A New Deal to scupper a presidency (Blumenthal has Rubin on SS)

[RamboLiberal]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,1394301,00.html

In his second term, President Bush is determined on regime change. The country whose order he seeks to overthrow is not ruled by mullahs or Ba'athists. But members of his administration have compared its system to communism. The battle will be "one of the most important conservative undertakings of modern times", the deputy to White House political director Karl Rove wrote in a confidential memo. Since the election, the president has spoken often of the "coming crisis" and he has mobilised the government to begin a propaganda campaign to prepare public opinion for the conflict ahead. The nation whose regime he is set on toppling is the United States.

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"It's a badly, badly flawed plan," Robert Rubin, the former secretary of the treasury and current Citigroup director, told me. "From a fiscal point of view it's horrendous. It adds to deficits and federal debt in very large numbers until 2060." He calculates that the transition costs of Bush's plan for the first 10 years will be at least $2 trillion, and $4.5 trillion for the second 10 years. The exploding deficit would have an "adverse effect on interest rates, an adverse effect on consumption and housing prices, reduce productivity and growth, and crowd out debt capital to the private sector. Markets could begin to lose confidence in fiscal policy. The soundness of social security will be worse".

Rubin adds that the stock market is hardly a sure bet. "You are not making social security more secure by subjecting people's retirement to equity risk. If you look at the Nikkei in Japan you get a sense of what can happen."

Behind the pomp and circumstance of the inauguration, the display of might and rhetoric of right, lie the fear and trembling of the Republican party. If the defeated, disheartened Democrats can maintain a modicum of discipline, the Republicans will alone be forced to defend Bush's social security proposal. Enough of them realise that attacking the fundament of the social contract may let loose political furies against them. Already the powerful chairman of the House ways and means committee, Bill Thomas, has called Bush's plan "a dead horse". But Bush appears intent on regime change at home. In his first term, he promised "compassionate conservatism". In his second term, he pledges casino conservatism, the restoration of boom and bust, which he calls "the ownership society". He has gambled his presidency on it.

[Kurovski]

1. "Gambled his presidency"?

What, do we get to recall him, and then replace him with a movie star like they did in Cal-lee-forneya?

[housewolf]

2. "Casino Conservatism"

This is a great phrase! It tells the truth about what this administration is up to. Let's use this a lot in our letters, faxes and emails and see if we can get this phrase into the MSM

[Kurovski]

4. Mail it in an envelope

with $240,000.

That seems to get the job done.

[eg101]

3. Bush is bad, but Rubin aint no friend of American workers

Rubin helped Clinton set up the outsourcing of jobs, the overseas flight to cheap labor, the importation of cheap white collar labor, all that crap. Fuck Rubin. He has no right to criticize anyone!