Barack Obama is trying to destroy Social Security

[LoZoccolo]

is a shit statement

[MadHound]

1. Will you be willing to eat those words come December,

When the Catfood Commission's "recommendations" are voted into law?

My bet, we're going to see benefit cuts or minimum age requirements go up, which is a backdoor benefit cut.

[donco6]

2. They're working on that spin right now.

"It wasn't Obama's fault! It was the Commission!"

[MadHound]

3. Yeah, I can hear the gears whirring,

Never mind it was Obama who appointed said commission.

[laughingliberal]

4. Yeah, but it won't work. There would not be a commission without him.

The Senate, in one of the few worthwhile moves they made this year, defeated the bill to create the deficit commission so President Obama, apparently to appease the ever whining Kent Conrad and obnoxious Judd Gregg, created it by executive order. Anything they do, anything at all, is on him, AFAIC. He breathed life into the monster we thought we'd killed and it is his monster, now.

[doc03]

5. I think it is certain if the Republicans take control of the.

House. The only way to stop it is take to the streets, the American people won't they will just roll over and take it. I don't know what will finally wake people up if ever.

[johnaries]

7. Oh no! Obama's Commission is going to RAISE TAXES!

Oh, sorry, I forgot which bullshit meme I was answering to.

The RW is against the Fiscal Commission because they are convinced that the commission will "raise taxes". So, of course they will attack any way they can.

Even if they have to create bullshit memes to make Liberals hate it.

Maybe we should do some research and make up our own minds rather than listen to bullshit memes that were probably started by the RW in the first place?

:shrug:

[MadHound]

9. As I said to LZ, are you willing to eat your words come December?

Benefits down, age requirements up, or a combination thereof.

[Jakes Progress]

16. I will repeat MadHound's question.

I didn't catch your answer. . . . . . . .Well?

[JDPriestly]

22. The Catfood Commission is shameful if for no other reason

than that it is operating in secret.

What are they so ashamed of? And whatever happened to Obama's promise of transparency?

The Catfood Commission deserves our constant attention, our utmost criticism. It is a shameful concept and should never have been created. Let Congress deal with the deficit in the open.

[AtomicKitten]

6. Yes it is. But the constant state of outrage doesn't fuel itself, ya know. nt

[EmeraldCityGrl]

8. Quoting Obama when asked about SS by an 83 yo woman

at an Ohio town hall meeting.


"QUESTION: I introduce myself. I'm 83 years old. I know I don't look it.

OBAMA: You don't. You don't. You look great.

QUESTION: Thank you. I'm very concerned about Social Security. I think there's a few here who are probably living on that or supplementing that. I understand that Congress has given themselves a raise but has denied us COLA for possibly the next three years. At the time of the H1N1 thing, people over 65 were not given the right to have the shot. For some reason or other this health care crisis was left on our senior backs. What can we do about this?

OBAMA: Well, let me address all three of your issues, because you're raising actually three separate issues.

First is how do we make sure that Social Security is sustainable over the long term. Social Security is one of our entitlement programs that for now is stable, but will not be if we don't make some changes. Now, here's the good news. Compared to Medicare, Social Security is actually in reasonably good shape, and with some relatively small adjustments, you can have that solvent for a long time. So Social Security is going to be there. I know a lot of people are concerned about it. Social Security we can fix."

Now we just have to wait and see how Obama defines "fix."

[Hannah Bell]

10. He already gave the game away. No fixes are needed for the next 30 years --

unless the government (& the rich who pay most of the income taxes) doesn't want to pay back the Trust Fund money it borrowed.

In that case, "fixes" are needed.

But THAT WOULD BE THEFT, TWICE OVER.

[daleanime]

11. See above...

'Raise age, lower benefits.':argh:

[MannyGoldstein]

13. Fix = reduce benefits by about $50,000 per person

Which is being called "raising the retirement age to 70".

[JDPriestly]

24. Trouble is, there are no jobs for the over 60s much less the over 65s.

Think of all the much younger people who cannot get jobs. It's much tougher to get work when you are older. And older people are the first to be laid off.

The idea of raising the retirement age is absurd. Anyone who votes for that had better start looking for a new job.

It might be possible to sell the country on something like that in good economic times. But it's not going to go over in these times.

I cannot imagine the young people who want to have to pay for the basic needs of their unemployed 60 years and over parents who don't qualify for Social Security. It's not possible for most young people to do that. In fact, a lot of young people have moved home to live with Mom and Dad regardless of how little Mom and Dad get from Social Security. It's better than being on the street.

[MannyGoldstein]

12. Co-chairs both veterans of deals to slash Social Security

As Clinton's Chief of Staff, Bowles cut a deal with Gingrich to slash Social Security. Congress said "No".

Simpson's tried to cut SS several times.

Why appoint those two unless it's to cut Social Security? Nothing else makes sense.

Why appoint a commission at all after Congress rejected it?

[Recursion]

17. Obama appointed the commission because the GOP filibustered Reid's attempt

Everyone's focusing on Social Security but the commission is looking at deficit levels as a whole and their recommendation will probably address a lot more than SS.

[girl gone mad]

27. How can they be looking at deficit levels as a whole?

They simply are not equipped to do so.

The military budget is completely off of the table and there is only on economist on the commission. How can they solve a problem which they do not seem to understand, based on past and ongoing public statements they've made?

To address the "deficit problem", they would need to tackle the root causes of the financial crisis. Even the sole economist on the commission doesn't have a sufficient background or working knowledge of global monetary policy to make the kinds of sweeping recommendations which would be necessary.

[Recursion]

29. If Grover Norquist hates it this much, it's probably not that bad

"The deficit problem" was a sloppy phrase of mine; what it's actually charged to examine is identifying "policies to improve the fiscal situation in the medium term and to achieve fiscal sustainability over the long run."

What do you mean when you say the military budget is completely off the table?

there is only on economist on the commission.

I wonder if you have misunderstood the purpose of the commission. There isn't any actual economic question that needs to be answered. Everybody knows that as the baby boom is starting to retire, they will stop pouring money into the Social Security system through levies and into the stock market through individual retirement plans; in fact, they'll start taking money out of both of those, and in a decade or so we'll be looking at a much lower percentage of workers to retirees than the country has ever had. There's no economic mystery here: we need to increase contributions and/or decrease benefits*. The commission's purpose isn't to find an economic solution but to find a political way to convince Senators and Representatives to do something they have always been averse to doing. It's the same idea as BRAC -- everybody knows which bases really do need to be closed, but Congress has shown itself to be unwilling to do it unless an outside body tells them to.

* Before anybody screams "cat food", one way to do this that I support is means-testing some portion of benefits

[Poboy]

19. Exactly Manny -nt

[Name removed]

26. Deleted message

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

[grantcart]

14. Well you just are going to try and take everyone's fun away aren't you

Oh and actuarial tables are a facist plot.

[Jakes Progress]

15. How about answering MadHound's question?

[dogday]

18. Bookmarking to see how this plays out.

Let us just see what happens by December.

[laughingliberal]

20. That's how I'm handling these. nt

[JDPriestly]

21. I wish you were right, LoZoccolo. We shall see.

I think that we all need to fight to keep Social Security without having the eligibility age raised to the point that Social Security is irrelevant for a lot of Americans who need it the most.

Life expectancies are not the same for all races you know.

According to the chart at infoplease, in 2005, life expectancy for white people was 78.3. for African-Americans it was 73.2. So if you are African-American and have to wait until you are 70 to take your Social Security, you may not get a very large share of what you contributed.

Of course, these rates include a lot of infant and childhood mortality as well as the mortality rates of young people. And these rates may be considerably higher for African-Americans than for white people. I don't know what the life expectancy comparison would look like if they figured it based only on individuals who are alive at the age of 30.

http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0005148.html

[Radical Activist]

23. Pretty much.

[inna]

25. This is not about Obama, there are much more powerful dynamics at play here.

It's not as if he's a great mastermind behind the plan to dismantle the New Deal; he's just playing his minor part.

[mmonk]

28. Maybe. Maybe not. Do you possess proof?

There is no good reason to have a deficit commission in a recession/depression looking primarily at social security and "entitlements" other than an ideological one.

[SammyWinstonJack]

30. +1