Blog entry

Sour Notes on Social Security

Isaiah J. Poole — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 11:46:05 -0500

Like an “American Idol” reject, John McCain keeps warbling George W. Bush’s greatest flops.

The latest is Social Security privatization, a proposal so roundly rejected by the American people when Bush tried to foist it on the nation in 2005 that even a solidly Republican and sycophant Congress couldn’t swallow it.

But the Arizona Republican senator can’t let it go. In an interview with The Wall Street Journal this week, McCain said that he would, if president, seek to implement “private savings accounts … along the lines that President Bush proposed.”

His words to the Journal are mirrored on his website, which says, “John McCain supports supplementing the current Social Security system with personal accounts — but not as a substitute for addressing benefit promises that cannot be kept.”

The ominous phrase after the “but” is not-so-thinly-veiled code for benefit cuts. Under McCain, you’ll have to work longer before you retire and get a smaller benefit when you do. Your check will be designed not to keep up with inflation, as Social Security does now, so that as you age, you will continue to fall behind as expenses rise.

Meanwhile, you will have to take some percentage of your money that would have gone into the Social Security trust fund and invest it in the stock market. You will have to navigate a dizzying array of options presented by brokers hungry to claim a slice of your personal account for their wallet. And then you will have to pray that you made a wise choice. If you didn’t, or if you ended up being taken to the cleaners in an Enron-style rip-off, well, tough.

This is the social insecurity that John McCain offers to senior citizens. And this man is not being laughed off the presidential stage?

As Roger Hickey, a co-director here at the Campaign for America’s Future and one of the leaders responsible for derailing the 2005 privatization scheme, put it:

Amazing! John McCain embraces the idea that made George W. Bush a lame duck! Clearly McCain learned nothing from George W. Bush's failed attempt to privatize Social Security. Over the past four years, Bush tried hard to achieve the holy grail of right-wing ideologues: dismantling our most important retirement system and putting part of people's contribution in the stock market. And the American people said NO, resoundingly. The fact that McCain is willing to campaign on this dangerous and elitist privatization proposition—even as the economy and stock market goes into a dive— shows that McCain is more concerned about right wing priorities (and Wall Street dreams) than with securing retirement security for the American people.

McCain wants to convince the public that he is going to take on a tough political challenge that no one else has been able to solve. If he was really all that politically macho, he would take the advice from a number of experts who have concluded that Social Security will remain solvent at current levels for at least another 40 years and will be solvent indefinitely through some relatively modest steps, such as simply raising the cap on the amount of earned income subject to Social Security taxes.

The problem is not that people don’t have private options for investing in their retirement—the millions of dollars worth of ads on television, print publications and the Internet hawking all manner of IRAs and 401(k)s testify to that—but it is that politicians have bought into one more Big Conservative Lie. The public saw through it in 2005 and said that the bedrock of our retirement should continue to rest on a platform of shared responsibility, not on a Wall Street gamble in which the house is the only assured winner. That same aware and mobilized public will deliver that same bit of “straight talk” that will sideswipe any bus that tries to take that privatization road again.

Weekend Watchdog Wrap-Up

Bill Scher — Mon, 12 Nov 2007 09:18:58 -0500

Another 0-for-3 day for the Watchdog.

Neither Secretary of State Condi Rice nor Sen. John McCain were asked if the continued White House support for Pakistan's dictator Pervez Musharraf shows that its foreign policy does not promote democracy or defeat terrorism.

Instead, both portrayed Musharraf as a positive force for Pakistan. On ABC's This Week, Rice claimed "Pakistan is a country that has come a long way from 1999 and the military coup," as if a fresh crackdown on political opponents constitutes some sort of democratic progress.

On Fox News Sunday, McCain praised Musharraf as someone who "came to power to replace a failed state," not someone who took power from a democratically-elected leader in a coup. He then said he would continue sending US taxpayer dollars to Musharraf.

Over on CBS' Face The Nation, former Gov. Mike Huckabee was not asked about his false assertion that most of the founding fathers of Ameria were clergymen.

And on NBC's Meet The Press, while Sen. Barack Obama was asked about Social Security, the exchange on both sides was based on the inaccurate premise that the program is in dire straits and requires major changes.

Weekend Watchdog

Bill Scher — Sun, 11 Nov 2007 01:57:19 -0500

Apologies for a belated Weekend Watchdog post, as I'm back from a vacation and long flight delay. But as usual, on Sunday at 4 PM ET, tune in to Air America Radio's "Seder on Sundays" program, where I'll offer the Weekend Watchdog Wrap-Up.

For Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice (ABC's This Week) and Sen. John McCain, R-AZ (Fox News Sunday): Time Magazine reported this week from Pakistan:

...as [Musharraf's] regime cracked down on lawyers, journalists and human-rights activists, it agreed to a cease-fire with a powerful militant leader who had taken 213 soldiers hostage in the lawless northwestern region. The irony was not lost on Asma Jahangir, Pakistan's best-known human-rights activist, who wrote in an e-mail from house arrest, "Those [Musharraf] has arrested are progressive, secular-minded people, while the terrorists are offered negotiations and cease-fires."

Yet, Condi Rice and President Bush have continued to describe Musharraf with kind words and have refused to take any substantive action in response to his dictatorial crackdown. And McCain has not criticized the White House for continuing to provide aid to Musharraf.

You claim your foreign policy is to defeat terrorism by promoting democracy. Isn't this further evidence that your actual foreign policy does neither?

For former Gov. Mike Huckabee, R-Ark. (CBS' Face The Nation): Last month, you asserted that "most" of the "56 brave people" who "put their signatures on the Declaration of Independence" were "clergymen."

That is false. Only one was active clergy and three others were former clergy.

Why should Americans elect as president someone who either doesn't know the basics about our country's founding, or is deliberately misrepresenting it?

For Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill. (NBC's Meet The Press): Economist Dean Baker blogged this week:

The Washington Post reports that Obama is making plans for raising SS taxes and/or cutting benefits if he is elected. It would be appropriate to remind readers that the Congressional Budget Office projects that the program will be fully solvent until 2046 with no changes whatsoever. This is almost thirty years after the latest date that Obama could possibly leave the presidency.

Readers should know that there is no urgency to address the projected shortfall in Social Security although there are many powerful actors who would like to see the program privatized and/or have its benefits cut.

Last month, you said yourself that "Social Security is not in crisis." Why then are you making significant changes to an effective program a campaign priority?

Stop Blaming The Baby Boomers

Dean Baker — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 11:49:01 -0400

Guest blogger Dean Baker is co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research.

Over the last two decades, there has been an effort by the enemies of Social Security and Medicare to demonize the baby boomers as a threat to country’s prosperity and the well-being of our children and grandchildren.

They have repeatedly warned of the enormous projected cost of Social Security and Medicare and called on the current or future elderly to sacrifice their benefits under these programs for the common good. We heard endless tales of $70 trillion dollar-plus deficits and how our children and grandchildren would face crushing tax burdens unless the greedy soon to be geezers accepted large cuts in their Social Security and Medicare benefits.

Those of us who challenged this story now have an important ally in Peter Orszag, the new director of the Congressional Budget Office. Orszag has made a point of distinguishing the extent to which costs are projected to rise due to aging and the extent to which they are projected to rise as a result of the rising cost of health care in the United States. As he recently said at a press event, “The long-term fiscal problem truly is fundamentally one involving the rate at which health care costs grow and much less about the aging of the population.”

This is hugely important. The way to deal with scary long-term budget projections is to fix our health care system, not to gut Social Security and Medicare. While aging will impose some additional costs in the future, this is not new; life expectancies have been increasing ever since the United States came into existence. The new threat is a health care system that is projected to consume more than 30 percent of gross domestic product in just over three decades. If health care costs in the United States looked more like those in any other wealthy country, we wouldn’t have to look at scary budget projections.

The moral of Orszag’s analysis is that those who are concerned about the huge deficits projected for future decades should be working first and foremost on reforming the health care system. If we fix our health care system, then our other budget problems are manageable. If we don’t fix the health care system, we can look forward to a future of bad health care and a weak economy. We will also have insoluble budget problems.

Weekend Watchdog: Rice, McCain Spin

Bill Scher — Mon, 30 Apr 2007 11:04:00 -0400

We were hoping to hear some tough questions asked of Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain on the Sunday talk shows.

For Rice (CBS' Face The Nation): You did not claim executive privilege when you were asked to testify under oath to the 9/11 Commission. Isn't it inconsistent to claim executive privilege now, when you've been subpoenaed to testify about the White House charge that Saddam Hussein sought uranium from Niger?

On ABC's "This Week," Rice pre-empted George Stephanopoulos. Without being asked, she delivered her talking point to justify her refusal to comply with a fresh House subpoena, when in 2004, the White House backed down from executive privilege claims and had her testify to the 9/11 Comisssion.

I testified before the 9/11 Commission. At the time, the President made clear that he did not consider that a precedent, but that the overwhelming concerns about 9/11 did make it necessary.

Well, there you have it. It's not a precedent because Bush said so. Besides, there's no "overwhelming concerns" about how intelligence was manipulated anyway.

For McCain, R-Ariz. (Fox News Sunday): In your announcement speech, you said:

No government program is the object of more political posturing than Social Security and Medicare. Here's the plain truth ... if we don't make some tough choices today, Social Security and Medicare will go bankrupt or we'll have to raise taxes so drastically we'll crush the prosperity of average Americans.

But if you were really interested in giving the public the "plain truth," why didn't you include in your announcement what you said three years ago: that you support Social Security "privatization"?

Fox News Sunday's Chris Wallace did ask about McCain's views, but failed to question why McCain masked his support for "privatization" in his announcement .

McCain did make a hash out of what he would support, telling Wallace he could support a tax increase as part of Social Security compromise, then seconds later, saying he "will not support a tax increase."

Weekend Watchdog Wrap-up

Bill Scher — Mon, 30 Apr 2007 09:30:41 -0400

Did the Sunday talk show hosts pose our Weekend Watchdog questions?

Sec. of State Condoleezza Rice pre-empted ABC's George Stephanopoulos.

Without being asked, she delivered her talking point to justify her refusal to comply with a fresh House subpoena, when in 2004, the White House backed down from executive privilege claims and had her testify to the 9/11 Comisssion.

I testified before the 9/11 Commission. At the time, the President made clear that he did not consider that a precedent, but that the overwhelming concerns about 9/11 did make it necessary.

Well, there you have it. It's not a precedent because Bush said so.

Besides, there's no "overwhelming concerns" about how intelligence was manipulated anyway.

Regarding Sen. John McCain and Social Security, Fox News Sunday's Chris Wallace did ask about his views, but failed to question why McCain masked his support for "privatization" in his announcement.

Weekend Watchdog

Bill Scher — Sat, 28 Apr 2007 02:17:33 -0400

Every Friday in our Weekend Watchdog feature, we post suggested questions for scheduled Sunday guests. You can add your own questions in the comment thread. We'll also include contact information for the shows, so we can let them know what their viewers want asked.

Then on Monday, we'll circle back and see if our questions were asked and answered. Let's take back our media!

For Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice (CBS' Face The Nation): You did not claim executive privilege when you were asked to testify under oath to the 9/11 Commission.

Isn't it inconsistent to claim executive privilege now, when you've been subpoenaed to testify about the White House charge that Saddam Hussein sought uranium from Niger?

For Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz. (Fox News Sunday): In your announcement speech, you said:

No government program is the object of more political posturing than Social Security and Medicare. Here's the plain truth ... if we don't make some tough choices today, Social Security and Medicare will go bankrupt or we'll have to raise taxes so drastically we'll crush the prosperity of average Americans.

But if you were really interested in giving the public the "plain truth," why didn't you include in your announcement what you said three years ago: that you support Social Security "privatization."

***

Email CBS' Face The Nation at ftn@cbsnews.com

Email Fox News Sunday at FNS@foxnews.com

Remember: always be brief, polite and respectful when contacting the media, so our voices will be taken seriously.

Recesspool

Bill Scher — Thu, 05 Apr 2007 17:10:55 -0400

Yesterday, President Bush made three significant recess appointments, installing officials without Senate confirmation during the congressional recess.

The abuse of the recess appointment perhaps isn't Bush's most egregious attack on our Founders' carefully crafted system of checks and balances, since others before him have exploited this constitutional loophole.

But the implicit reasons behind each appointment are quite egregious, and each in their own way.

The one that's gotten the most attention is Sam Fox, our new Ambassador to Belgium.

It's typical, if still highly inappropriate, for cronies of the President to get cushy Ambassador gigs.

But Sam Fox wasn't just a big donor of Bush. He gave $50,000 to the Swift Boat liars that smeared John Kerry's war record.

Of course, the Bush campaign always insisted it had nothing to do with the smear merchants, even though the group had ties to Karl Rove.

But to go the extra mile after being stiff-armed by the Senate, to appoint a major backer of filthy politics to a major post, shows how politics are played in the conservative movement.

Get dirty now, get rewarded later. No consequences for your actions. No disincentive to smear again.

The second is Andrew Biggs, to become the #2 man at the Social Security Administration.

Biggs is not only committed to the dismantling of Social Security via privatization. As associate commissioner of SSA, he was behind an effort to use the agency to pump out misinformation and undermine support for the program.

He is one of the many examples of how the White House is trying to cripple the civil service, and prevent our government from providing us with objective, factual information.

Finally, we have Susan Dudley becoming administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, also known as the "regulatory czar" because it reviews regulations throughout the government.

OMB Watch explains her significance:

"Dudley's record is one of anti-regulatory extremism," said Rick Melberth, Director of Regulatory Policy at OMB Watch. "She has opposed some of our nation's most basic environmental, workplace safety and public health protections."

Dudley has falsely proclaimed ground-level ozone to be beneficial, opposed ergonomic standards to protect workers from repetitive stress disorders, and even suggested that airbags should never have been mandated in automobiles.

This is also a big part of the conservative game plan to cripple the civil service.

When civil servants try to implement laws passed by our democratically-elected Congress, like say the Clean Air Act, folks like Dudley are installed to bring the hammer down, prevent the law's implementation, and put the special interest ahead of the public interest.

The abuse of the recess appointment weakens our system of checks and balances. But the specific people appointed threaten to do even greater harm.

Crippling Our Civil Service

Bill Scher — Tue, 30 Jan 2007 18:15:47 -0500

Today's NY Times reports that Bush issued a new executive order intended to undermine our civil service:

...each [government] agency must have a regulatory policy office run by a political appointee, to supervise the development of rules and documents providing guidance to regulated industries. The White House will thus have a gatekeeper in each agency to analyze the costs and the benefits of new rules and to make sure the agencies carry out the president's priorities.

This strengthens the hand of the White House in shaping rules that have, in the past, often been generated by civil servants and scientific experts. It suggests that the administration still has ways to exert its power after the takeover of Congress by the Democrats.

The Bushies sought to spin this power grab as just "a classic good-government measure that will make federal agencies more open and accountable."

Hilarious. Especially on the same day that Dem Rep. Henry Waxman and GOP Rep. Tom Davis hold a public hearing on how Bush's political appointees pressured our civil servant scientists to downplay climate change ... and the White House refuses both of their requests to release relevant documents.

This is classic secret and unaccountable government. Classic bad government. Classic conservative government.

This power grab is not simply a feature of George W. Bush's personal, monarch-esque tendencies.

It is the foundation of how Washington conservatives believe our government should be managed, or more accurately, mismanaged.

In January 2001, when Bush was assuming the presidency, the right-wing Heritage Foundation issued a white paper: Taking Charge of Federal Personnel.

That report effectively counseled Bush to suffocate the ability of our civil servants to provide objective and factual information, making it impossible for the public to make informed decisions and communicate our will to policymakers in Washington.

It sniffed at the "Public Administration Model" of government as "emphasiz[ing] the Progressive ideal--a value-free 'scientific' program of government administration."

Instead, it preferred the "Political Administration Model" which it defined as "providing presidential leadership to committed top political officials...holding them and their subordinates personally accountable for achievement of the President's election-endorsed and value-defined program."

We've seen Bush implement Heritage's vision of conservative government for six years. We've seen his political appointees:

Run roughshod over our intelligence community.

Threaten to fire Medicare staff for telling Congress accurate cost estimates of White House prescription drug plans.

Use the Social Security Administration to pump out misinformation.

And of course, pressure scientists in multiple government agencies to mislead the public about global warming. (Check out the newly released survey of 1600 climate scientists from the Union of Concerned Scientists, finding "435 occurrences of political interference in their work over the past five years.")

That's conservative government in action. Squelching factual information so it can cater to its corporate backers and pursue a reckless foreign policy agenda.

The voters rejected conservative government in November.

But Washington conservatives fundamentally do not believe in representative government that responsibly informs the public and responds to the will of the people.

And so, the conservative agenda to cripple our civil service will continue, until the people take the White House back.

Cross-posted at The Huffington Post.

The President's Delusions

Robert Borosage — Wed, 24 Jan 2007 11:16:31 -0500

Last night's State of the Union address revealed that the state of this president is still delusional. He can't level with the American people because he can't or won't recognize the reality that we face.

The best part of the speech wasn't anything the president said. It was House Speaker Nancy Pelosi sitting over his shoulder, signaling the change that Americans voted for. The president also got a lift from the "ordinary heroes" that he recognized at the end of the speech. But when it got to substance, the president seemed bored with his own words as he trotted out his pledge for more of the same.

For this president, the economy is great and we need to stay the course. The Democratic response by Senator Jim Webb offered a glimpse of the reality that the president doesn't get - that this economy isn't working for most Americans. No wonder less than a third of Americans think the president has any clue about the problems they face.

For this president, we have a strategy for moving forward in Iraq, and we're garnering global support for our foreign policies. Maybe he's back on the sauce - he certainly isn't reading his briefing papers or listening to his own generals. The president called for bipartisanship, apparently not aware that Senators from both parties are already coming together - in bipartisan opposition to the president's escalation of the war in Iraq. Again, Webb offered a dose of reality in his response, stating flatly that it was time to bring the president's war to an end, and that if he couldn't understand that, "we will be showing him the way."

Even where it has dawned on the president that there is a problem to be addressed, his proposals are gestures, if not mockeries. The health care system is broken. The president's reforms, by his own exaggerated numbers, might provide health insurance for maybe 3 million of the 47 million that now go without, while taking a whack at workers who have decent plans (read unions) and public hospitals (read Hillary Clinton's New York which takes 40% of the hit).

Catastrophic climate change and our dependence on foreign oil are a clear and present threat to our security. The president recycles his ethanol enthusiasms (substituting "woodchips" for last year's "switch grass" as a potential source). But his plans won't even cover the projected increase in US oil demand for oil over the next decades. He still defaults on the imperative for a dramatic national drive for energy independence - like that called for by the Apollo Alliance, which can generate jobs even as it helps address global warming.

Our education system is not providing the basics - children with the nutrition and health care to be ready to learn, universal pre-school, smaller classes in the early grades, skilled teachers, affordable college and advanced training. The president offers only to continue the No Child Left Behind reforms that he has failed to fund.

Immigration reform is a vital necessity. The president calls for comprehensive reform, in the face of growing right-wing opposition. But he insists on a guest worker program, simply a subsidy for exploitative employers, insuring them a pool of second class workers.

The president's speech was more striking for what it omitted than for what it contained. No mention of our unsustainable trade deficits, the loss of 17% of our manufacturing jobs, the growing indebtedness to foreign creditors, particularly the Chinese and Japanese central bankers. No talk of the worst corporate crime wave in modern history, with executives cooking the books and plundering their own companies. Not a word about the worst inequality since the Gilded Age, the rise of families in poverty. Obscenely, the president said not a word about the beleaguered survivors of Katrina, who having weathered Katrina's winds, now must struggle to survive the administration's broken promises.

Speaker Pelosi's presence and Senator Webb's response offered the only solace for Americans watching last night. This president remains in his bubble, divorced from a reality he can't see, committed to a course at home and abroad that won't work. But it matters less and less. Americans have already tuned him out, and the Congress no longer dances to his fancies. From now on, it is the new leadership in Congress that "will be showing him the way."