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Republicans Trying To Level The Midterm Playing Field

I can only assume that the GOP is worried that it might regain control of the House…

House Republicans don’t have an official budget yet. But they have what amounts to a first draft. The official budget will be released in March or April and will be authored by Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI), the ranking member of the House Budget Committee in consultation with the other Republicans on the Committee. But Ryan has released a budget he’d like. And it’s actually fairly detailed. And if you read it, which we have, you start to wonder why Democrats aren’t making a bigger deal out of it.

What’s in it? A few interesting things.

First, it calls for big cuts in Social Security benefits for everyone currently under 55 years of age. On top of the cuts it also calls for privatizing Social Security.

Basically the exact plan President Bush tried in 2005. Next, it calls for the full privatization and phasing out of Medicare. It’ll be replaced by a system of vouchers in which instead of getting Medicare you get a voucher to buy un-reformed private insurance.

Weirdly, with all that, the draft GOP budget doesn’t get the federal budget into surplus until sometime after 2060, which seems like a pretty long time. But isn’t this sort of a big deal? House Republicans are poised to run in 2010 on slashing or abolishing the two most popular federal government programs — Social Security and Medicare.

Yes, right in the middle of a prolonged recession and right after a stock market crash is a great time to sell Americans on privatizing Social Security.  And 60+% support for the healthcare public option must mean that everyone hates Medicare and wants it destroyed.  And releasing a plan that takes 50 years to eliminate the deficit is especially brilliant when you’ve spent the last year demagoguing about how it’s murdering our grandchildren.

If the Democrats can’t make hay with “Here’s what the Republicans/my opponent wants to do to your retirement if they get elected” messaging in November, they deserve to lose.

P.S. I can’t believe Serious People are still spouting this ridiculous point-missing zombie lie.

Add comment February 4th, 2010 at 07:58pm Posted by Eli

Entitlement Peril!!!

Just in case there hasn’t been enough drumbeating for Social Security reform, it looks like the AP has gotten into the act:

The shortfall between the promises the government has made on Social Security, Medicare and other benefit programs is $45 trillion over the next 75 years, up nearly $1 trillion in just one year, the Bush administration reported Monday.

The administration, releasing the “Financial Report of the United States Government” for 2007, said that the gap between benefits that have been promised and projected revenues is up 67.8 percent from just four years ago, when it was estimated at $26.9 trillion.

This shortfall includes Social Security and Medicare in addition to Railroad Retirement and the Black Lung program.

(…)

Members of Congress said the increase in the unfunded liability for Social Security and Medicare underscored the critical urgency to do something in light of the looming retirement in coming years of 78 million baby boomers.

(…)

[O]fficials warned that something must be done to address the significant shortfall in the government’s largest benefit programs for Social Security and Medicare.

Shorter AP: Oh noes! Socialsecurityandmedicare is totally insolvent! We must reform Social Security immediately! (Because no-one ever, ever wants to talk about reforming Medicare)

Of course, if you actually look at the report, the Medicare deficit dwarfs the Social Security one, either $34T-$6T (p. 46) or $29T-$16T (p. 25), depending on whether you’re including people under 14 (the $34T-$6T number). But somehow Social Security reform is all anyone ever wants to talk about.

Even more interesting, if you look at expenditures as a percentage of GDP (p. 5, the chart titled “Current Trends Are Not Sustainable”), you see that Social Security holds fairly steady, Medicare and Medicaid expand significantly, and Net Interest positively explodes. This is why running up the national debt is bad, kids.

Me personally, I’m not worried about whether Socialsecurityandmedicare is insolvent or not, because Billgatesandeli has a net worth of $59 billion.

(h/t dakine)

Add comment December 17th, 2007 at 10:52pm Posted by Eli

Has Bush Treed Himself?

Since the webmail I have to use for blogging via e-mail tends to insert line breaks in inconvenient places, I can’t really use it to post anything that requires links to any but the tiniest URLs (no, I can’t access TinyURL either), and I’m leery of even attempting to use block quote tags. Consequently, I can pretty much only use the blog-by-mail to post random musings that don’t reference any specific article or blog post.

Today’s random musing regards Bush’s Social Security quagmire. Of course, the most obvious question to ask is, If the polls on Social Security privatization are so bad and getting worse, why can’t Bush just back off?

I think I have an answer to that, and it just tickles me pinko. As we all know, one of Bush’s signature traits is to Never Admit Error, the corollary of which is the We-Have-Always-Been-At-War-With-East-Asia Doctrine. Whenever this administration has flip-flopped on a policy, they have always insisted that the new position is the one that Bush has held all along, and the flip-flop is somehow merely a refinement or restatement of that position. Or else they just release it on Friday afternoon and hope no-one notices. To do otherwise would be to admit that their original position was a mistake.

Now this is the beauty part: Ask yourself, HOW? After 60 days of barnstorming all over the country to pitch the virtues of Social Security privatization, HOW is the White House going to pretend that Bush has been in favor of the Social Security status quo all along? Or slip a radical policy reversal under the radar in such a way that no-one notices? My bet is that they’ll do it via solvency and “saving Social Security”, and explain that the president’s number one priority has always been to protect SS’s finances, and he has always kept an open and pragmatic mind, blah blah blah. Some people will actually even buy it. But for most people, I think this is going to be far, far worse than Hillarycare, which never threatened to take money away from anyone’s retirement. The media can only do so much – or so little, as the case may be.

You know, if you use enough rope, the head will just pop right off.

Someone get this man some more rope, please.

2 comments May 5th, 2005 at 05:07pm Posted by Eli

Big OopSS…

From the Washington Post, by way of Yahoo, by way of watertiger:

While the White House has helped convince more than two-thirds of those polled that Social Security is heading for a crisis or possible bankruptcy without change, 56 percent disapprove of his approach, a survey of 1,001 adults conducted March 10-13 shows. By comparison, 38 percent approved of his handling of the issue and 52 percent disapproved of it in mid-December.

Does everyone see the beauty of this? Bush and the Republicans have succeeded in making a sizable majority of Americans believe that Social Security is in a state of crisis, while at the same time failing miserably at convincing them that their plan will save it.

So, if SS is in mortal danger, and no-one trusts Bush to save it, that opens up a pretty huge opportunity for the Democrats. Yes, I’ve heard everyone saying, “Don’t offer a plan! Don’t bail the Republicans out!”, but I don’t really buy that. Offering a simple, sober, sensible plan like “Raise the FICA cap – problem solved” that bears zero resemblance to Bush’s dramatic, roll-the-dice-in-the-stock-market plan is not bailing the Republicans out. And if the Democrats can frame themselves as the party that saved Social Security from BushCo, then so much the better.

Now, if we can just get America to wake up to the fact that the Republicans haven’t actually made us safer from terrorism, then maybe we can get rid of their sorry criminal asses once and for all…

2 comments March 15th, 2005 at 09:39pm Posted by Eli

Krugmania

Today’s excellent-as-always Krugman column focuses on the godawful bankruptcy bill poised to pass in the Senate, and its conspicuous and unsurprising favoritism of the rich over, well, everyone else.

One increasingly popular loophole is the creation of an “asset protection trust,” which is worth doing only for the wealthy. Senator Charles Schumer introduced an amendment that would have limited the exemption on such trusts, but apparently it’s O.K. to game the system if you’re rich: 54 Republicans and 2 Democrats voted against the Schumer amendment.

Other amendments were aimed at protecting families and individuals who have clearly been forced into bankruptcy by events, or who would face extreme hardship in repaying debts. Ted Kennedy introduced an exemption for cases of medical bankruptcy. Russ Feingold introduced an amendment protecting the homes of the elderly. Dick Durbin asked for protection for armed services members and veterans. All were rejected.

Krugman then goes on to frame this as part of the larger pattern of “ownership society” being used as code for “You’re on your own, kiddo.” This is, of course, appalling, but it is also an opportunity, if the Democrats have the sense and spine to seize it. Now that they have a stranglehold on power, the Republicans are going for the gusto because they can, without any thought to consequences. Basically, their mindset is “Let’s repeal as much New Deal/environmental foolishness as we can before the grownups come back.” What the Democrats must do is aggressively remind voters in 2006 and 2008 just how the Republicans voted, where their priorities were, and how their rhetoric was applied differentially to the rich and the everyone-else.

Essentially, what I would like to see are commercials where we see Bush or Republican Candidate A pontificating about personal responsibility, and then we hear about how Republican Candidate A voted to shield the rich from the full brunt of bankruptcy laws while making sure veterans and Grandma Millie get no loopholes at all. Or Bush/Republican Candidate B talking about the ownership society,followed by a reminder about how Republican Candidate B tried to undermine Social Security. Or any number of examples of government social programs being depicted as havens for freeloaders that must be purged of “waste, fraud, and abuse”, contrasted with generous subsidies, tax breaks, and preferential treatment for the rich and corporate. And if the Democrats can drive home the statement that Republican values are corporate values, then so much the better.

Oh, and if someone wants to use the same strategy in a primary run against Tim Johnson and Ben Nelson, who voted with the Republicans to shoot down some of the Democratic amendments to the bankruptcy bill, well, I won’t stop ‘em. Fine, they’re red state senators who have to vote like Republicans to stay alive. But if they vote like Republicans, what earthly use are they to the Democratic party? Democrats can make inroads in the red states if they go populist and paint the Republicans as the party of the corporate fatcats against the little guy. This will be even more effective if the Republicans’ corporate-friendly policies continue to run the economy into the ditch. Especially since those policies are always rationalized as “economic stimulus”, so if they fail on that level, then they are revealed as get-while-the-getting-is-good corporate giveaways.

13 comments March 8th, 2005 at 05:49pm Posted by Eli