;)
The Commentariat -- March 8, 2013
I published a "We the People" petition on the White House site. It has one signature. Please sign it unless you vehemently disagree, of course.
CLICKING ON THE IMAGE WILL GET YOU TO THE WHITE HOUSE PAGE.
Hey, Peggy Noonan Is Still Ignorant! Dan Amira of New York has fun bashing the latest Noonsense. CW: I'll say this for Noonan -- her uncanny ability to make sweeping generalizations based on fleeting observations made during brief visits to Wal-Mart or a hotel or a neighborhood with Romney yard signs must be a great inspiration/challenge to Tom Friedman. ...
Also, sometimes a busy writer just has to plagiarize, then blame his "researcher" for "betraying" him like that. Alex Seitz-Wald of Salon on Juan Williams' inattention to "attribution." CW: you know Peggy Noonan doesn't plagiarize, because nobody else -- except Friedman -- would write that crap.
Peter Finn & Aaron Blake of the Washington Post: "John O. Brennan was confirmed as CIA director on Thursday afternoon, after Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) expressed satisfaction with the response he had received to his questions about the Obama administration's drone program.... In the final vote, Brennan was confirmed 63-34." The roll call results are here. ...
... Washington Post Editors: "The fact that [Sen. Rand Paul's] paranoid fantasies gained some traction is testimony to the administration's real failures in managing its counterterrorism campaigns. Mr. Obama has chosen to carry out hundreds of drone strikes against al-Qaeda targets in Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia, including one against a U.S. citizen, without any public accounting. Justice Department memos authorizing the attacks have not been disclosed; only this week were senators on the intelligence committee allowed to read them. The White House has devised a process for adding names to a target list for drone strikes but has never revealed even its outlines." ...
... Jeremy Herd & Justin Sink of The Hill: "The same day [Sen. Rand] Paul went to the Senate floor to press President Obama on whether drones could be used to kill American citizens within U.S. borders, Attorney General Eric Holder said Obama would soon speak to the public about the U.S. drone policy. The public address by Obama highlights the administration's understanding that it needs to give a fuller account of a program that is a hallmark of Obama's counter-terrorism policy -- but that was a covert policy not publicly acknowledged by the government just months ago." ...
... New York Times Editors: The Senate's report [on detention & interrogation techniques] may be the last hope for Americans to know the truth about what Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney authorized in the name of protecting our country -- decisions that caused enormous damage to its reputation worldwide. But it remains classified, and Mr. Brennan has not said whether he would support releasing a redacted version to the public. That is the only acceptable course. The cover-up of the Bush-era lawbreaking has to stop."
... Carl Hulse of the New York Times: "John McCain and Lindsey Graham assailed Senator Rand Paul's filibuster of an Obama administration nominee over drone policy a day earlier, suggesting an emerging split in the Republican Party over antiterrorism tactics.... Mr. Paul had said that he would try to hold up the nomination of John O. Brennan as director of the Central Intelligence Agency unless the administration answered unequivocally that President Obama did not have that power. The full Senate confirmed Mr. Brennan's nomination Thursday afternoon. Mr. McCain ... noted that Mr. Paul had raised the idea that the antiwar activist Jane Fonda could have been singled out for a strike during her criticism of that war.... 'To allege that the United States, our government, would drop a drone Hellfire missile on Jane Fonda, that brings the conversation from a serious discussion about U.S. policy into the realm of the ridiculous,' Mr. McCain said. Mr. Graham said he did not remember Republican critics attacking President George W. Bush for employing drone strikes, and he said the question for Republicans was, 'What are we up to here?'" ...
... Yoo Too. Adam Serwer of Mother Jones: "John Yoo, the author of the Bush administration legal memos justifying the use of torture, thinks President Obama is really getting too much grief over targeted killing. And he wants Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) -- who filibustered Obama's nominee to head the CIA for 13 hours on Wednesday -- to lay off." CW: when the guys on your side are McCain, Graham & Yoo, you really may want to rethink your position. ...
... Update. Daniel Strauss of The Hill: "Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) blasted fellow GOP Sens. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) on Thursday, saying the two 'think the whole world is a battlefield.'"
... Charles Johnson of Little Green Footballs: "The right wing blogosphere is absolutely delighted with Rand Paul, of course, but it has nothing to do with his theatrical opposition to drones; it's because any Republican who acts out in public and bashes President Obama gets their uncritical support. They're already talking about having him run for President. Note that Sen. Paul is a frequent guest on the conspiracy-peddling Alex Jones show, where he co-signs every deranged fantasy. This is the new hero of the right."
... Hulse also has a blogpost on the GOP filibuster of Caitlin J. Halligan , whom President Obama nominated to a seat on the federal appeals court for the District of Columbia. The filibuster of Halligan "could renew a feud over rules governing filibusters and how the Senate handles high-level judicial nominations -- an issue that has torn the chamber for years. Democrats are already in discussions on how to respond to the Halligan filibuster. They believe Republicans are dead set against confirming qualified Obama administration nominees to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. They accuse Republicans of exaggerating their objections to Ms. Halligan to justify a filibuster under a 2005 agreement that short-circuited the last partisan showdown over filling judicial vacancies." ...
Law Prof. Adam Winkler, in The New Republic: "A number of legal scholars have argued that the filibuster is unconstitutional.... The first Senate filibuster occurred in 1841, a full half a century after the Founding... The constitutional challenge to the rule thus appears to be very much like Paul's anti-drone filibuster: a symbolic gesture whose value comes only from the expression of disagreement rather than a substantive measure that will change the outcome. So the filibuster will remain the law of the land, whether it's constitutional or not."
Jennifer Steinhauer of the New York Times: "The Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday approved a measure that would make the practice of illegally buying a gun for someone else a felony, and increase penalties for the crime. The measure, which addresses a practice known as straw purchasing, passed the committee by 11 to 7; the only Republican to vote in favor was Senator Charles E. Grassley of Iowa. Mr. Grassley's nod on the measure, which already had two Republican co-sponsors, was significant because he is the most senior member of the committee."
Philip Rucker & Rosalind Helderman of the Washington Post: President "Obama wants to cement his legacy with a long-term deal to rein in the federal deficit and new immigration and gun laws, his advisers said. But his reelection victory, which brought a humiliating GOP defeat, has done little to break the logjam on taxes and entitlements. Now, advisers said, the president has concluded that the key might be to bypass talks with Republican leaders ... and instead find common ground with rank-and-file Republican lawmakers. So the president is in the midst of a charm offensive. Wednesday, he treated a dozen GOP senators to a dinner.... Thursday, he invited House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (Wis.) ... to his private White House dining room for lunch. Next week, Obama will take a rare drive to Capitol Hill to meet with all lawmakers.... House Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) said Thursday that he welcomed Obama's outreach, even though it means the president is sidestepping him and other party leaders." ...
... Charm Offensive, Ctd. Michael Scherer of Time: "... the spirit of the city is shifting, and the commonalities between the two parties, for the first time in several years, are taking center stage. This is how Washington once worked. The nation now waits to find out if it can work this way again." CW: isn't "charm offensive" something of an oxymoron? ...
... Alexander Bolton of The Hill: President "Obama told a small group of Republican senators who had dinner with him Wednesday evening that a deficit-reduction deal needs to happen in the next four to five months, according to three sources familiar with the meeting."
Former President Bill Clinton, in a Washington Post op-ed, urges the Supreme Court to overturnthe Defense of Marriage Act, which he signed into law.
Julie Pace of the AP: "President Barack Obama is playing down expectations for a Mideast peace breakthrough during his upcoming trip to Israel, telling American Jewish leaders that he won't be carrying a 'grand peace plan' when he arrives in the region later this month. Obama, in an hourlong private meeting at the White House on Thursday, acknowledged that near-term prospects for peace are bleak, according to a person who attended the discussion. But the president said a deal with the Palestinians remains the only way for Israel to achieve long-term security."
Paul Krugman: "Stocks are high, in part, because bond yields are so low, and investors have to put their money somewhere. It's also true, however, that while the economy remains deeply depressed, corporate profits have staged a strong recovery. And that's a bad thing! Not only are workers failing to share in the fruits of their own rising productivity, hundreds of billions of dollars are piling up in the treasuries of corporations that, facing weak consumer demand, see no reason to put those dollars to work.... What the markets are clearly saying, however, is that the fears and prejudices that have dominated Washington discussion for years are entirely misguided. And they're also telling us that the people who have been feeding those fears and peddling those prejudices don't have a clue about how the economy actually works." ...
... MEANWHILE, MSNBC's Imitation of Bill O'Reilly has teamed up with Village Economist Jeffrey Sachs (who is not a macro-economist) to pen a Washington Post op-ed titled on the front page of the Post's online edition, "Why Paul Krugman Is Wrong." The column title is "Deficits do Matter." CW: Scarborough just can't quit. I only glanced at what these guys wrote for -- literally -- ten seconds, tops, and in that time, I saw two straw men they'd erected. This is Conservo-Debate Tactic No. 1: (a) claim the liberal guy said something ridiculous, (2) show that whatever crap you made up is ridiculous, (3) claim victory. I'm assuming their whole essay is a sham.
Jackie Calmes of the New York Times: "Standing with survivors of domestic abuse and sex trafficking, President Obama on Thursday signed into law a renewal and expansion of the 19-year-old Violence Against Woman Act, a long-sought victory made possible last month when House Republicans quit blocking the measure's passage." ...
... I hope readers will take the time to listen to Diane Millich (sp??), who introduced Vice President Biden. Many House Republicans (and some Senate Republicans) opposed protecting her. It is mighty hard to keep on laughing at the misogynists running our country:
... AND Evidently the Misogynists Know It. Jennifer Bendery of the Huffington Post: "When Congress passed the Violence Against Women Act reauthorization bill late last month, more than 130 House Republicans voted against it. But some of those same lawmakers are putting out misleading statements that make it look like they voted for the bill instead. [For example,] Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa), for one, issued a statement with the headline, 'King Votes in Support of Violence Against Women Act.' But King didn't vote for the VAWA bill. Instead, he voted for a GOP alternative bill that failed to advance." Bendery goes on to list a number of other members of the House Old Boys Liars Club. Not all of the Old Boys are men, BTW. ...
... To wit, Lindsey Wise of McClatchy News, catches House Republicans Vicki Hartzler & Ann Wagner (both R-Missouri) pretending they voted for the VAWA even though they voted against it; they voted for the watered-down House bill, which didn't pass & later voted against the bill that did pass). The statement by Hartzler's spokesperson that she has "sympathy for women who've been abused on attacked" is really heartwarming. Apparently Hartzler does not have any sympathy for Millich, because Millich would have been specifically excluded in the bill Hartzler voted for, but is included in the bill Hartzler voted against. ...
... Steve Benen: "What happened to far-right conservatives having the courage of their convictions? If they opposed the Violence Against Women Act and felt the need to vote against it, then why pretend otherwise? ... Extremism is disconcerting, but by some measures, cowardice is worse."
Question: When Is Moving an Ounce of Blow Worse than Moving Millions of Dollars Worth?
... Answer: When You're Not a Bank. Thanks to contributor Barbarossa for the link. ..
... It's Not a Crime if It's Profitable. Linette Lopez of Business Insider: on March 6, "Attorney General Eric Holder spoke [to the same Senate committee] on the Justice Department's part. The agency did not prosecute any individual criminally for this matter in part, he said, because the size of large banks 'has an inhibiting influence -- impact on our ability to bring resolutions that I think would be more appropriate', Mr Holder told lawmakers. 'And I think that is something that we -- you all -- need to consider.'" CW: Holder's argument, then, is that "Corporations are people, my friend." If an individual works for a big bank & commits a crime that hurts the bank -- embezzlement, say, then some law enforcement agency will prosecute her. But Holder is arguing that an individual who commits crimes that are money-makers for the banks cannot be prosecuted because to do so would upset the industry. Make sense of that, please.
Tim Egan: "The people who grow grain for breakfast cereal and raise pigs for prosciutto are also among the biggest deniers of the consensus scientific view that humans have altered the earth's climate.... At first glance, this makes no sense, because farmers have the most to lose in a world of weather havoc.... Why the denial? Cost. Any fix in the sticks is likely to hit farmers hard, because they use a disproportionate amount of the fertilizers, chemicals and fossil fuels that power the American agricultural machine, and are likely to come under increased regulation.... [A farmer] should be put in charge of the daunting task of convincing food producers that nothing imperils their future more than climate change."
Robin Pogrebin of the New York Times: "The Santa Monica post office, with its distinctive PWA Moderne style, is one of about 200 post offices around the country, dozens of them architecturally distinctive buildings, that the Postal Service has indicated it may choose to sell in coming years because of its financial problems. Eleven historic post offices are already on the market in places like Yankton, S.D.; Gulfport, Miss.; Norwich, Conn.; and Washington.... So as the Postal Service tries to shrink, it is often finding itself in battle with groups trying to prevent what the National Trust for Historic Preservation last year labeled one of the most significant threats to the country's architectural heritage."
Root for China the Chinese Economy. Zachary Karabell in the Atlantic: "The consequences of a Chinese collapse ... would be severe for the United States and for the world. There could be no major Chinese contraction without a concomitant contraction in the United States. That would mean sharply curtailed Chinese purchases of U.S. Treasury bonds, far less revenue for companies like General Motors, Nike, KFC and Apple..., and far fewer Chinese imports of high-end goods from American and Asian companies. It would also mean a collapse of Chinese imports of materials such as copper, which would in turn harm economic growth in emerging countries that continue to be a prime market for American, Asian and European goods."
Congressional Race
Rachel Weiner & Aaron Blake of the Washington Post: "Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.) will not seek reelection in 2014, he announced Thursday afternoon, saying he wanted to focus on the nation's challenges rather than politics." CW: Levin was one of the principal Senators who opposed serious filibuster reform. Thanks, Carl.
Right Wing World
One Crazy Thing You Have to Do to Win a GOP Presidential Nomination. Luke Johnson of the Huffington Post: "Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) said Thursday that he would not support a stopgap bill to fund the government unless it defunded President Barack Obama's health care law, allying him with tea party darling Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas).... Rubio's position puts him to the right of House Republicans, who passed a continuing resolution Wednesday that does not defund the health care law upheld by the Supreme Court. The move caused ire in the conservative blogosphere, with RedState's Erick Erickson accusing the GOP of 'capitulation' and threatening primary challenges for House members who voted for it."
News Ledes
Reuters: "Employers stepped up hiring in February, pushing the unemployment rate to a four year-low, suggesting the economy is gaining traction despite the blow from higher taxes and deep government spending cuts. Nonfarm payrolls surged 236,000 jobs last month, the Labor Department said on Friday, handily beating economists' expectations for a gain of 160,000. The jobless rate fell to 7.7 percent, the lowest since December 2008, from 7.9 percent in January. The decline reflected gains in employment as well as people leaving the labor force."
New York Times: "Angrily responding to the United Nations Security Council's unanimous decision to impose tightened sanctions, North Korea said on Friday that it was nullifying all nonaggression agreements with South Korea, with one of its top generals claiming that his country had nuclear-tipped intercontinental ballistic missiles ready to blast off. Matching the harsh warning with a toughened stance, South Korea said on Friday that if Pyongyang attacks the South with a nuclear weapon, the regime of the North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, 'will be erased from the earth.'"
Reuters: "Kenya's presidential race tightened on Friday with frontrunner Uhuru Kenyatta gaining just under half of the ballots counted four days after the vote, raising the prospect of a tense run-off against his main rival Prime Minister Raila Odinga." ...
... New York Times: "... when the ballot counting began [in Kenya] this week, Uhuru Kenyatta, the son of Kenya's first president, surged ahead in the race for president and stayed out front as the margin narrowed early on Friday. Soon, the Obama administration and its allies could face a tough choice, made even more complicated by the appearance of taking sides against a candidate who may very well win.... He has been charged with heinous crimes, accused of using a vast fortune to bankroll death squads that slaughtered women and children. His running mate also faces charges of crimes against humanity, and as Kenya's election drew closer, the Obama administration's top official for Africa issued a thinly veiled warning during a conference call about the vote, saying that Kenyans are, of course, free to pick their own leaders but that 'choices have consequences.'"
AP: "Flight attendants, pilots, federal air marshals and even insurance companies are part of a growing backlash to the Transportation Security Administration's new policy allowing passengers to carry small knives and sports equipment like souvenir baseball bats and golf clubs onto planes. The Flight Attendants Union Coalition, which representing nearly 90,000 flight attendants, said it is coordinating a nationwide legislative and public education campaign to reverse the policy announced by TSA Administrator John Pistole this week. A petition posted by the flight attendants on the White House's 'We the People' website had more than 9,300 signatures early Friday urging the administration to tell the TSA to keep knives off planes."
AP: "More than 30 heads of government, including Cuban President Raul Castro and Iranian leader Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, were scheduled to attend [the funeral of President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela]. U.S. Rep. Gregory Meeks, a New York Democrat, and former Rep. William Delahunt, a Democrat from Massachusetts, represented the United States, which Chavez often portrayed as a great global evil even as he sent the country billions of dollars in oil each year."
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Reader Comments (22)
Marie,
I missed this. A lot on my plate so maybe you linked it and I missed it here also. If so my apology, but Thomas Edsall speaks truth to power as many of us have been doing and still it's falling on deaf ears.
No Grand Bargain!
Comment -- an attack on almost all Reality Chex contributors -- has been removed. Remember, please, that the rule here is that writers cannot attack other commenters. Anyone can certainly disagree with ideas expressed here, as long as the disagreement is polite & is fact-based. (Take the tack you would if you were trying to convince your beloved maiden aunt that, no, Obama had not implanted a chip in her brain.) I'm more amenable to attacks on me, especially the really off-the-wall nasty ones, which I think are a hoot. It's been a while since anyone favored me with crazed invective.
Ken Winkes' comment -- below -- makes perfect sense in the context of the comment I removed. -- CW
@Waltwis: Food for possible thought (possible food for thought) here, but as always specifics would help. Not (horrors!) a call for WAPOST neener-neener recriminations, but merely for mention of the specific arguments you might take issue with. Speaking only for myself, I find reasoned disagreement occasionally instructive. Occasionally, I say, because agreement and well-phrased rants, regardless of their bias, have their own rewards, the one the comfort of a well-worn pillow, the other that of simple aesthetic delight.
With that, off to my pillow.
@Dave S. Agreed. Edsall puts together a number of things we've been saying here: (1) remove the cap (or at least raise it high) on Social Security contributions; (2) don't means-test Social Security & Medicare because doing so would make the programs less popular and will give Congress leeway to further cut them; (3) the reason Congress won't lift the cap is that the members don't want to pay the taxes themselves, & lifting the cap is unpopular among their friends & contributors. (As Edsall points out, it is very popular among voters of both parties. But who cares, right?)
It hadn't occurred to me before, but I'll betcha one of the insidious plans for chained CPI is to chain Social Security contributions, too. Right now (& since 1972) the cap rises every year based on estimated wage growth, but I would not be surprised to see that change.
I would not, BTW, be a bit opposed to also increasing benefits for the wealthy. The right-wing argument now is that the cap is there because Social Security receipts are supposed to be loosely pegged to payments. Well, okay, raise the maximum benefit for big contributors; that seems fair to me. Social Security alone will never allow anyone to live in the style to which he was accustomed, but there's no reason big contributors shouldn't get a somewhat higher benefit than they do now.
BTW, when I was looking to see what the cap was pegged to, I came across this post on AllVoices. I don't like to link to anonymous writers, but it's a damned good post on why it is stupid & mean for Obama to cut Social Security.
@Marie, glad you started the petition! I just signed it and immediately sent out an e-mail blast to a bunch of friends to alert them and get more signers. If we all push this...and get the word out, than we'll have that 100,000 plus in no time.
Thank you!
DaveS, thanks for the Edsall piece on SS caps etc. I have been wondering for some time why discussion of cap-raising has not been prominent in all the deficit/cliff/sequester noise of the past few months. Raising the cap seems a simple solution to the SS problem, and while I am always wary of simple solutions to complex problems, it does seem that cap-lifting is a big part of any real solution. I find it hard to believe Edsall's conclusion that political elites don't talk about it because it would cost them more if the caps were raised ... but he certainly presents information that supports that assertion. I hope that the issue gets in the national dialogue, as Edsall is trying to insert it, because the facts and the numbers (including the Kaiser polls, which are factoids) are very persuasive.
BTW, I personally will never see a dime of SS, but am quite content to pay my payroll deduction every two weeks because it is part of the social contract.
A recent Letter to the Times (by Ron Allen, Published February 27 under "Should Benefits be Means Tested") gave a straightforward and convincing argument against means testing for Social Security: Two neighbors with the same income, one lives extravagantly, the other lives frugally, the frugal one receives less in Social Security when retirement time comes.
To me, means testing seems like a way to let people who devote their time and energy to gaming a system win. I don't think that is a good way to live life, but the gamers seem to be doing very well for themselves these days.
Removing the cap on social security payroll deductions has been a soapbox for me for several years. Bernie Sanders introduced a bill (S 1558) with 10 co-sponsors, to remove the cap in 9/2011 - it died in the Finance Committee forthwith. I have written more than 1 letter to Senator Feinstein and got a butkus bullshit unrelated form letter in response. Boxer was one of the co-sponsors. Obama supported moving the cap up to 250K. If you Google eliminating the cap on social security, there are mega hits with salient arguments in favor. However, if you Google opposition to cap on SS you find a Heritage foundation paper from 1999 with the usual blather. That's pretty much it. So I remain perplexed as it seems such an obvious and painless solution. High income earners would hardly miss the extra FICA coming out of their paychecks.
Re: the WaPo op-ed piece by Joe (I'm never wrong) Scarborough and Jeffrey Sachs.
I've never counted on much from Scarborough but self-serving pablum and temper tantrums, but I've lost a lot of respect for Sachs for enjoining Scarborough's puerile and thoroughly unschooled ravings.
One of their primary "nyah-nyah-nyahs" to Krugman is that in 2001 he thought reducing the deficit made sense but now he's not so hot on it (their rationale is that he was getting all up in Bush's grill solely because he's a Republican but he leaves Obama alone).
First, I'm not entirely sure Krugman said this the way they claim. But even if he did, this sort of argument is silly and disingenuous.
First, the country's economy was far different in 2001 than it is today. Krugman is not, so far as I can tell, FOR deficits now as much as he is for job creation which demands reinvestment which, in turn, will up the deficit in the short term but serve the purpose of restoring the nation's economic fettle. In 2001, Bush took over a much healthier economy than he handed off to his successor, by orders of magnitude (he being the CEO president, and all). The disastrous economic dysfunction that followed President CEO's malfeasance required an extensive retooling of our approach that would differ markedly from 2001.
What Sachs and his jejune co-author don't consider is that Krugman's argument is similar to saying that when a person is healthy, they should be concerned about staying that way, reducing weight, eating right, etc, but when they are on the verge of kicking the bucket, worrying about which treadmill to buy can--and should be--put off until they're back from the dead. This, at least, is my interpretation.
I fully expect an whiny, immature response from Morning Blow-job, but not from a guy like Sachs. Guess I've been reading him wrong.
But here again, we have two guys with a big bullhorn shouting at the top of their voices that up is down, black is white, and guy with the Nobel in economics doesn't know half of what they know.
Joe Sixpack is taking it all in. Maybe he doesn't read the Post but he listens to the lame MSM regurgitators who do, and this shit will be repeated down the echoing tunnels and across the widening gyre.
http://www.nationalmemo.com/watch-elizabeth-warren-asks-what-it-would-take-to-shut-down-a-big-bank/
No wonder big banks don't like EW. I'd trade both Isaakson and Chambliss for one like her.
@NiskyGuy Appreciate the Ron Allen article date, I used the same counter argument to someone I e-mailed earlier this morning to sign the WH petition. She replied to me that she couldn't sign because it excluded means testing. Since I fired back have not heard from her. And, this is someone with strong liberal leanings! (We'll be having an interesting discussion at dinner tomorrow night!).
@MAG: please explain to your friend that means-testing is a trick favored by conservatives. Prominent conservative Yuval Levin advocated for it in a New York Times op-ed within the past week. Brooks & Friedman have urged it, too, among many others.
The whole purpose is to make Social Security and Medicare less popular. You won't get little old Teabaggers out there screaming at the government to keep its hands off their Social Security & Medicare if these become viewed as programs for "those people."
There will be a stigma attached to Social Security, even if millions of middle-class people still get it. People will brag at cocktail parties that "Bob & I made too much on our investments last year to get Social Security." Those at the party who do get Social Security will grin & bear it; they sure won't boast about receiving benefits, as they won't want to seem "needy."
If you need proof, ask yourself why Congress -- including the majority of Congressional Democrats -- keep their mouths shut about raising the Social Security cap. Obama opposed raising the cap in his campaign literature. That's because their influential friends, and they themselves, look forward to the day when they hit the cap & their paychecks go up. I know the Wal-Mart Waltons wouldn't even notice if they didn't get their piddly Social Security checks, but as long as "comfortable" retirees are getting theirs, Social Security & Medicare will remain popular.
There's also the slippery slope problem. If Congress sets a high bar for means-testing to begin with, they can & will progressively set it lower & lower.
Means-testing "sounds" reasonable, especially to liberals who don't see any need to help out the wealthy any more than we already are. But it's a very bad idea. The cost of sending little checks to the Waltons is miniscule compared to the cost of not sending them. As Tom Edsall wrote in the post Dave S. linked, "... insofar as benefits for the affluent are reduced or eliminated under means-testing, social insurance programs are no longer universal and are seen, instead, as a form of welfare. Public support would almost certainly decline, encouraging further cuts in the future."
Marie
File this in the "Justice Delayed is Justice Denied" file:
Conservative "provocateur" James O'Keefe agreed to settle a lawsuit for invasion of privacy with former ACORN employee Juan Carlos Vera for $100,000, although not until Vera lost his job and hundreds of ACORN employees were also forced out onto the street. Here's the HuPo story:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/03/07/james-okeefe-juan-carlos-vera_n_2832338.html
This is a little late but I wonder if rather than the broiled sea bass and vegetable ragout the president offered to GOP cipher and pretend budget guru Paul Ryan during their summit luncheon yesterday, it would have been more salutary to serve that slimy rat bastard some ramen noodles, off-brand tomato soup from the "grocer's special" rack, a side of 9 Lives Tuna from a dented can, and some stale week old bread from the reduced bakery section. This way he could see what those grannies he is so intent on starving have to survive on.
Aside from that I hope the president wore some dark glasses. Imagine having to look across the table at those bulging bug eyes all through lunch? Bad enough he had to try to keep from zoning out while listening to his fabricated budget bullshit.
Chuckie cheese with the feral children one day and lunch with the Ayn Rand zombie the next.
Sheesh. Whatta life.
http://prospect.org/article/lone-star-state-left-out-dry
Told you so!
Has anyone ever seen Noonan and Friedman in the same room?
Thanks for the petition. Just signed.
@Ak. better yet cat food.
Re: Prospect article on sequester impact (and a bit more).
As the article states, the sequester will hit the poor and near-poor Texans hardest. I can't imagine Rick Perry cares. He must be concerned about the smaller number whose more middle class lifestyle will be affected, expecting they will speak with a louder voice in the next election. Also, more proof, if any more were needed, that blue states (and I'd guess the majority of RC readers) are generously supporting the states who traditionally vote against most of what they hold dear about fairness, tolerance and democracy.
Have signed the petition and forwarded it to others. Thanks, Marie.
The signing and today's posts caused me to think a bit more about means testing. For Social Security, I don't like it either because I, too, see it as an attack on the basic SS concept, an insurance/retirement policy we all have in common. Have noticed, though, that Medicare does charge a significantly higher monthly rate for those who can afford it, which is a kind of means-testing in reverse. I would also note that basing costs and distributions on income is a progressive initiative, something I fully support when it comes to taxation. That's one of the reasons I would like to scrap the cap on SS contributions, because not doing so is essentially regressive. That's why I'm still thinking.
On SS, have to share something that appeared the the local paper this week, quoting from the letter I wrote in response.
"In a recent letter to the editor a federal employee looking at a sequester-induced ten percent salary cut blames "entitlements" for his plight and our debt. He cited Social Security, though he himself says the program is adequately funded for another twenty years. While the federal budget does have problems, social security is clearly not one of them. In fact, social security’s large surplus funds other federal expenditures....."
Such nonsense from a federal employee is surely no cause for optimism. Makes me feel it's not just the red states who don't understand fairness, tolerance, democracy or ARITHMETIC that I'm doomed to support.
Dave,
Got that covered with the third course of 9 Lives Tuna. I'm sure Ryan would consider actual tuna fish an extravagance for those greedy grannies that his budget could not abide. This while he feeds his face with gourmet victuals.
Prick.
Oops. I meant to say evil prick.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/03/07/bishops-oppose-violence-against-women-act-because-of-lgbt-provisions_n_2833675.html
The above is a link to 5 guys that are also against the Violence Against Women Act. I guess we should count ourselves lucky that it wasn't ALL the bishops.
@Ken Winkes: you're quite right. Medicare is effectively means-tested when it comes to premiums. However, we all get the same benefits, so if I need $50,000 surgery + hospital care, & so do you, even though our premiums may be different, we're each eligible for the same level of care.
With Social Security, on the other hand, I get a different benefit from you, depending upon your overall contributions relative to mine. So although SS is not means-tested, the monthly benefit does reflect how much of a contribution each person made during his/her working days, at least to a point.
That is, neither Medicare nor Social Security treats everyone precisely equally.
Marie