Bernie Sanders Praises Obama’s Budget For Not Cutting Social Security
President Obama’s budget provides major investments on rebuilding our crumbling infrastructure, expanding community health centers and improving the lives and educational opportunities of our children. It includes smart investments in pre-school education and job training. It calls for expanded tax credits for 13.5 million low-income workers. At a time when the wealthiest Americans are doing phenomenally well, it asks some of the richest people in the country to start paying their fair share of taxes. At a time when the country is still struggling to recover from a terrible recession, the president’s initiatives would benefit Vermonters and all Americans by improving the economy and creating of millions of decent-paying jobs.
As the founder of the Defending Social Security Caucus, I am especially proud that the president did not renew his proposal to cut Social Security benefits. With the middle class struggling and more people living in poverty than ever before, we cannot afford to make life even more difficult for seniors and some of the most vulnerable people in America.
As a member of the Senate Budget Committee, I look forward to working with my colleagues in the Senate to build on the many positive proposals in the president’s budget and address those areas where the president’s proposals fall short.
http://www.politicususa.com/2014/03/04/bernie-sanders-praises-obamas-budget-cutting-social-security.html
= new reply since forum marked as read
Why on earth was Bernie worried? Why is he thanking Obama for not cutting it? .
Supposedly, it's ludicrous Obama never had any intention of touching Social Security. Or other programs he refers to as "entitlements" to begin with. The interview he gave WAPO before he took office, the Cat Food Commission, floating chained CPI, the Grand Bargain Commission, putting Social Security and Medicare on the table before Boehner and Cantor asked were all brilliant chess moves.
It's not that something stopped him, be it the shift in national conversation that followed Occupy, or the desire of his fellow Democratic officeholders to ensure that the 2014 mid term is not worse than the 2012 midterm, or anything else. Iit's that he never intended to do it in the first place.
Cutting fuel subsidies to the poor in the very first budget the WH sent to Congress and cuts to food stamps are just feints, to throw Republicans off the track (IIRC, chess afficionados call the "emptying out food banks combo gambit"
.
Gee, even Bernie seems to have fallen for the wild, evil imagination of the left of the left. You'd think Bernie, of all people, would know better, wouldn'tcha?
I, for one, am utterly disappointed in Bernie.
