Based on the Catfood Commission, I suspect the Democrats are fully prepared to go along with every last crazy thing the Republicans want to do to Social Security.

If Democrats fail to take advantage of this, they're missing a huge opportunity.

Then by all means, let's not bring it up.

I suspect that, as with most issues since Howard Dean's departure from the DNC, Democratic leadership will not miss this opportunity to miss an opportunity.

-Z

If Democrats fail to take advantage of this, they're missing a huge opportunity.

Have you met the Democratic party?

A Catfood Epicure beat me to it on the Commission recommendations apparently endorsing raising the retirement age again (from 67 to 70) and cutting back benefits.

"If Democrats fail to take advantage of this..."

Substitute "When" for "If" and it's a wrap. Remember, these are people who are inclined to tremble at the sight of their own shadow.

There is but one structural problem with Social Security, and it can be fixed with one very simple change, no commission necessary.

The problem is an illogical regressiveness. The solution is to remove the cap on income subject to the withholding.

No one would ever have to worry about benefits bein adequately funded again, and it would be a more progressive tax and therefore better policy.

See how easy that was?

If Democrats fail to take advantage of this, they're missing a huge opportunity.

Have you programmed a hotkey for this yet?

The reason that Americans need to fear continued attacks on SS is not because of the far right, regardless of how wacked out their suggestions may be.

No, it is the Third Way Rail Democrats who are needlessly attacking one of the most wildly successful government programs in American history.

Make no mistake, the Catfood Commission is a Democratic plan. One cannot even blame this on political misjudgment. Everyone knows that commissions are a favorite tool of D.C. politicians who want a policy but are afraid to implement it. They are proposing attacks that they know full well will be unpopular and are hoping for bipartisan cover.

The question isn't whether Democrats will take advantage of this opportunity to distance themselves from Republicans. It is whether liberal Democrats will finally take this opportunity to distance themselves from Third Rail Democrats.

The idea is to force people to 'save' for their eventual 'retirement', but without offering a guaranteed level of benefits, as in SS and / or some pension plans.

401Ks offer zero security for the retiree.

But it also means they couldn't simply save their own money, since their 'contribution' would still be deducted from their paychecks [as in SS] but put into the Wall Street gambing casino.

Have you programmed a hotkey for this yet?

Or just change the design of the site. Static text: "Republicans lied today. The media applied a double standard and didn't hold them to it. Democrats could have made a stink, but didn't, because they're afraid they won't get reelected if they don't do what Republicans say. Details below."

And then, way way way below the fold, you could get the day's details. Not that you would need them, because all our comments are expressions of the very same Angst every day anyway.

What most people forget, and what Angle and Palin are too ignorant to know, is that, rather than saving money, privatization or partial privatization will require an enormous infusion of cash to fund current benefit payments. Social Security has always run as an insurance system, with workers' current contributions funding current payments to retirees. If current workers' contributions are diverted, in whole or in part, to fund their own future retirement, then the difference will have to be made up from somewhere to fund the current benefits payments.

If Palin thinks this is some sort of solution to the impending "bankruptcy" of Social Security, she is 180 degrees wrong; this will worsen Social Security's financial position, not improve it.

This, of course was, in large part why the Bush privatization initiative failed. Bush originally tried to sell this to the public as a "fix" to the impending Social Security shortfall. Finally, the Administration was forced to admit that this wasn't correct and that, in fact, at least in the short run it would worsen the financials. That pretty much took any air out of the initiative.

Dem's need to tell the public that since 1985, Social Security premiums have constituted a huge transfer of wealth from the working class to the wealthy. That transfer is reflected in the Bush tax cuts which benefited the wealthy the most and in the government bonds that make up the social security trust fund. When social security was "reformed" in the mid-1980's, social security premiums were increased above the amount necessary to maintain a pay as you go system (thanks to Alan Greenspan). The surplus contributions were borrowed by the government and used to reduce the size of the Federal deficit thereby making it easier to justify lower tax rates for the wealthy. Now, with social security needing to redeem the bonds in the trust fund to help fund benefits for the workers whose premiums funded that surplus, Repub's and some Dem's are against raising taxes on the wealthy (who benefited greatly from the lower tax rates) to allow the gov't to repay social security without expanding the deficit. Indeed, the deficit hawks want to reduce benefits so that the borrowings will never have to be repaid. In other words, working people were required to pay excess amounts into social security to help fund their future benfits and now are being told that those benefits must be reduced. It ain't right.

I could see them fashioning a mildly successful selling point for privatizing social security. They could say, "it's your money, we don't think some pointy head Washington bureaucrat should be able to tell you what to do with it! You invest how you see fit."

And then they pretend that they actually could give Americans SS money without screwing up the cash flow of the PayGo system and floating some large govt. debt.

It doesn't have to work, or even become a bill to vote on, it just has to be something they can say.

So they think social security will cause us to go bankrupt, but of course another 700 billion for the renewal of the tax cuts for the rich is OK - to put it on the credit card for our kids to pay for.
They have eliminated the middle class, now they still want to steal from the poor.

Yes...Ms. Palin believes she doesn't NEED social security now (a recent phenom) so NOW it's all bad. Bitch.

"If Democrats fail to take advantage of this, they're missing a huge opportunity."

Steve: not only did you bury the lede as the last sentence, you reversed the order of the two clauses.

Corrected:

"In order to miss this huge opportunity, Democrats must again fail to take advantage of fundamental facts."

Hey JJM, getting the social security money into Wall Street is exactly the plan--bump up stock prices without having to do anything, then the CEO's can rake in bonuses...and then it will crash

Steve wrote: "If Democrats fail to take advantage of this, they're missing a huge opportunity."

Yep, just like "health insurance reform" and the "energy reform" bill, Social Security "reform" is a HUGE opportunity for Democrats to compromise, compromise, compromise, and then compromise some more with the Republicans to find a "bipartisan" approach to furthering the interests of the ultra-rich corporate oligarchy at the expense of the American people.

The willful misunderstanding of Social Security -- it's a pact BETWEEN generations -- has never failed to amaze me.

Sigh.

Right. Because we already had such a good health insurance plan before the ACA, and god knows our energy reform is working so well.

If you're going to criticize, at least make sense.

"And yet, just five years later, the appetite on the far-right for Social Security privatization seems to have increased."

Of course it has. It's the last big pot of money in the United States that the wealthy haven't managed to divert to their own uses yet.

And, ON TOP of all the cogent comments made above about how stupid this is:

WE ALREADY HAVE PRIVATE ACCOUNTS

They are called IRA's and Roth IRA's.

A Democrat with a lick of sense would be calling for expansion of the amounts you can put in these. Then, we'd have a simple message:

Social Security is to keep all American seniors out of poverty - We do that because we respect our elders.

Your IRA/Roth IRA/401K etc. are for you to build the future you want - We do that because in the US we believe you should be able to go as far as you can.

There - was that hard?

The way to get Social Security off the table is to lead on the issue,not ignore it. We all know the program is good for 25 - 35 years. With a combination of small changes it can be made whole for 75 years. Make the changes, get the issue off the table, move on to more difficult issues. Why keep it an open issue that the Repubs can just keep bringing up?

See, you ain't lookin' at this from the workin' man's point of view. The gummint is taking money out of OUR pockets every week, and giving to THEM.

-when I could invest it my ownself, in a new set of tires for the 4x4, and a case of beer.

However, switching to the Progressive POV, no one is stopping the employee from saving an additional amount, over and above their employer's withholding, and investing it in their future retirement. Or a set of tires. . .

Make the changes, get the issue off the table, move on to more difficult issues. Why keep it an open issue that the Repubs can just keep bringing up?

Making the changes will not get the issue off the table, because the existence of the program is the issue. No fix, or 'fix', short of eliminating it altogether would shut the Republicans up.

Republicans didn't lose on this issue in 2005. They never lose. They sometimes fail to win, which requires sustained and increased effort, which is what happened in 2005. For them there is only winning, and continuing to try to win.

Don't be too sure this is a losing issue for them, even if their claims are a truckload of bull-pucky. Don't forget we are still enmeshed in a war against a country that didn't and couldn't attack us that they sold as defending the nation. They are very, very good at making people believe bull-pucky.

Goldman Sachs is drooling for billions of social security money. The wolves have been at the door for years trying to figure a way to get at all that cheese. Logic and facts be damned...we will invest all that money for you...in the Cayman Islands.

Next time you scream about your disappointment with Obama and the dems just look at the alternatives. Oh, the horror! Elect more dems then we can take away the power and excuses of those few dems siding with the repugs. Or fix the broken senate and end the tyranny of the minority. Tyranny should at least be with the majority. Paliens can't seem to understand, people can still invest in private plans in addition to SS. Many do but for many this is their only safety net.

One of the best plan our government ever came up with and "what part of it's not going bankrupt can you not understand Mz. Palin?". The wealthy want to reduce us all to serfs begging for work and their good graces. "Paying Palin" IS her psychological profile.

The young workers money won't be there anyway. You know as well as I do that the baby-boomers will simply say "oops, the debt is big, no social security for you millenials!"

I'll demagogue as much as you want because I hate republicans but look at the kind of language you are getting on the Dem side and from Obama and his team--they are getting set to gut it.

Mostly very astute comments. I would feel much better if the Democrats and msm would be making them. Since the creation of social security it has always been a GOP wet dream to destroy it. Dumbya went the "its your money route" coupled with the acturial assumption that a slight shortfall MAY occur under current law in 30 years and noting that the trust fund is not cash in a lock box but a drawer full of iou's. The current GOP meme is that we have to get control of spending and once you take military spending off the table their is nothing left with big money except social security and medicare. Nevermind that while the military is completely unfunded and medicare is largely unfunded, social security is totally funded through 2040 and only has a shortfall--maybe--of 3 trillion through 2085 and 5 trillion through infinity. Obama let the camel's nose under the tent by setting up the catfood commission and there are enough goofy Democrats that it is a matter which every thinking person in this country should worry about. Democrats may not be as concerned about tax cuts for the rich, but everyone of them would love to steal the trust fund for their pet projects and if they can blame the GOP for it so much the better.

Social Security isn't what's hurting our economy, it's the endless and pathetic wars we are waging.

We easily slam Social Security, but few question the trillions we spend on our military fiascos.

Until we have an honest debate about the huge cash black hole that is the MIC, leave Social Security alone.

benen, be honest enough to put the blame on this latest SS attack squarely where it belongs: on your love object obama.

obama, faithfully serving bush the lessors third term is the one who resurrected this pile of dung going after SS.

The GOP always wants to destroy SS. Nothing new about that.

The fact that Obama has the Catfood Commission set on destroying SS too is very disturbing.

What part of Unregulated Greed is destructive, dont You understand Madam Palin?

Hmm. So, it sounds like two major options here, should we buy into the "SS Crisis" doomsday scenario (which requires a bit of squinting and several separate events going the worst way possible simultaneously, but let's pretend).

1. When we hit this crisis, float debt to cover the crisis point and pay that debt off. The kids 10 years out from the crisis are then paying into social security and on the debt incurred by their grandparents. Not great, but the tootsie roll center is that they still have a real social security system intact for them when *they* retire.

2. Preemptively dissolve Social Security. Float a HUGE debt to cover all promised payouts now and prorated down for all currently active workers (who have paid into the system for some number of years). Everyone instead is forced to buy into the stock market, creating a glut of stock market cash, as well as paying off the huge debt incurred at rates far exceeding conservative stock market gains (and approaching short term aggressive investment gains when they pay off). The crap ball center is that kids ten years from now have no social security system to fall back on at all, are completely at the mercy of the stock market (which we all saw was a Great Idea the last couple years, right?), and have in net paid out significantly more to cover the debt incurred from the dissolution than they can ever hope to gain from their retirement accounts (remember: no country is going to loan the US money at a rate lower than what they could be making on a rock-solid NASDAQ investment, so to get a better return than that you either have a much longer time horizon than the US Government or you are willing to risk losing everything for the increased potential). From the banks' perspective, it ends up putting more money into the stock market, introducing a temporary glut and allowing institutional investors to make out big-time in the short term.

Folks, economics ain't hard. Social Security is there to provide security for the elderly. It's better - and cheaper - to provide such security in the form of a check than to provide it in the form of emergency room care, homeless shelters and "charity" drives.

No, the aim of Social Security Destroyers is flat out to destroy that safety net, and as a bonus line their backers' pockets with forced investment cash. Some are sociopathic "religious" warriors who would rather the elderly pledge fealty to their god for their charity than let the government take all the glory. Some are social darwinists who'd just rather the "losers" end out their days in squallor and die of treatable illnesses to leave more of the riches to them. Others are financially invested in the stock market which would be the main short term beneficiary of any of the "privatization" schemes. NONE are interested in everyone getting more money for their retirement, unless they've been deluded into believing modern economic theory is nothing but bunk.

In Fact, Why the Hell isn't the DNCet al bashing tbe Repubs over their collective heads with this... I want Ads....

Also average life spsn in US is now surpassed by 36 other countries... CF wikipedia from CIA factbook. So Soc Sec may not go "bankrupt" because all those old fat boomers may die early.

Check the trends. Your parents may live longer than you. Certainly the Japanese and French will.

One way to fix social security:
Change the pay roll tax by reducing it from 6 to 5 per cent on the first $100,000 which would be matched by the employer then a graduated upward tax on all earnings (gross income) above that amount. Such a tax could look something like this:
The first $100,000 5%
$100K - 1M +1%
$1M - 5M +2%
$5M - & above +3%
Everything paid above the first $5,000 would be a tax deduction. In other words a person making one million dollars would pay $5,000 on the first $100,000 and $9,000 on the remaining $900,000 for a total of $14,000. Someone fortunate enough to be making $10,000,000 would pay $5,000 plus $9,000 plus $80,000 or 2% on the next $4M and $150,000 or 3% on the final $5M for a total of $244,000 or 2.44% of earnings of which $239,000 would be tax deductable.

Right... Invest my safety net into Wall Street that is going to be unregulated and retire during the next fiancial crises. Great plan. Did anyone look at their retirement accounts when that little financial crisis occurred?

i.e. the Republicans want Goldman Sachs to manage your privatized SS funds.

The AARP magazine points out that the system is good for 33 years at this point.