Strengthen Social Security

The Democratic base seems to have coalesced around two opposing realities: Either President Obama is inept - if not an enemy of all things good and true - or he's doing the best any human being could possibly do. Both of these seemingly opposing positions lead to the same outcome. They encourage inaction, either through trust or through hopelessness, at a time when action is urgently needed.

Whatever his motives, reports suggest the President's about to make a terrible mistake by announcing cuts to Social Security in his next State of the Union address. If he does he'll be remembered as the "anti-FDR," the President who destroyed the Democratic legacy of Franklin D. Roosevelt, began the dismantling of the New Deal, and led his party to overwhelming defeat. As for his Presidential legacy - well, you can bet he'll be remembered. Generations of older Americans will mutter his name under their breath every time their Social Security check arrives.

What are his motives? I don't know, and at the moment I don't really care. He's shown that he'll respond to public pressure, and he urgently needs to feel some of that pressure right about now. more »

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Uh-oh. David Brooks is offering the President advice again. Since we're told that Brooks is one of President Obama's favorite columnists, there's always the chance that his latest idea will gain traction in the White House. Brooks is smart, and he's a good salesman, so his ideas may resonate with a lot of other powerful Democrats, too.

That would be a very, very bad thing indeed. He's using new catchphrases to dress up some very bad, very old, and very unpopular ideas.

Two old paradigms ain't worth forty cents.

The Brooks proposal may sound fresh, but it's really only a mash-up of two stale notions: That "bipartisanship" happens whenever well-heeled Democratic and Republican politicians cut a deal, and that "transformation" is always exciting and positive - no matter what you're transforming from or to.

Brooks is still thinking in clichéd, outmoded "left" vs. "right" terms. Like so many others in Washington, he doesn't realize that the world has changed. The Grand Compromise he's offering isn't between "liberals" and "conservatives," but between most Americans - Republicans and independents as well as Democrats, Tea Partiers as well as progressives - and the tiny band of Washington insiders that have hijacked that city's thinking with ideas they continue to peddle as "bipartisan."

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Right-wing billionaire Pete Peterson continues to use the Washington Post as an outlet for deceptive anti-tax and anti-government propaganda. His "Fiscal Times" is a factory for churning out James Frey-like mendacity, which the Post then deceptively packages and distributes as "journalism." For those of you who have forgotten, James Frey's deception, in his book A Million Little Pieces, was to pose as a former drug addict who got clean through the force of his own unaided will.

The Washington Post, on the other hand, poses as a newspaper.

The latest Peterson production, "Analysis examines what it's like to be a 'rich' family in America," is a grab-bag of misinformation and fiscal ignorance. This "analysis" was written by the latest Frey from Peterson's shop, someone named Karen Hube, and it's based on two phony premises: First, that "President Obama and others have repeatedly used (that level of income) to define what it means to be 'rich' in America today," and second, that it's a hardship to get by on $250,000 a year. more »

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In 2008, Barack Obama said this: "I think Ronald Reagan changed the trajectory of America in a way that Richard Nixon did not ..." He might want to rethink that statement, especially now that he seems to be promoting policies that are opposed by large majorities of the voting public. more »

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You know what they always say: Pay now or pay later. Middle-class Americans may pay very dearly for the president's tax deal, and at the stage of life when they can least afford it. By providing a temporary cut in the payroll taxes that fund Social Security, this deal starts the nation down a slippery slope that could lead to permanent benefits cuts for the middle class and even more wealth for the rich.

In other words, Obama's "payroll tax holiday" could send the financial safety of America's seniors on a permanent vacation. more »

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I appeared on the Rick Smith Show this weekend to talk about the Deficit Commission report (it's technically not an official report, but it's being treated like one anyway), and what its recommendations would mean to a lot of people in this country.

Rick, who's based in central Pennsylvania, does a great job of discussing the issues from the perspective of working men and women.  As if that weren't enough, the intro music for this segment (Social Distortion's cover of "Ring of Fire") will be met with great approval among Southern California punk-rockers.  

Our conversation is here. (The clip will start to play as soon as you click on the link, so don't click if you're anyplace where the punk version of a Johnny Cash song might not be well received).

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The Presidential Deficit Commission has issued its report -- sort of -- and the president has a problem. Like Dr. Frankenstein in the Mary Shelley novel, he built a creature from discarded parts and it took on a life of its own. more »

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Tomorrow the Deficit Commission votes on its draft proposal. That proposal will not "pass," according to the charter that created the Commission. But if it gets enough yes votes, it's likely to trigger a chain of events that will cost the President and his party dearly. The outcome could define this Presidency for generations, while imposing needless hardship on millions of Americans. A handful of Democrats are the President's - and the country's - last line of defense.

Friends of the White House are in the uncomfortable position of having to save the Administration from itself. For anyone who has the President's ear, that means giving him some straight talk about the political and economic realities that make this proposal so unwise. For Commission members like Sen. Dick Durbin, that also means voting against the proposal. If they do, they'll be helping millions of seniors - and possibly rescuing the Administration's political fortunes. more »

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The co-chairs of the Presidential Deficit Commission released the final draft of their report today, and it's now scheduled for a Friday vote by members of the Commission. We're being told that it's a fairer and more reasonable document than its predecessor. It's nothing of the kind. In many ways this document is worse than the draft that preceded it, and those much-lauded "compromises" evaporate in the cold light of reality. This new draft is lipstick on a piggy-bank robber, a package of cosmetic changes meant to disguise its true purpose: To raid the future financial security of most Americans in order to benefit a few.

This proposal would still cripple government's vital role in society by imposing arbitrary limits on spending. It would still place great financial burdens on lower- and middle-class Americans while easing those of the wealthy. All in all, it's the most profoundly right-wing policy prescription the nation has seen in decades. Democrats who lack the political courage to oppose it will be remembered for it for a long time to come.

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