Social Security Scare Squad Enlists Obama

[Karmadillo]

http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=108&ItemID=14347

Social Security Scare Squad: Reason to Hate the Media #567,945
by Dean Baker
November 22, 2007
Truthout

Halloween has come and gone, but the Social Security Scare Squad (SSSS) refuses to take off their masks. This group of ghouls will not stop until they have substantially dismantled and/or privatized the nation's most important social program.

In their latest foray, the SSSS enlisted Sen. Barack Obama in their effort to convince the public the program is on its last legs and in desperate need of an overhaul. Obama suggested raising the income cap on the payroll tax as a way to increase the program's revenue, and then chided Senator Clinton for not having a plan for addressing the program's projected shortfall.

Senator Clinton rightly brushed off the attack, pointing out the projected problems with Social Security are distant and relatively minor. There is no reason she needs to develop a plan for plugging a hole that is not projected to arise until 2046, almost thirty years after the latest date she can leave the White House.

Proposing tax increases is not generally a smart way to win elections, but Obama clearly hoped to be rewarded by the SSSS with positive news stories and editorials, and praise for his courage from the print and broadcast pundits. From the early returns, it doesn't look as though the SSSS have come through with their end of the bargain. However much they might appreciate efforts to undermine confidence in Social Security, Obama's attack seems to have done little to raise him from his distant second place standing in the polls.

While Obama's attack can be dismissed as bad judgment by a politician running out of time, the deeper issue is it has so much resonance with the media elite. This group has been blatantly ignoring and/or misrepresenting the facts in its attacks on Social Security for almost two decades. They have used their power over the news to force politicians to respond to their agenda, praising those who advance their crisis story and damning those who try to keep the projections in perspective.

Politicians are not dodging a tough issue when they refuse to say what we should do with Social Security in the second half of the 21st century. Rather, they are staying in touch with reality. We don't know what the world will look like in 2040, 2050 and 2060. Under very plausible assumptions, Social Security will remain fully solvent through these decades with no changes whatsoever.

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[Bitwit1234]

1. Obama probably thought he was getting a jump on Hillary

that's why he jumped on the bandwagon. Maybe he thought it was true. And this is another reason I say he is so immature and not ready to be president. He jumps in, before he knows what he is doing. He needs to gain more experience in the political field.

[Cha]

2. Fuck that Obama...Do Not

Privatize Social Security..you're falling into the wall street trap.

Study it.

[ripple]

5. Obama is against privatizing SS

Where did you hear differently?

[RufusTFirefly]

3. Hooray for Hillary

I commend Sen. Clinton for avoiding this trap and condemn Sen. Obama for falling into it.

Kucinich on Social Security

"First of all, the Social Security money belongs to Main Street, not to Wall Street. It needs to be said very clearly here that privatization is off the table. There will be no privatization when I'm elected president. I'll block any effort. Social Security, as a matter of fact, is a better investment now than the stock market. There's a higher return. There's guaranteed cost-of-living increases. Privatization you have to worry about the value of your account. - D.K. 9/25/03

[cuke]

4. Obama gets a twofer - pandering and fear mongering

[creeksneakers2]

6. Hillary showed courage

by not caving in on the SS hoax.

[Karmadillo]

7. And then he slams Clinton "ducking" the non-crisis. Tim Russert no doubt approves, but

it doesn't make much sense to try to take down a fellow Democrat on this particular issue.

http://www.dailyhowler.com/dh102907.shtml

<edit>

That news report, by Perry Bacon, describes a new approach by Obama’s campaign. Here’s the way Bacon began:

BACON (10/27/07): Sen. Barack Obama yesterday slammed Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton for "ducking the issue" of ensuring the solvency of Social Security and signaled that he will take a more aggressive approach to the front-runner for the Democratic presidential nomination.

At an event in Des Moines, Obama (D-Ill.) characterized Clinton's approach to addressing the issues as "You should hedge, dodge and spin, but at all costs, don't answer."

Obama is going to be “more aggressive” about Clinton—and he’s starting with Social Security. According to Obama, Clinton has been hedging, ducking, dodging and spinning the issue. And omigod! The point of this new approach by Obama is even more clear in what follows:

BACON (continuing directly): The statements marked the latest escalation of campaign rhetoric from a candidate who earlier this year declined to criticize his chief opponent for the nomination. Increasingly, he is taking on not just Clinton's policy views but also her character, and is casting the Democratic front-runner as someone who makes decisions based on polls and calculation, rather than on her convictions.

Increasingly, Obama is talking about Clinton’s “character.” Granted, that’s an assessment by Bacon, not a quote from Obama. But when you say that someone is ducking, hedging, dodging and spinning a serious issue, you are, of course, critiquing her character. And that is the way your claims will be reported—especially since the candidate in question has the last name of Clinton.

Of course, Clinton really hasn’t been ducking or hedging or dodging or spinning this non-issue issue.

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[ClarkUSA]

8. The only people scared about Obama's ideas are Club For Growth Republicans and DLC Democrats.

Obama's actual proposal to raise the cap on social security taxes isn't controversial at all among liberal economists. Why not?
Currently social security taxes are capped at the first $97,500 of payroll income a year --- a minority, about 6%, of Americans
earn in that income bracket. One of the prime advantages of raising the cap on taxable income for social security benefits is
that it would make social security taxes less regressive -- i.e., regressive meaning that the tax rate declines as the income level
goes up.

People who make $200,000/year pay the same tax as those who make $100,000/year so their effective tax rate is half as much
(just 3.1%). For those making $10 million, the effective tax rate is 100 times lower (just 0.065% = $6,045/$10 million). Why should
Americans in a much higher tax bracket pay a far lower tax for a program dedicated to ensuring that seniors do not slip into poverty?

Clinton's claims that a tax increase would hurt the middle class and retirees as playing into an established tradition of Republicans
pretending that any tax increase will be aimed at the middle class ––– as they have done with the estate tax. It is this very framing
that has prevented America from implementing more progressive legislation, which makes it that much more unforgiveable that
Clinton would be espousing these lines.

This same argument will, one way or another, be at the center of our campaign against Republicans in 2008. Obama's line -- that
"the wealthiest 6% of Americans are NOT the middle-class" -- is a line that the Democratic party can unite behind, and win behind.

[Karmadillo]

9. Is Paul Krugman a Club for Growth Republican or a DLC Dem?

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/16/opinion/16krugman.html?_r=2&n=Top/Opinion/Editorials%20and%20Op-Ed/Op-Ed/Columnists/Paul%20Krugman&oref=slogin&oref=slogin

By PAUL KRUGMAN
Published: November 16, 2007

Lately, Barack Obama has been saying that major action is needed to avert what he keeps calling a “crisis” in Social Security — most recently in an interview with The National Journal. Progressives who fought hard and successfully against the Bush administration’s attempt to panic America into privatizing the New Deal’s crown jewel are outraged, and rightly so.

But Mr. Obama’s Social Security mistake was, in fact, exactly what you’d expect from a candidate who promises to transcend partisanship in an age when that’s neither possible nor desirable.

To understand the nature of Mr. Obama’s mistake, you need to know something about the special role of Social Security in American political discourse.

Inside the Beltway, doomsaying about Social Security — declaring that the program as we know it can’t survive the onslaught of retiring baby boomers — is regarded as a sort of badge of seriousness, a way of showing how statesmanlike and tough-minded you are.

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[ClarkUSA]

10. Nice try. Krugman wasn't panning Obama's ideas; he simply has no faith in GOP compromise.

Unlike Obama.

Try again.

[Karmadillo]

11. "But Social Security isn’t a big problem that demands a solution..."

Sounds like he's panning Obama's ideas since he's saying Obama is misguided for proposing them in the first place. The fact he called him a "fool" and a "sucker" would seem to reinforce that interpretation.

[ClarkUSA]

12. He's right and Obama's right. Fixing projected SS shortfall is not too difficult.

Krugman is questioning Obama's faith that there is the political will to do this. Looking at Clinton's lies and GOP framing
in her debate response, I'd say he's right. That doesn't make Obama wrong. Only economically uninformed and/or
blindly biased would come to that politically convenient and erroneous conclusion. Then again, relying on cherrypicked
commentary taken out of context is par for the course from the Swift Boat Obama crew here from Hillaryworld. The fruit
doesn't fall far from the tree, does it?

IClinton's right-wing talking points are totally self-serving. She lied about $97,500 being "middle-class" and she's
borrowing Club For Growth phrases to scare Democratic voters away from Obama's elegant solution because she is beholden
to the same corporate interests as the Republican Party. After all, she takes in more money from lobbyists than all the
candidates from BOTH parties. That kind of money demands favors and she's delivering on them by attacking Obama.

[Karmadillo]

13. Strange. Krugman thinks he's right and Obama's wrong.

nt

[Cameron27]

14. I think Krugman's right.

[ClarkUSA]

15. No, that's your desperate Hillaryworlder spin; nowhere does Krugman say that.

Krugman is a cynic who doesn't believe Republicans will ever agree to Obama's ideas because it threatens the corporate personhood
special interests that the GOP (and the Clintonian DLC) hold so dear.