blue_In_AK]

I'm glad I decided to take my SS early

so I'll at least get a LITTLE of my share before it's gone.

[scarletwoman]

20. I'm glad for you! I don't dare. I'll have to keep working for 10 more years (if I can) if I want to

have any hope of SS providing me with a bare minimum to sustain survival.

I worked lots of low-wage jobs over the years, and some jobs for cash under the table because that was the only way I was going to be able to feed my kids.

So my accumulated SS is really a pittance. If I can hang on until I'm 70, I just might be able to manage to live on it -- provided I don't drop dead in the meantime because of my unaffordable health insurance co-pays, deductibles, and yearly out-of-pocket minimums.

Feh.

:grr:
sw

[Blue_In_AK]

79. I'm so sorry, SW.

I was lucky to have had "real" jobs over the years -- especially here in Alaska for 30 years where the pay was good.

Even so, I'm always afraid that the bottom is going to fall out. I never feel totally comfortable or secure. Too many bad things have happened to me over the course of my life for me to ever completely relax even when things seem fine.

[scarletwoman]

114. Nah, nothing to be sorry about. I wouldn't change a thing about how I lived my life.

It might have been nice to go into my "golden years" with a partner, but due to an untimely fatal heart attack, that didn't pan out.

I'll be fine. I own my house free and clear and the property taxes are very low. And I have a wonderful family who would never let me starve to death. :D

I'm sorry to hear that you "never feel totally comfortable or secure" -- I do know well how life can sometimes throw a major curve ball. On the other hand, I think it's important to trust in your strength and ability to adapt, no matter what happens. Life's too short to not feel joy in the simple daily wonder of being alive on this beautiful planet.

Wishing you all happiness,
sw

[Junkdrawer]

18. A variation on the Conrad/Judd "Don't spend the Trust Fund" nonsense...

For 25 years, we all overpaid FICA taxes so that there would be a "Trust Fund" to cover the anticipated deficits. But now that those IOUs are due, there's going to be a commission to recommend that said IOUs not be paid.

[rockymountaindem]

11. Why don't they just say "austerity program" and call it what it is?

I also find it laughable that the administration that wanted to give billions in subsidies to private insurance companies so they can make a legally sacrosanct 15% profit on everything wants to slash deficits. One of those things clearly works against the other.

In addition, isn't it hilarious that they want to pay for things like this is with taxes on health care plans. First, they said it was such a high threshold that it wouldn't have an impact on middle class workers. Then they had to cut a deal with unions when they realized that was clearly not the case. Yet the only people who talk about raising taxes on the ultra-rich who have been riding high on the hog for the past 15 years is the Democratic House delegation.


As a Poli Sci grad student, I've been drawing on my comparative politics knowledge (and my days going to college in Canada) and thinking of what this last year would have looked like if the US had adopted the Westminster system at the revolution and just allowed more people to vote instead of the even more restrictive franchise the UK had at the same time (yes I know developing a new system of government was the whole point of the revolution - thank you Barrington Moore and others - but bear with me). So in this little counterfactual, Nancy Pelosi would be head of government and all legislation passed by the House this year would have become law. That means we would have had a bigger stimulus package, mortgage cramdown, and a health care bill with a public option way back in August. And that's just for starters. Not that I want to bring in UK style government, which I don't, but it's interesting to think about IMHO.

[Smashcut]

12. Here we go. "Entitlement reform"

[jgraz]

13. And the hits just keep on comin'

:banghead:

[Junkdrawer]

21. You KNEW that this would be done while everyone was distracted....

Like I said, I suspected as much, went Googling, and sure enough....

[scarletwoman]

16. I don't suppose it crossed any of the brilliant minds of the Ruling Class that we could save

a SHITLOAD OF MONEY if we'd stop spending on overseas military adventures?

No, I'm quite sure it didn't...

:banghead:
sw

[blindpig]

127. Well, ya gotta spend money to make money.....

and when you're spending other people's money and turning a profit on it it's a win/win!

[bemildred]

17. That ought to wake up the sheep.

I notice it doesn't say diddle about the money we spend on spooks and the Pentagon. They must want to emulate the USSR.

This sounds remarkably like the "fast track" crap they used to feed us to get "free trade" agreements passed.

[Enrique]

19. Harry Reid stood up to Bush

but will he stand up to Obama?

[tbyg52]

22. Oh dear god. nt

[SammyWinstonJack]

25. Pissed beyond words!

:grr: :mad:

[Junkdrawer]

26. As long as excess FICA taxes funded the deficits, it was "Everything's Fine!"....

But the MINUTE the trust funds were needed....

[SammyWinstonJack]

30. Exactly! Rotten rat bastards!

[TxRider]

27. Will the commision release its prposal before Nov?

[Junkdrawer]

29. After the elections....

"The commission would deliver its recommendations after this fall's congressional elections"

[SammyWinstonJack]

31. Sneaky rotten rat bastards!

:grr: :mad:

[Junkdrawer]

32. How do you really feel... Don't hold back....

Everything about this sucks eggs....

[SammyWinstonJack]

34. Yeah it does, especially coming from a 'Democratic' Administration.

HA! :eyes:

[Ignis]

58. Oh, how convenient.

:argh:

[SammyWinstonJack]

62. Isn't it though?

:banghead:

[Ignis]

69. I guess I need to work on my chess game.

Because I sure as hell don't get it. :(

[invictus]

28. And what about the massive defense budget?

How long will Americans have to finance this corporate colonial empire?

[SammyWinstonJack]

33. FOREVER! Priorities man Priorities and we the people aren't even on their radar.

:grr: :mad:

[fascisthunter]

35. Dem voters have been duped big time...

...that's what's goin' on here. The sooner folks come to terms with that, the better. One thing is certain today, Wall Street has benefited mightily from both Presidents, and tax payers have a massive debt to pay for it. Just think about it.

[blues90]

36. This is very un-nerving !

all I have for income is SS. If this damn thing comes out to be true then I guess I along with many others are screwed.

Take SS away and it also removes any sales taxes SS allows people to spend.

Part of me says they will not do this because of the amount of people who will be affected which may cause a revolt.

They list quite a few so called entitlements being looked at and how about the 500 billion they want to remove from medicare they call fraud , is this another lie because people cannot do the fraud only healthcare corps can.

[Junkdrawer]

39. Take away the Trust Fund and you're looking at SS cuts....

to about 50% or less in current dollars. It would probably be rolled out over a ten year period.

Buy cat food stocks.

[amandabeech]

37. I'm having trouble calling myself a Democrat after emotionally joining in 1967.

Almost every Dem up there is a tool of the capitalist pigs.

I knew Obama was going to be bad, but he is close to exceeding Reagan in dumping on all but the top 5%.

Would Joe Biden be as bad? Can some impeachable offense be trumped up?

I'm serious.

Everyone in leadership needs to leave DC now.

[hollowdweller]

59. Obama will dump Biden in 2012 replace with Alan Keyes

True bipartisan ticket

[undeterred]

38. Screw you, Barack Obama.

You should have campaigned on HOPELESSNESS, to be truthful.

[Fearless]

54. +1

[blues90]

56. I didn't vote for Obama or McCain

I got the idea in 2004 with Kerry and 2006 with the useless Dem impeachment off the table crap. Both parties are one consisting of corporate crooks. Fuck them . Maybe Kucinich will get this stopped if he is allowed to even speak.

[SammyWinstonJack]

63. That's what he selling now, isn't it?

x(

[Hannah Bell]

40. I think you'd better start to organize, folks. This is "The Perfect Storm".

Junkdrawer's summary is brief but accurate. For thirty years they took extra money from workers to give tax cuts to rich people, & now the rich fucks don't want to pay it back.

They want *you* to pay for their speculative losses. Fuck them, & fuck any politician who enables this fraud & theft: Republican, Democrat, Independent, Green, Socialist, whatever.

[Junkdrawer]

42. Remember the "Obama and Pelosi would never do this!" posts on the other thread?

Riiight....

[Name removed]

43. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[SammyWinstonJack]

48. It's certainly my last straw! Pissed off big time! Have had ENOUGH!

:mad:

[Hannah Bell]

71. ...

[blues90]

52. Any suggestions on organizing?

I see a few here . My wife heard something about this on the radio news but I fear it is not out there enough to organize . I saw one group but it was to call or email your senator , I did that.

I read AARP is on it if you are a member.

[Junkdrawer]

53. My wife today asked me what ever became of the Gray Panthers?

Perhaps a resurgence is needed...

http://www.graypanthers.org/

[Hannah Bell]

72. "organize" = you & your friends do the heavy lifting. Talk to some people you think are likely to

be sympathetic, brainstorm targets, get a flyer/faq/action agenda & speech together, & start spreading the word about what's taking shape.

Step one is always to get the word out. As you do that, word of mouth will carry it on.

[Hannah Bell]

76. AARP: from the link above

Meanwhile, many influential interest groups -- including some unions and AARP -- have lined up in opposition to giving an outside commission power to cut federal spending and are likely to pressure Democrats to resist sharp budget cuts.

[Junkdrawer]

116. A Perfect Storm indeed:

1.) Obama creates the "Bipartisan Commission". It works in secret until AFTER the midterm elections.

2.) Republicans, thanks to Democratic disenchantment and a big influx of Corporate money, win back Congress.

3.) The Commission announces its findings (Lead pipe cinch to include big "entitlement" cutbacks.)

4.) Republicans simply vote to accept the findings and any blame goes back to Obama because he appointed the most seats on the commission.

[Hannah Bell]

117. I was thinking also of the recession & the debt, purposefully jacked up by Bush, which can now be

used to plead poverty & "shared sacrifice" in a (engineered) crisis.

I sort of pegged it in 2007:

http://dissidentvoice.org/2007/11/shock-therapy-perfect-storm/


Shock Therapy: Perfect Storm
Part 5

by Hannah B. / November 14th, 2007

Lenin and the boys at Cato agree with Friedman: “Only a crisis produces real change. When that crisis occurs, the actions that are taken depend on the ideas that are lying around.”

We know what ideas our “leaders” have lying around. They’ve been drumming them into our heads for years. What shape might the coming crisis take?

Crisis needn’t be a hurricane or tsunami; it can be a financial disaster as well — even a phony one. As long as people are scared and confused and will do what you want them to — that’s all that matters.

Crisis might look like the perfect storm of mortgage meltdown, recession, declining industries and wages, rising deficits, all coming to a head as the boomers retire — and that unfortunate file cabinet full of IOUs, with — so sorry — “no money” to redeem them.

Combine that with a full-court press of pundits, preachers and politicians, all well-manicured and well-fed, none in any danger of going without in their old age, though they insist you must. All of them nattering away at you, on the TV, in the papers, on the radio, relentless as the zombies in The Night of the Living Dead:

“There’s no-o-o-o money! No-o-o-o money! If you don’t do what we say the country’s going to go broke and you’re all going to die!”

It might be that the 1983 debut of both Greenspan’s “reform” and the Cato paper wasn’t coincidental. It might be, indeed, that Greenspan created the debt to the Trust Fund with an inkling that it could eventually be hyped as a “crisis” to take down Social Security for good.

That’s how the IMF did it, Klein says. Get the rubes in debt, then pressure them to take your “shock treatment,” your austerity program. As in Chile, as in Russia, where poverty rates doubled and tripled after the treatment1; so here. We too must take our medicine.

Bugger that.

There’s no Social Security crisis. There never has been. If you’re not convinced yet, how about this: the projection used to hype the phony crisis assumes a growth rate of 1.8% over the next 75 years.2 That’s lower than the 1.9% average growth rate of the Great Depression, 1929-1940.3

But there are actually three projections; an optimistic one, an intermediate one, and a pessimistic one. In the “optimistic” scenario, long-term growth averages 2.6%, the Trust Fund never runs out, and there’s a 17-trillion dollar surplus in 2080.4 So far, reality has always turned out closer to the optimistic projection than the other two. Since 1980, growth has averaged 3.1%.5 Whee! Feel better?

Not that a projection 75 years into the future has any bankable accuracy anyway.

The projection, like “crisis” it predicts, is a fraud, a cynical Big Lie, a con. They want your money. That’s all they’ve ever wanted, and they’ll keep pushing until they get it, unless they know you understand the con.

The Republicans won’t save you, and the Democrats won’t save you either. They’re the ones up on the tube, debating oh-so-seriously about the “crisis” when they know it’s phony, pretending to disagree, all the better to con you. They’re the good cop and the bad cop, the inside and the outside man in the three-card game.6

They know that some of you’ll want to identify with the nice, caring Democrats, who’ll save Social Security by raising taxes — just a hair, just a smidge. And others will want to identify with the tough, fiscally responsible Republicans, who’ll institute sensible private accounts.

And while you’re watching the game, taking one side or the other, getting all riled up about the stupidity of the other side — they’re moving in, like the partners in crime they really are, for the coup de grace.

Here’s the straight story.

“The economy” isn’t the casino, isn’t the game, isn’t even the chits of paper we use to trade and keep score with. The economy is the real world of producing real goods and services. So long as American workers are producing real goods and real knowledge for decent wages, there will be enough surplus for their elders’ Social Security.

If, on the other hand, our “leaders” follow the road they’ve been on the last 30 years: off-shoring production, outsourcing democratic government to unaccountable private power, stripping resources faster than they’re renewed, allowing infrastructure and human skills to decay, and substituting a casino economy for a real one, we’ll all go broke, and private accounts won’t change that likelihood one bit.

Social Security’s not in crisis. Our leadership is. Our democracy is.

No tax hikes, no benefit cuts, no private accounts. Hands off, ya lying crooks.

[Junkdrawer]

126. Very, very good article.

Clear thinking well presented.

:thumbsup:

[JDPriestly]

121. You forgot to mention that the Supreme Court gives corporations the

right to totally confuse the public about the issues.

That's the cherry on the cake.

Obama will serve one term. He will be the last of us Democrats to be elected president.

Seniors will not stand for this betrayal.

Wall Street gives outrageous bonuses and seniors face the threat of homelessness, hunger and poverty.

Obama promised transparency. This is anything but transparency.

[Edweird]

41. That is not good.

[suffragette]

44. Just started reading about this and Peter Peterson

Really worrisome.

From The Nation:

http://www.thenation.com/doc/20100111/greider

The first TFT "dispatch" to appear in the Post--"Support grows for tackling nation's debt"--made no mention of Peterson's crusade. But it featured the same devious gimmick the financier has been peddling around Washington. Congress should create a special commission of eighteen senators and representatives empowered to to make the "tough" budget decisions politicians are loathe to face--slashing benefits, raising payroll taxes or both. Other members of Congress would be prohibited from changing any of the particular measures, and would cast only an up-or-down vote on the entire package, no amendments allowed. Supposedly, this would give them political cover. Look, no hands. We just cut Social Security but it wasn't our fault.

This "reform" is profoundly antidemocratic because it would strip ordinary citizens of the only leverage they have in Washington--the ability to lean on their elected representatives and exact retribution if they get sold out. Peterson has two advocates in the Senate--Kent Conrad of South Dakota and Judd Gregg of New Hampshire--who are self-righteous fiscal hawks. The TFT story describes the rising federal deficits as a threat to the republic, yet fails to explain why deficits on rising. The billions have been devoted to bailing out major banks and Peterson's old chums in Wall Street or to turning around the failed economy or fighting two wars at once.

So why do the TFT reporters (Elaine Povich and Eric Pianin) zero in on old folks and Social Security or entitlements like Medicare and Medicaid? Because those are Pete Peterson's favorite targets. He has flogged Social Security as a blight on our future for at least twenty years. He is a nut on the subject. His "facts" are wildly distorted or simply not true. Never mind, the establishment press portrays him as a disinterested statesman.

This crusade is dangerous for the people because the "respectables" in governing circles and both parties embrace the same reactionary logic. Does government have money problems? Don't restore the progressive income tax on the wealthy or capital, don't cut away some of the corporate boodle in the federal budget--that politics is too difficult. Instead, let's whack Social Security while folks aren't watching.

[L0oniX]

45. Clue: It's the military spending that causes the debt more than anything else. Look at Russia.

Do we think we can dump our money into the military (700+ billion a year) and do a better job at staying afloat than Russia? Really? Just what do they expect retired people to do without SS? You think there are a lot of homeless people out on the street now? Pffft This is nothing compared to what the homeless population will be without SS. I hate these mutha fuckin rich assholes.

[Junkdrawer]

46. A lot more oldsters freezing to death....starving....going without meds.....

SS barely makes ends meet. Cut it in half and see what that does...

[Name removed]

50. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[blues90]

55. Fine with me , give me a pill . If I lose SS and there are no jobs

for someone 50 let alone my age I will take the pill after getting to DC just to toss a sack of horse shit through a window even if I have to walk there. I'll die to fight this crap . you hear me Obama and the commission thugs?

[Generator]

64. YES, we won the cold war and in another geneartion

We will become the USSR of 1975. All of our money into fighting wars that can't ever be won. Totally lost and broken. We even have the propaganda part down. Best country on earth! No money for the people that live in it though.

[fascisthunter]

91. and it's never the rich's money they use

they use our collective taxes our voluntary military personal for their own greedy ambitions.

[JDPriestly]

123. Strange. We "defeated" Russia by forcing them to spend

too much on their military.

Now we are being defeated by Al Qaeda in precisely the same way -- by forcing us to spend far more than we can afford on the military.

We have no manufacturing left.

Jobs get rarer and rarer.

And now they want the elderly and helpless to pay for their stupid wars.

Now that is treason if there ever was treason.

Aiding and abetting enemies of the people.

[Obamanaut]

60. Is this the 'change' I voted for? nt

[rateyes]

65. If the Democrats don't remove the cap on Social Security

and cut Medicare Benefits, and the people lose all the money they have been paying for years into those plans, there WILL be riots in the streets.

Things are getting ugly.

[wordpix]

66. hey don't do away with my Soc. Sec. without giving me my money back first

:grr: I worked for it, by the way.

[SammyWinstonJack]

70. +1. Worked for it, only to have it looted, Nice, eh? Lousy bastards.

[slipslidingaway]

67. knr for later n/t

[nightrain]

68. this is Rahm and Zeke's way to raid SS. Medicare "reform" is coming too.

Disgusting from a Dem.

SS and Medicare need to be under the oversight of Congress, not an independent commission whose recommendations Congress has to take as a whole package, and with NO amendments. Bye bye safety net.

[Little Star]

73. WTF.

[MzNov]

74. from earlier today

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=103x511548

I'll be DAMNED if I'm going to pay into the SS Fund for 40 freaking years and have these rat bastards take it. FIX THE CAP, GAWDDAMMMMIT.

[Oilwellian]

78. Great find Junkdrawer

I knew the time limit was up today and wondered if Obama went through with it. Son of a bitch.

Something is very wrong and I wonder if this destruction of the Democratic party is intentional and part of a larger plan.

[Little Star]

82. +1

[proudohioan]

86. +1

You know, I was thinking the same thing, and thought that maybe I was just getting "paranoid".

I'm not usually prone to "paranoia".

But this shit is getting kinda scary......

t.

[amborin]

98. +1

[tom_paine]

102. Most definitely it IS intentional and part of a larger plan

The exact details will never be known, nor will exactly how coordinated it is.

But even if it wasn't a Conspiracy of the Aristocracy, which is almost certainly is, it wouldn't matter.

Because it's behaving as if it were one.

[ima_sinnic]

81. I wash my hands of this CON ARTIST

I'll be 66 in 2012 and my piddly FULL SS better fucking be there, and be there for however long I'm lucky enough to live after that, as well as Medicare, since I have no other means of health care.

Fuck You Barack, and the rest of your stinking corporate cronies in your back rooms, slapping yourselves on the backs, smoking Cuban cigars and laughing about the way you stuck it to the starry-eyed saps who were stupid enough to buy your fucking BULLSHIT.

Hey, that "community organizer" schtick was a stroke of genius! Organizing the Wall Street community has served you well, eh?

YOUR retirement (which can't come fast enough, as far as I'm concerned--and I predict it WILL come in 2012) is well assured--as for the rest of us, not very much at all.

[Red Knight]

83. He's trying to destroy the party

What's left of it.

Sad.

[mnhtnbb]

84. I'll be 62 in 2013 and was counting on filing for my SS before it could be "reformed".

Aaagh.

[Junkdrawer]

85. Kick

:kick:

[glitch]

88. What, no cheers? Shift change? Maybe in a talking points meeting.

Anybody else feeling a little shocked, and awed?

[Junkdrawer]

90. There was a brief attempt at a rebuttal thread, but now that even Krugman....

is coming out against this, low profile is the strategy du jour.

But that may change....

[glitch]

92. Hoping it blows over, huh? It won't.

I'm sure they'll think of something to spin, it won't convince anyone but it will allow them some cover. Perception is everything!

[Junkdrawer]

99. Look at the timing....

Right between the MA special election and the Supreme Court corporate political spending decision....

I think the hope was there wouldn't be any exposure until after the election. So much for that plan...

[ima_sinnic]

97. I'm sure they'll come up with some inane talking, er, shouting point

they always do -- anything to drown out the truth.

[Individualist]

89. How can anyone doubt that Obama is promoting DLC's agenda?

:shrug:

[johnaries]

100. Disinformation. It is NOT the "SS Commission". It is a BUDGET DEFICIT

Commission. And guess what? The RW is against it because they expect it to raise taxes! Indeed, although it is looking into all areas of the budget, re: SS it's mostly likely to recommend that the cap is either raised or eliminated. Which is something I support.

Further, it will probably also take a long look at the Defense budget.

Also, note this paragraph in the article:

The presidentially appointed commission would be a fallback if the Senate, as expected, does not vote to create a budget commission as part of the debt-limit legislation. House leaders are insisting, however, that they will not go along with the commission's creation unless the Senate does approve stringent pay-as-you-go budget rules, an outcome that is far from certain. Such rules, which helped produce budget surpluses under President Bill Clinton in the late 1990s, bar lawmakers from approving legislation that increases the deficit.

I would love to see PAYGO reinstated. Also, it's likely to look at ways to recoup any losses from the numerous bail-out programs.

But, bottom-line, anything the commission suggests has to be voted on by Congress. Do you really think Congress would vote to eliminate one of the most popular programs, ever?

DUer's should stop spreading disinfomration. That's what the RightWingnuts do.

[Better Believe It]

106. You want PAYGO reinstated? Nothing like balancing the budget on the backs of working people

So we can't have a big job stimulus program, programs to help stop foreclosures, new federal unemployment benefit extensions, improvements in Medicaid and Medicare that cost money, etc., if the national debt is increased under PAYGO. Wonderful.

PAYGO along with the cuts in Medicare and Social Security that WILL BE proposed by any entitlement cuts commission will be welcomed by every right-wing "deficit hawk" who wants to balance the budget on the backs of working people and the elderly.

[johnaries]

124. Once the economy is restored, yes. I don't want to see a return

to the Bush Admins policy of passing all kinds of unfunded projects intended to purposely increase the deficit. Remember, they were following the Reagan example of driving the deficit so far out of control Congress eventually had to cut good programs. That was the NeoCon hope and plan.

I'm for good, working programs but I want Congress to make sure they are funded so they WON'T get cut.

[Junkdrawer]

112. To my mind, including Social Security in a Budget Deficit discussion....

is a betrayal right there. It's saying that not repaying the monies borrowed from the Trust Fund is fair game for balancing the budget. And that's not a point I'll concede.

[johnaries]

122. Would you rather see SS go bankrupt? Don't assume that the

recommendations will automatically be cuts. If they are nothing but cuts, then Congress will reject it. More likely it will be recommendations to generate new revenues for SS.

[Better Believe It]

128. It's far from being bankrupt. That's the old right-wing Wall Street political line which you

obviously have fallen for.

Of course a commission would propose cuts.

Are you really that naive or uninformed on this issue?

You're being sarcastic .... right?

[xchrom]

101. I guess I'm getting what I deserve -- I didn't like obama --

Felt that especially he was no friend to gay folk --
but I voted for him.

I have no one to blame but myself.

[inna]

103. Oh, damn.

I can't believe it.

:mad: :grr: :mad:


I was reading in this local conservative paper (SF Examiner) earlier today that fixing budget deficit and spending cuts will be the main focus of his SOTU speech next week, and I was hoping they were just talking out of their ass.

Crap. Crap. Crap.

Between this and today's SCOTUS ruling, nore we're even MORE screwed (who'd think that's even possible at this point??).

[blueworld]

104. A wealthy country with money for war but not children & old people?

What is wrong with these people? Bush financed slaughter in 2 countries with borrowed money & decimated our economy. Now the Dems want to look at ENTITLEMENT programs to fix the deficit????? We had money to bailout corporate criminals & money to burn children & bomb & devastate the environment.

What about us - we the people? What about the sick & old & unemployed & uneducated or undereducated or those in foreclosure or those trapped in poverty or those living next to nuclear cesspools & blasted mountaintops...What about us?

If the creepy politicians need money, how about a nice fat luxury tax? Or end one of the wars? Or decimate the ridiculous corporate tax loopholes?

[Bluebear]

105. So we're going to CHANGE Social Security?

[hughee99]

107. "granted broad authority to propose changes"?

Why does one need broad authority to propose changes? PROPOSING changes requires no authority. Hell, anyone can PROPOSE changes.

[Junkdrawer]

110. Because, AFAICS, the Commission is promised an up-or-down vote....

AFTER the election, possibly with a lame duck congress - NO AMENDMENTS ALLOWED. And the recommendations won't be made known until after the election.

[hughee99]

111. Ah, transparency at it's finest. n/t

[Marr]

113. Oh, this must be that "turn to the left".

What a fucking laugh. They see the electoral disaster looming on the horizon, release some statements to convince the Hope©ful rubes that they've "seen the light", and get their actual corporatist agenda all revved up and ready to unleash after November.

[MilesColtrane]

118. My bipartisan solution.

Tax the fucking fuck out of the rich, and as a sop to the GOP, raise the retirement age to 68.

[JDPriestly]

120. If benefits are cut, seniors will revolt and form a third party.

They can increase taxes, but they cannot decrease benefits. They are already minimal, and I mean minimal.

[jeanpalmer]

125. They've robbed the SS trust fund

to fund their wars. Now, they're going to finish it off. Obama is going to create a budget commission while he wastes another $30 billion a year to send 30,000 more soldiers to Afghanistan. What a con.

[defendandprotect]

129. There's only one way I can see Obama now . . .

as a Trojan Horse --

and I can't take credit for that . . . someone mentioned it before me!!

Social Security and Medicare -- bye --