… Bush is making the trips in hopes of persuading voters to pressure Congress to tackle the future solvency problems of the politically sensitive Social Security system. His message is twofold: reassure those born before 1950 that their Social Security benefits will not change in any way and tell younger workers that ``Social Security is heading toward bankruptcy.''
``Massive numbers of baby boomers, like me, will soon begin to retire,'' Bush said in his radio remarks. ``People are living longer and benefits are scheduled to increase dramatically, and fewer workers will be paying into the system to support each retiree.'' …
… Before leaving Washington for an extended recess, Republican lawmakers were coached on how to reassure older Americans that Social Security will remain unchanged for retirees as well as workers age 55 and up. Suggested talking points also focused extensively on the demographic difficulties that loom for younger workers. They touched only lightly on personal accounts….
Well. The president bush is obviously intent on creating a generational split, and a generational war. This will fit right in with the class warfare he’s waging.
Apparently, he feels that the only way he’s going to be able to sell this dog is to divide the American people, and pit the generations against themselves.
And incidentally, and not by coincidence, all these so-called “SocSec reformers”, seem to have no stake whatsoever in Social Security. It seems mighty uppity for them to be speaking about it at all.
Josh Marshall’s Talking Points Memo today talks about a new actuarial memo put out by the Social Security administration. In one of the solutions in the memo, removing the cap on earnings subject to the payroll tax (currently $90,000) would extend the viability of the Trust Fund out beyond 2079. Besides fixing the so-called “crisis” it would also work to rebuild the social contract among the American people that the bushistas are so blithely destroying.
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