Social Security
Top Stories
Looting Social Security
February 18th, 2009
Defending Social Security sounds like yesterday's issue #&8212; the fight people won when they defeated George W. Bush's attempt to privatize the system in 2005. But the financial establishment has pushed it back on the table, claiming that the current crisis requires "responsible" leaders to take action. Will Obama take the bait? Surely not.
Featured Issues
The Perils of Privatization
Conservatives are trying to resurrect an idea to radically change Social Security that has already been soundly rejected by the American people—privatization. A new series of Institute for America's Future reports finds that if privatization proponents succeed, 8.6 million senior citizens would lose a safety net that keeps them from falling into poverty.... more »
The Conservative Plan for Social Security Is “An Absolute Disgrace”
Sen. John McCain's comment last week that it's an "absolute disgrace" that current workers pay for the Social Security benefits of current retirees was bad enough, but the conservative policy alternative, and the fear-mongering that comes with it, is even worse. Here's how to attack it.
... more »
Why Social Security?
A conservative assault on Social Security was turned back during President Bush’s second term. But we have a long way to go before all Americans can count on dignified rest after years of hard work.... more »
The Case
Retirement with Dignity
We need to make it possible for all Americans to retire with dignity at the end of a lifetime of work. That means protecting Social Security and mandating corporations treat their employees the same as their executives when it comes to health and retirement benefits.
The Privatization Threat Is Back
Prominent Republicans have come out publicly in past weeks stating that, given the chance in 2007, they will push Social Security privatization again. This includes...
The Facts
Less than half of workers participate in a retirement plan
Only a fraction of workers who participate in a retirement plan have access to a traditional kind of pension that guarantees income in retirement
The Social Security "crisis" is a right-wing myth
Social security assets assets, held in the form of U.S. Treasury securities, will last another 38 years
The News
Lawmakers Seeking Consensus On Social Security Overhaul
May 6th, 2009
Dems Target McCain On Social Security
September 19th, 2008
The Case
A Modern Safety Net
We need to update our social contract for the real lives of working families in a brutal economy.more »
The Truth Behind the Social Security and Medicare Alarm Bells
Social Security is a tiny problem. Medicare is a terrible one, but the problem is not really Medicare; it's quickly rising health-care costs. Look more closely and the real problem isn't even health-care costs; it's a system that pushes up costs by rewarding inefficiency, causing unbelievable waste, pushing over-medication, providing inadequate prevention, over-using emergency rooms, and spending billions on advertising and marketing seeking to enroll healthy people and avoid sick ones.more »
Latest from our Bloggers
may
8
2009
10:18 am
10:18 am
Wrong Way Riegels became a football legend when Roy Riegels, captain of the California football team in the 1929 Rose Bowl picked up a fumble and rumbled the wrong way down the field. He was prevented from scoring a touchdown for the opposing team only when one of his own players tackled him. Now we have the political equivalent: Wrong Way Steny Hoyer could become a political legend for going the wrong way on Social Security unless his own teammates tackle him.more »
mar
12
2009
10:11 am
10:11 am
What happens when a blindly ideological outfit pretending to be non-ideological so it can gut Social Security and Medicare gets confronted on videotape? At the "Fiscal Wake-Up Tour" Wednesday night in Boston, it's the outfit itself that gets the jolt.more »
sep
26
2008
11:11 am
11:11 am
Before she became the first female Labor secretary in 1933, Frances Perkins had seen firsthand the tragedy of Manhattan’s 1911 Triangle Shirtwaist fire. Locked in by their employer, 146 mostly young girls died when they couldn’t escape the burning building where they toiled in sweatshop labor. Later, as the New York industrial commissioner, Perkins held employers accountable for workplace safety and health, expanding factory investigations and championing other pro-worker laws, like unemployment insurance.
Now, imagine if Elaine Chao had been there instead. more »
jul
10
2008
10:29 am
10:29 am
Sen. John McCain, I'm one of your friends, right? The kind of friend who can handle some of your special brand of Straight Talk™.
So why won't you just tell me you hate Social Security? more »
mar
4
2008
11:46 am
11:46 am
Like an “American Idol” reject, John McCain keeps warbling George W. Bush’s greatest flops.
The latest is Social Security privatization, a proposal so roundly rejected by the American people when Bush tried to foist it on the nation in 2005 that even a solidly Republican and sycophant Congress couldn’t swallow it. more »
nov
11
2007
1:57 am
1:57 am
Apologies for a belated Weekend Watchdog post, as I'm back from a vacation and long flight delay. But as usual, on Sunday at 4 PM ET, tune in to Air America Radio's "Seder on Sundays" program, where I'll offer the Weekend Watchdog Wrap-Up.
For Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice (ABC's This Week) and Sen. John McCain, R-AZ (Fox News Sunday): Time Magazine reported this week from Pakistan:
...as [Musharraf's] regime cracked down on lawyers, journalists and human-rights activists, it agreed to a cease-fire with a powerful militant leader who had taken 213 soldiers hostage in the lawless northwestern region. The irony was not lost on Asma Jahangir, Pakistan's best-known human-rights activist, who wrote in an e-mail from house arrest, "Those [Musharraf] has arrested are progressive, secular-minded people, while the terrorists are offered negotiations and cease-fires."
Yet, Condi Rice and President Bush have continued to describe Musharraf with kind words and have refused to take any substantive action in response to his dictatorial crackdown. And McCain has not criticized the White House for continuing to provide aid to Musharraf.
You claim your foreign policy is to defeat terrorism by promoting democracy. Isn't this further evidence that your actual foreign policy does neither? more »
apr
30
2007
10:04 am
10:04 am
We were hoping to hear some tough questions asked of Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain on the Sunday talk shows. more »
