Virtual Summit

Paul Rosenberg is the Senior Editor of Random Lengths News, and contributor to Open Left

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If you're playing checkers on a checkerboard, but your opponent is playing chess, it's only a matter of time until you lose. And that's the problem in fighting against the enemies of Social Security and Medicare who are rallying around the flag of so-called “fiscal responsibility” this week. The attack on these two popular programs is part of a decades long war—a game of chess, if you will—that all too few of us understand. more »

Lynn Parramore is the editor of New Deal 2.0, the website of the Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt Institute.

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The national debate over fiscal responsibility and sustainability is entering a new, critical phase. With so much at stake, the time has come to examine our fundamental assumptions about government deficits and debt. It’s time to consider alternative perspectives before we rush down potentially destructive policy paths that could compromise our future. The Roosevelt Institute’s New Deal 2.0 asked seven economic thinkers to address what they see as the most dangerous myths currently circulating on the deficit. more »

I just watched Erskine Bowles pontificating at the first meeting of the President’s Bipartisan Fiscal Commission, and I just couldn’t get past my visceral reaction: I don’t trust any of these people.

And I don’t. I mean, Alan Simpson? The man who likes to talk about “senior citizens driving up to their gated community in a Lexus”? The man’s a weasel, he’s always been a weasel. So already I’m suspicious. Why the hell is he co-chairing this commission, anyway?

And it’s beside the point. Pay attention: The reason Franklin Roosevelt would not allow Social Security to be means-tested is that the political will to protect it would vanish as soon as it was perceived as a “welfare” program.

Alan Simpson knows that. They all know that. They just want to change it under the radar, because if it only goes to poor people, it’s a lot easier to destroy.

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Mike Lux is the co-founder and CEO of Progressive Strategies.

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Deficit hawks have been in full flutter mode. Pete Peterson and his friends have gotten together in recent days for one of their periodic teeth-gnashing, rending-of-clothes bacchanalias, and President Obama's deficit commission is having its first meeting today.

While progressives have done some good things in response to all this deficit hawk fervor -- like repeatedly pointing out that if we cut deficits too fast, the economy will tank, and reminding people that some of the biggest deficit hawks (such as Greenspan and Rubin) are people who ignored the housing bubble or even benefited from it. I think it is incumbent on us, though, to have a sharper, less defensive message overall on the deficit. It is not politically tenable for us to ignore or downplay the big deficit numbers that are projected. We need a proactive deficit strategy of our own to push back on the conservative deficit hawks. Such a strategy should be built on two major messages, both of which are good economic policy as well as good politics: more »

The deficit hawks are going into high gear with their drive to cut Social Security and Medicare. President Obama’s deficit commission is having a big public event on Tuesday in which many of the country’s most prominent deficit hawks will tout the need to reduce the budget deficit. The next day, Wall Street investment banker Peter Peterson will be hosting a “summit on fiscal responsibility,” which will feature more luminaries touting the need to get deficits under control.

What will be missing from both of these events is any serious debate on the extent of the deficit problem and its causes. These affairs are not about promoting a real exchange of views on issues like the future of Social Security, Medicare, and public support for education, research and infrastructure. The purpose of these events is to tell the public that everyone agrees, we have to cut the deficit. And, this means cutting Social Security and Medicare. This is argument by authority. more »

This spring, much of Washington is afflicted with deficit allergies.

The Senate had to break a filibuster just to pass a one-month extension of unemployment insurance without “paying for it.” House Blue Dog Democrats are posturing about a balanced-budget amendment on top of the president’s three-year freeze on domestic discretionary spending.

The president’s bipartisan commission on deficit reduction holds its first public session Tuesday. Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke issues dark warnings about the need for deficit reduction. 

This allergy is accompanied by spring fevers from infectious signs of economic recovery. 

“America is back!” crows Newsweek, hailing the “remarkable tale of our economic turnaround.” March saw an increase of 160,000 jobs. Retail sales are up. The stock market bounced 70 percent in little more than a year. 

Vice President Joe Biden predicts the economy will soon be adding 500,000 jobs a month. Springtime in America! Surely, it’s time for the government to tighten its belt.

Don’t bet the house. Spring blossoms wilt in the summer’s heat. 

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Ashley Carson is the Executive Director of OWL-National Older Women's League.

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Today is the first meeting of the President’s National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform. Some of us have been paying very close attention to the discourse leading up to this momentous occasion. For example, Alan K. Simpson, one of the co-chairs insists that the solution to fixing America’s deficit is to target Social Security. more »

This is deficit-fest week with President Obama’s deficit commission scheduled to have their big public kickoff on Tuesday, followed by an all-day affair sponsored by the Peter G. Peterson Institute the next day. If the deficit hawks succeed, everyone should be really really scared about the deficit by the end of the week and just dying to cut Social Security and Medicare for the sake of our grandchildren.

While there will be many facts about the debt and deficit tossed out at these gala events, there are some important tidbits of information that are likely to go unmentioned. So, courtesy of billionaire investment banker Peter G. Peterson (not) we bring these facts to you here. more »

When many of us think of how senior citizens live their lives, our thoughts turn to retirement communities in Palm Springs or Boca Raton. But in fact, a large percentage of older Americans must regularly grapple with far harsher economic realities. more »

Before the White House deficit commission meets for the first time tomorrow, the two co-chairs Erskine Bowles and Alan Simpson gave a preview on Fox News Sunday.

It wasn't pretty.

They claim to be leading a "just-the-facts" dialogue, yet they seem unaware of the fact that we just passed the biggest deficit reduction bill in history, known as "health care reform."

Both Bowles and Simpson stressed they would be relying on official numbers from the Congressional Budget Office and government actuaries. But Simpson, unprompted, made this bizarre comment:

Somebody said, well, is the new health care bill off the table? I said, nothing is off the table, absolutely nothing.

Uh, the proper response to that question is: "Absolutely, because it would be pretty stupid to put on the table legislation that the Congressional Budget Office just estimated would cut the deficit by over $1 trillion." more »