President Obama's Big Deal: Cuts for Social Security, but No Taxes for Wall Street

[dajoki]

President Obama's Big Deal: Cuts for Social Security, but No Taxes for Wall Street
by Dean Baker | July 19, 2011 - 8:26am
http://www.smirkingchimp.com/node/37397

<<snip>>

The claim of out-of-control spending is simply not true. It is an invention, a fabrication, a falsehood with no basis in reality that politicians are pushing to advance their agenda. And that agenda is not pretty.

According to numerous reports in the media, President Obama wants a "big deal" on the budget, which will involve cuts to Medicaid, Medicare and Social Security. The last is especially ironic, since Social Security is financed by its own designated tax. Therefore, it does not contribute to the deficit. If there is no money in the Social Security trust fund, then benefits will not be paid.

The plans to cut to Social Security also seem perverse since we know that the vast majority of retirees are not living especially well right now and the benefits already are not especially generous. If we exclude their Social Security income, more than 80 percent of people over the age of 65 get by on less than $20,000 per year.

The average Social Security check is about $1,100 a month. This would be less than an hour's pay for many of the Wall Street honchos whose greed and incompetence brought down the economy.

Yet, when President Obama preaches equality of sacrifice, it is the elderly and the poor who are supposed to do most of the sacrificing. His plan to change the annual cost-of-living adjustment formula for Social Security would reduce benefits for someone in their seventies by 3 percent, in their eighties by 6 percent and in their nineties by 9 percent.

<<snip>>

[n2doc]

1. They way we are going it won't matter

Few will live into their 80's and 90's with piss poor medical care. Only the rich will get the state-of-the-art care that their big pensions can afford. Going back to the world of the 1920's.....

[Donnachaidh]

2. I would have liked to be warned that I was voting for Hoover

:grr:

[SammyWinstonJack]

10. Yeah, no kidding!

:mad:

[woo me with science]

16. +100000000000000000

It seems Obama himself was the real "rope-a-dope."

[dajoki]

3. All the years...

of repub hatred of Social Security, but it will take the Dems to screw us over.

[hifiguy]

4. As only Nixon could go to China

only an ostensibly "Democratic" president will be able to destroy the New Deal and Great Society.

We were chumped in '08, and royally so.

[SidDithers]

5. Recycled speculative outrage is even better than fresh speculative outrage...

"According to numerous reports in the media, President Obama wants a "big deal" on the budget, which will involve cuts to Medicaid, Medicare and Social Security"

Sid

[ClarkUSA]

6. Smirking Chimp's Dean Baker is an Obama-bashing PUMA like Jane Hamster Face of FDL.

He has zero facts but he's good at shit-stirring spin with the usual Pavlovian talking points which easily get that OUTRAGE!!! going. He doesn't know shit about what the final bill will look like. Nothing has been agreed upon so everything has not been agreed upon.

[Lorien]

9. When you attack the messenger

you automatically lose the argument.

[JuniperLea]

11. Nonsense...

We are smarter than to think that today's messengers are honest or working toward our best interests. I guess you've missed the big deal over the GOP's number one messenger... Murdoch. I guess we shouldn't be attacking him either, huh?

[cliffordu]

17. What facts are actually behind the message??

maybe bullshit slinging fact free diatribes and their creators NEED to be attacked.

Unless, of course, you have to believe fact free smears for personal or professional reasons.

:shrug:

[timtom]

21. Here's a fact or two:

$9 billion/month Iraq
$12 billion/month Afghanistan

Wherever shall we find the money?
Hmmm...

Everything else is just pettifogging and arguing how many angels can dance on the head of a pin.

[villager]

23. the facts do have a liberal bias. Even on DU. Or is that a "professional liberal" bias?

:shrug:

[timtom]

25. I truly don't get your point.

Sorry. If you could explain, please, I might be able to clarify my point.

[villager]

26. Well, I'm agreeing with you, in any case!

:thumbsup:

[timtom]

30. Super!

Thanks!

:fistbump:

[bvar22]

27. I like that, and will repeat it with your permission.

When you attack the messenger,
you automatically lose the argument.

Thank You, Lorien.

[Ignis]

32. "Jane Hamster Face" -- Oh, that's awfully mature of you.

Don't forget to comment on other parts of her body, to demonstrate how a Really Real Democrat wins an argument.

:puke:

[OHdem10]

7. "but no taxes for Wall St."... Those who run things do not pay taxes

if they do not want to.

[blindpig]

8. k&r

[JuniperLea]

12. "According to numerous reports in the media..."

So, this isn't even first hand poutrage... it's unnamed numerous media reports... I wonder how many of those reports went out on Murdoch's dime.

[Name removed]

13. Deleted message

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Fire Walk With Me]

14. I'm on social security disability.

They take money from that to pay for meds and doctors. What's left goes to pay for room and board at a "sober living", with unhealthy food (mostly red meat), bedbug infestation, twelve men in a tiny 3-bedroom house with one bathroom...before becoming disabled (trust me, if I were able to work, I'd go back to my beloved field) I had an apartment, car, decent, healthy food
(face palm emoticon)

CUT MILITARY SPENDING. TAX WALL STREET.

[dajoki]

15. So am I...

on social security disability and my wife is currently unemployed. We are just trying to hold on to our home, I don't know how much longer we can hold up, but we will just keep trying.

[Fire Walk With Me]

31. Never give up. Hang in there!

[Major Hogwash]

18. "when President Obama preaches equality of sacrifice"

He's only talking about the 98% of Americans who make less than $2 million dollars a year.

Okay, I get it now.

[girl gone mad]

19. k & r

[StarsInHerHair]

20. any info on what the cuts to SSI may be?

[piratefish08]

22. yay america!

we're fucked.

[Bluebear]

24. Dean Baker never really loved him

:cry:

[Hell Hath No Fury]

28. Let them know how you feel -

Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, DNC head
Phone: [phone]
Fax: [phone]

White House
Comments: 202-456-1111
Switchboard: 202-456-1414
FAX: [phone]

Harry Reid
Phone: [phone]
Fax: [phone]

John Boehner
Washington, DC 20515
[phone]
[phone] fax

Eric Cantor
P: 202.225-2815
F: 202.225-0011

Mitch McConnell
Phone: [phone]
Fax: [phone]

Nancy Pelosi
Phone: [phone]

On edit:

Here is the Gang of Six to add to the mix:

Tom Coburn
Main: 202-224-5754
Fax: [phone]

Mike Crapo
Phone: [phone]
Fax: [phone]

Kent Conrad
Phone: [phone]
Fax: [phone]

Saxby Chambliss
Main: 202-224-3521

Mark Warner
Phone: [phone]
Fax: [phone]

Dick Durbin
[phone] - phone
[phone] - fax

[Starry Messenger]

29. k&r