How Social Security Was Saved (hint... progressives did it)
Features » March 12, 2014
How Social Security Was Saved
Progressive groups and their allies in Congress win one for the people.
BY Cole Stangler
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During the 2012 fiscal-cliff showdown, Woods and others were determined to stop history from repeating. So, in December 2012, about 35 representatives of progressive groups—the AFL-CIO, the Progressive Change Campaign Committee (PCCC), Democracy for America, MoveOn and Progressives United, among others— came together and held a thumbs-up and thumbs-down vote on whether to draw a line in the sand against any cuts to Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. The result was unanimous: Chained CPI was an unacceptable pill to swallow, no matter the circumstances.
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Led by Social Security Works, PDA and the PCCC, the coalition kicked off the New Year by pressuring the Congressional Left to go on record against chained CPI. In the Senate, they lined up Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), who all spoke out against the proposal. In the House, the coalition found a champion in Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Fla.), who had just retaken his seat after a defeat in the 2010 midterms.
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Grayson and his colleague in the Progressive Caucus Rep. Mark Takano (D-Calif.) rallied House Democrats against chained CPI by rounding up signatories to a letter that drew a hard line against slashing the social safety net. “We will vote against any and every cut to Medicare, Medicaid or Social Security benefits,” the letter promised. Forty-four Congress members, including Progressive Caucus Co-Chairs Keith Ellison (D-Minn.) and Raúl Grijalva (D-Ariz.), signed the Grayson-Takano letter and six more representatives made statements in support of it. That effort triggered a less strongly worded anti-cuts letter from Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.) that drew 107 signatures.
Meanwhile, in April 2013, the progressive coalition delivered a petition with more than 2 million signatures to the White House. And the AARP coordinated a large-scale petition drive against chained CPI, culminating in August 2013 with the delivery of 1.5 million signatures to the House Ways and Means Committee.
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The Netroots crew also reached a consensus on how to back an expansion. Initially, some wanted to back a proposal from Sen. Mark Begich (D-Alaska), a moderate facing a tough reelection fight in his conservative-leaning home state. Others favored liberal stalwart Sen. Harkin’s plan, which went a step further than Begich’s by creating a new formula for calculating benefits that would boost them, on average, by about $70 a month. In order to maintain unity, the groups decided to cross-endorse each bill, and together push for the “Harkin-Begich plan.”
much more...
http://inthesetimes.com/article/16399/how_social_security_was_saved
= new reply since forum marked as read
for now. 
