General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsAfter a dramatic week, Social Security is again off the table
Question: If Democrats were going to sell out, and President Obama really wanted to cut Social Security, why didn't he make Boehner an offer he couldn't refuse?
It would have been the perfect cover. He could have acquiesced on more of the tax cuts and breaks for the wealthy and thrown in something else Republicans absolutely wanted.
He could have done it his first two years when Democrats controlled the House. It was determined that he would do it in the 2012 lame duck using Republicans as cover. So what happened?
Here's an example of how dead chained CPI is, and why it should be.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022048462
a geek named Bob
(2,715 posts)Our president is playing Go.
Xipe Totec
(43,890 posts)a geek named Bob
(2,715 posts)but I didn't expect them to fall this quickly...
Gregorian
(23,867 posts)I never knew how perfect he would be for this job. Mr. Cool.
Honeycombe8
(37,648 posts)Not something that should be done. It's wrong.
My grandma was on SS for years. Thank God she had three sons to help care for her, or God knows what would've happened to her. She didn't get enuf SS to live on. Imagine someone like her having to take a cut so that Boehner, Cantor, and other wealthy people don't have to cough up to pay their fair share.
KoKo
(84,711 posts)Check out his speech in 2006 at Brookings Institute where he "implies" FDR's programs are "outdated."
=======
I also don't think you understand the speech you keep posting, or you're attaching a meaning to it only you understand.
KoKo
(84,711 posts)Repugs don't let a "cookie thrown to them" GO TO WASTE.
Wait and see.
ProSense
(116,464 posts)Still, feel free to wait for its return.
"Repugs don't let a 'cookie thrown to them' GO TO WASTE."
They're not that smart.
"McConnell wound up having to filibuster his own bill."
http://sync.democraticunderground.com/10021937851
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)Why are you making false statements and posting blue links that do nothing to support them?
ProSense
(116,464 posts)Are you afraid that it's gone?
Afraid of a victory?
Actually, it's not really a victory if Obama pulled it himself, now is it? I mean, he ignores us, right?
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)It shouldn't be a hard question, Prosense.
This has been a repeated problem of yours, posting blue links that do not say what you claim they do.
ProSense
(116,464 posts)The proposal is to extend the tax cuts under $250,000 and unemployment benefits. Do you see Social Security in the offer. Read it again and let me know when you find it.
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)You posted an article that quotes some things the President said, not the text of an offer.
Where did the President say that SS is off the table?
ProSense
(116,464 posts)woo me with science
(32,139 posts)These blue links that go nowhere are a recurring problem, and they hurt credibility.
ProSense
(116,464 posts)woo me with science
(32,139 posts)People are tired of being jerked around, Prosense. They are tired of being lied to and manipulated by our own party, and having this snake, which threatens the lives and livelihoods of millions of us, rear its head again and again. Do you remember crowing triumphantly that SS had been "saved" last time? When it was used as a hostage to ensure that we will get austerity out of this deal?
Well, we are still ensured austerity, Prosense, because of this President's actions. And SS came back. And now you crow triumphantly that it is going away...again. How many times do we have to do this?
Less mocking of those who hang in the balance of this game would be nice. Refraining from making statements that are blatantly unsupported by facts would be nice. Some acknowledgement that this is more than a guffawing game of blue links, but deadly serious policy that will determine the future of millions would be nice. It would be nice if the administration understood that, too, or had some empathy for it.
Obama, speaking for the Hamiltonian Democrats (2006) on cutting the safety nets: "This is not a bloodless process."
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x1540315
ProSense
(116,464 posts)rateyes
(17,438 posts)Obama is saying to pass the middle class tax cut now, and that he will promise to negotiate on spending later, and thats all it says. For you to use that link to declare he took it off the table is disingenuous at best.
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)that backs up what you are claiming it says.
spanone
(135,861 posts)and turn over the senate to them for raising taxes on billionaires only and they would say no.
ideologues.
you can't govern 'with' them.
Cha
(297,528 posts)Plutocrats They're so sensitive to paying their fair share for First Repsponders, Roads, Bridges, the Military. Hoarding money is so much better for their shells.
dkf
(37,305 posts)Who put it there? What a dysfunctional chaos.
President Obama's latest offer: http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022051149
And select cliff-jumping gear: http://sync.democraticunderground.com/10022042859
dkf
(37,305 posts)It's funny how the complaint re I/P issues was the lack of a negotiating partner. Looks like we. Have the same thing here.
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)Where has the President said SS is off the table?
How about austerity? Can we get austerity off the table?
ProSense
(116,464 posts)http://sync.democraticunderground.com/10022051625
President Obama's latest offer: http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022051149
"How about austerity? Can we get austerity off the table?"
That's never off the table. It has to be fought. It was there in 1935 with FDR and it still there.
It's being pushed by Third Way and some Democrats people consider progressive:
DEAN: Yes.
O`DONNELL: And it`s better that anything you`re going to get in the compromise.
DEAN: Well, here`s -- and I rarely agree with anything on the opinion pages of "The Wall Street Journal." But here`s where -- I`m a deficit hawk. And the reason I`m a deficit hawk is, as a progressive, I know that social programs can only be sustained in the long term if you have a balanced budget, which is what Bill Clinton and his folks did.
So if you really want to be serious about this, you got to attack the deficit. This is the fairest way to attack the deficit of any system I have seen in terms of taxes, in terms of cuts evenly spread. There are some bad cuts in there I don`t like as a progressive in human services.
But everybody is going to have some sacrifice. And I think going over the fiscal cliff is the fairest sacrifice. It`s also coincidentally going to take the biggest bite out of the deficit, which Wall Street should like.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/50260060/ns/msnbc/
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)with Republicans to ensure that it will be an outcome of this process?
You still have not posted any statement from the President indicating that SS is off the table.
dkf
(37,305 posts)TheProgressive
(1,656 posts)He said " In the next few days, Ive asked leaders of Congress to work towards a package that prevents a tax hike on middle-class Americans, protects unemployment insurance for 2 million Americans, and lays the groundwork for further work on both growth and deficit reduction.".
We have to be steadfast and watch what they are doing. Obama already put SS cuts on the table - SS and Medicare age might be the stuff he wants to lay the ground work for...
Persistence works in both directions. They are persistent to do these cuts - we have to be persistent to say 'no funking way'.
Note: I posted this on another tread on this same topic...
ProSense
(116,464 posts)We have to be steadfast and watch what they are doing. Obama already put SS cuts on the table - SS and Medicare age might be the stuff he wants to lay the ground work for...
...it's off the table until it's put back there. Laying the groundwork is just can-kicking terminology, unspecific to any proposal. That will be defined later.
It's off the table in this offer.
TheProgressive
(1,656 posts)Like I said, we need to be persistent in insuring that the c-cpi *is* off the table.
The second we let up - the c-cpi will be back on the table.
It is like how the NDAA was modified in committee to allow you and I to be held without any Constitutional Rights.
"the Constitution forbids it yet it is the law" - wha????
ProSense
(116,464 posts)"Like I said, we need to be persistent in insuring that the c-cpi *is* off the table. "
...wrong with vigilance. Still, it's off the table in this negotiation. People aren't going to box shadows.
The chained CPI was issued a severe blow in that a lot of powerful groups came out against it, and even a key supporter had to acknowledge it inflicts pain: http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022048462
TheProgressive
(1,656 posts)However, I and others will be on watch to insure c-cpi is, how about these words, never put on the table...!
We, as citizens, are required to fight for what we want...
Hekate
(90,773 posts)But I can tell by the sullen mutterings around here that a large coterie still really believes that Obama has it in for the rest of us.
Tell it to the GOP, guys.
Demo_Chris
(6,234 posts)SidDithers
(44,228 posts)Sid
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)Obama has guaranteed that we will be fighting this battle for years to come. What used to be understood as merely Republican talking points are now a malignant bipartisan narrative.
It is a devastating betrayal.
ProSense
(116,464 posts)Obama has guaranteed that we will be fighting this battle for years to come. What used to be understood as merely Republican talking points are now a malignant bipartisan narrative.
It is a devastating betrayal.
...this battle has been fought ever since Social Security was enacted. It's not new.
A Democratic President enacted the COLA. Everything objectionable, including linking Social Security to the general fund, was part of that proposal.
President Jimmy Carter
While campaigning for President, I stressed my commitment to restore the financial integrity of the Social Security system. I pledged I would do my best to avoid increases above those already scheduled in tax rates, which fall most heavily on moderate and lower-income workers. I also promised to correct the technical flaw in the system which exaggerates the adjustment for inflation, and to do so without reducing the relative value of retirement benefits as compared with pre-retirement earnings.
I am announcing today a set of proposals which meet those commitments and which solve both the short-term and long-term problems in the Social Security system through the end of the twentieth century. These proposals are designed to:
--Prevent the default of the trust funds now predicted to occur.
--Bring income and expenses into balance in 1978 and keep them that way through the end of the century.
--Create sufficient reserves to protect the system against sudden declines in revenue caused by unemployment or other economic uncertainties.
--Protect the system's integrity beyond the turn of the century to the extent we can predict what will happen in the next 75 years.
--Provide for an orderly review and examination of the system's basic structure.
My proposals are the result of a number of hard choices. I am convinced that action is needed now, and that these steps will restore the financial integrity of the Social Security system.
I will ask the Congress to take the following specific actions:
1. Compensate the Social Security trust funds from general revenues for a share of revenues lost during severe recessions. General revenues would be used in a counter-cyclical fashion to replace the payroll tax receipts lost as a result of that portion of unemployment in excess of six percent. General revenues would be used only in these carefully limited situations. Because this is an innovative measure, the legislation we submit will provide this feature only through 1982. The next Social Security Advisory Council will be asked to review this counter-cyclical mechanism to determine whether it should be made permanent.
2. Remove the wage-base ceiling for employers. Under present law employers and employees pay a tax only on the first $16,500 in wages. Under this proposal the employer ceiling would be raised over a three-year period, so that by 1981 the ceiling would be removed. This action will provide a significant source of revenue without increasing long-term benefit liabilities.
3. Increase the wage base subject to the employee tax by $600 in 1979, 1981, 1983, and 1985, beyond the automatic increases in current law. This will provide a progressive source of financing.
4. Shift revenues from the Hospital Insurance Trust Fund to the Old Age, Survivors, and Disability Trust Funds. In part, this shift will be made possible because of substantial savings to the Medicare system from the hospital cost containment legislation that I have proposed.
5. Increase the tax rate on the self-employed from 7 percent to 7.5 percent. This will restore the historical relationship between the OASI and the DI rates paid by the self-employed to one and one-half times that paid by employees.
6. Correct certain technical provisions of the Social Security Act which differentiate on the basis of sex. This will include a new eligibility test for dependent benefits. Recent Supreme Court decisions would result in un-financed increases in the cost of the system and some inequities without this change.
These six steps, along with measures already contained in existing law, will eliminate the short-term financing problem and improve the overall equity of the Social Security system.
In order to guarantee the financial integrity of the system into the next century, two additional steps must be taken. I will be asking the Congress to:
1. Modify the Social Security benefit formula to eliminate the inflation over-adjustment now in law. This modification, known as "decoupling," should be done in a way that maintains the current ratio of retirement benefits to pre-retirement wages.
2. Adjust the timing of a tax rate increase already contained in current law. The one percent tax rate increase presently scheduled for the year 2011 would be moved forward so that .25 percent would occur in 1985 and the remainder in 1990.
Taken together, the actions I am recommending today will eliminate the Social Security deficit for the remainder of this century. They mill reduce the estimated 75-year deficit from the Trustee Report forecast of 8.2 percent of payroll to a manageable 1.9 percent.
Prompt enactment of the measure I have recommended will provide the Social Security system with financial stability. This is an overriding immediate objective.
In addition, I am instructing the Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare to appoint the independent Social Security Advisory Council required by law to meet each four years. I will ask the Council to conduct a thorough reexamination of the structure of the system, the adequacy of its benefits, the effectiveness and equity of disability definitions, and the efficiency and responsiveness of its administration. Their report, which will be issued within the next two years, will provide the basis for further improvements.
I call upon the Congress to act favorably on these major reform initiatives.
Jimmy Carter
The White House,
May 9, 1977.
http://www.ssa.gov/history/carterstmts.html#system
Fact, the current COLA is inadequate:
http://robertreich.org/post/38349329185
Noise without facts is noise. Work to reject attempts to cut the program and demand that it be expanded and strengthened.
The current drama helped to deliver a blow to one of the disguised cuts, and that's a good thing.
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)It takes a special type of shamelessness to claim that this debacle has helped anyone or delivered any blow except to the ability of millions of us to trust our own party to stand up for our interests.
You know, Prosense, it is exactly this type of spinning that just makes people feel angrier, and more helpless. When they are repeatedly fed a narrative that is completely at odds with what they have witnessed with their own eyes, it is hard to conclude that the party and its mouthpieces view us with anything other than contempt.
ProSense
(116,464 posts)"You know, Prosense, it is exactly this type of spinning that just makes people feel angrier, and more helpless. When they are repeatedly fed a narrative that is completely at odds with what they have witnessed with their own eyes, it is hard to conclude that the party and its mouthpieces view us with anything other than contempt."
Here's what we "witnessed": Social Security was put on the table in these negotiations, and then taken off.
You had nothing to do with that outcome. You are "helpless."
You tell everyone they should feel the same.
There were others who did protest, and believe their voices were heard.
You are having a hard time believing that its no longer part of the negotiations because you invested so much energy in wanting the cut so that it could bolster your indictment of the President.
It didn't happen. Other people are glad. Not you.
I repeat, this is an ongoing struggle: http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=2052837
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)because he killed his parents.
Obama is the one who put SS on the table. Twice.
ProSense
(116,464 posts)"Obama is the one who put SS on the table. Nobody made him do it. "
And you didn't make it take it off, but he did.
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)and there is no reason whatsoever to believe it is.
And we still get painful, economy-starving austerity, either way. That, of course, was purposely orchestrated and guaranteed.
And now we have come full circle to the initial false statement, posted with blue links that go nowhere, served up with the same spinning and contempt we have seen so many times before.
I am weary, and more than a little disgusted and sad. Goodnight, Prosense.
ProSense
(116,464 posts)"No, he never said this is over, and there is no reason whatsoever to believe it is."
...reading and understanding for yourself that this is no longer a part of the negotiations taking place before the tax cuts expire at the end of the year, you'll know in 10 days.
"And now we have come full circle to the initial false statement, posted with blue links that go nowhere, served up with the same spinning and contempt we have seen so many times before. "
Is that some kind of defense mechanism: absurdity?
SidDithers
(44,228 posts)Obama didn't want to cut SS. Obama has never wanted to cut SS.
Sid
MannyGoldstein
(34,589 posts)And why appoint Tony Soprano to guard the cash register Simpson and Bowles to figure out how the government can save money?
TDale313
(7,820 posts)SidDithers
(44,228 posts)Sid
MannyGoldstein
(34,589 posts)SidDithers
(44,228 posts)MannyGoldstein
(34,589 posts)HiPointDem
(20,729 posts)MannyGoldstein
(34,589 posts)Hope I'm wrong.
ProSense
(116,464 posts)you have to acknowledge that it's not longer part of this negotiation.
That was the immediate goal. Back to speculating.
MannyGoldstein
(34,589 posts)And then there may be a "strengthening" exercise shortly thereafter.
But for now... improvement.
ProSense
(116,464 posts)and the House gains a few more Democrats.
Like I said, the speculation will continue. After this outcry, I doubt the issue of strengthening Social Security will be approached this way again.
MannyGoldstein
(34,589 posts)Bonobo
(29,257 posts)Lone_Star_Dem
(28,158 posts)I am exhausted. All this political drama and the flu.
I swear, if obama ever makes a proposal like that again, I'm sending my mother to Washington DC to give him the worst talking to of his life! If you knew my mom you'd understand the severity of this threat.
I'm going to breath a sigh of relief now. I think everyone of us helped to kill this. Our calls, letters and emails all had a part to play in its demise.
I suspected as much when it was said the WH hadn't had as much blowback as they expected the day after.
Thank you everyone for your blowback!
DJ13
(23,671 posts)This new offer by Obama is a stop gap to blunt the worst aspects of the fiscal cliff Obama himself negotiated for a year ago.
A year ago was when he first put Social Security on the table, I seriously doubt after two tries he wont try to include it in the later negotiations next year.
(Though I wish he would wise up and admit defeat on it.)
ProSense
(116,464 posts)trying to push it off are the cuts to defense, $500 billion.
I'm for not only going over the cliff, but also for sequestration.
DJ13
(23,671 posts)Demo_Chris
(6,234 posts)Bohner or Limbaugh proposing increasing taxes on millionaires because we just cannot afford to keep them as they are?
When was the last time you heard the NRA proposing we eliminate guns?
When was the last time you heard an American Evangelical arguing that we need to keep Jesus out of our schools?
But here we have Obama offering to slash social security. He OFFERED it. You think it's now off the table? It will never be off the table now. From now until the end of time the GOP is going to be saying that even the "radical leftist" Obama thinks social security needs to be cut.
It's amazing that our President, the guy were just barely finished busting our asses to get elected, the guy who campaigned on the promise to protect these programs, couldn't even wait until freaking Christmas before stabbing his supporters in the back. And I really don't want to hear a bunch of nonsense about how none of us are smart enough to understand the hyper-dimentional chess that the master negotiator is doing. Obama makes crying Bohner look like the man of freaking steel.
grahamhgreen
(15,741 posts)"I am still ready and willing to get a comprehensive package done."
Means chained CPI
ProSense
(116,464 posts)Means chained CPI
...the President's first offer was comprehensive:
Obama offers GOP an ambitious, progressive debt-reduction plan
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10021905787
Like I said, chain CPI is dead. It would never pass the Senate, and is even less likely to after January 1. I doubt the issue of strengthening Social Security will be approached this way again.
If the issue of strengthening it is raised again, there will be other proposals discussed, and there will be no rush to do it.