Reply #3: Here's the background from Gephardt's website. Look at the DATE.

[hedda_foil]

This whole thing occurred within the first MONTH of Gingrich taking over ... when the debate was over how to balance the budget given the horrendous deficit inherited from Reagan-Bush. Gingrich had not yet shown himself to be the total asshole he is and Dean was trying to keep the feds from making the states bear all the burden, which was what Gingrich was trying to do. He was also asking for DEFENSE to be put on the table.

http://www.dickgephardt2004.com/plugin/template/gephardt/*/1931

Here's the full text of what Gephardt posted:

Howard Dean on Social Security
Dean called for increasing the Social Security retirement age to 70 or 68.

"I absolutely agree we need to reduce the - I mean, to increase the retirement age. There will be cuts and losses of some benefits, but I believe that Senator Packwood is on exactly the right track, and we need to deal with the Social Security retirement age..."

"The way to balance the budget, Dean said, is for Congress to cut Social Security, move the retirement age to 70, cut defense, Medicare and veterans pensions, while the states cut almost everything else. "It would be tough but we could do it," he said."

"We've raised it to 67. Now, can we raise it more? I am not going to rule it out… Yeah, I'll look at retirement age. I'll look at all the things that you have to look at…"

"….. I also would entertain taking the retirement age to 68. It's at 67 now. I would entertain that."


Dean said we need to cut Social Security to balance the budget.

"The Governor complains...that while federal spending restraint is clearly needed, it is unfair to place Social Security, Medicare, and defense spending off the table when it comes time for budget cuts."

"I also think that we ought to put Social Security back on the table and defense. If you take defense and Social Security off the table, what you've essentially said, 'We're not going to cut any of the controversial things at the federal level, despite our rhetoric about being courageous in a new day in the American Congress, we're just going to let the governors do all the cutting.' We'll do the cutting, but they got to do some cutting here, too."

"My problem is this. There have been a lot of statements up on Capitol Hill that say 'We're not going to touch Social Security.' 'We're going not to touch Medicare,' one statement was. 'We're not going to touch veterans' benefits.' 'We're not going to touch defense. We may add to defense.' Well, then you're going to stick all the cuts on the programs, as you well know, that go to the states..."

"We know what's going to happen and we're willing to live with that,' Dean said, referring to lower welfare funding. 'We just would like to see some similar kind of backbone by the new leadership in Congress when it comes to Medicare, when it comes to Social Security and when it comes to defense.' Without Social Security and defense on the table, Dean says, cuts in what's left of the budget would harm states..."

"Dean himself has been hawkish on the federal deficit, but his budget balancing suggestions include two programs virtually off limits for Republicans: defense spending and Social Security."
Dean on "This Week with David Brinkley," 1/29/95; Dean on CNN's Crossfire, 2/28/95; Montpelier Times-Argus, 1/30/95; Montpelier Times-Argus, 6/1/95]