Rep. Hensarling Advocates Cutting Benefits And Privatizing Social Security

Just handed the Dems their first attack ad, but I'm sure they'll screw it up somehow.

Blue Dogs will "reach out" to Republicans. Nelson and Lieberman will form the new and improved "Gang of Four" with Graham and McCain, and demand the President do what they say. I can see it all now.

as has been oft repeated; the democrats never miss a chance to miss a chance. while i truly believe democrats, for the most part but not those who call themselves blue dog or conservative, are on the right side of history; but are just to naive, too stupid, too spineless and too afraid to play the hardball required to call the republicans out. in fact, was wondering can you think of another democrat who could have done what pesident obama did friday at the gop retreat?

how someone like frank lutz can, with his magic little words, convince a majority of americans health care reform is a bad thing and now is on his way to doing the same thing with financial reform.

it must surely be the republicans, aided and abetted by the msm and the democrats lack of response, can repeat something over and over, regardless of its veracity or common sense, long enough until it becomes the "common wisdom."

health care reform = a bad, socialist takeover
taking the tax rate on the super wealthy back to clinton era = loss of jobs
banking reform = will hurt small businesses
privatizing medicare and social security = a good thing

hell, i could be a gop strategist.

How does it cost less to privatize SS? The government will have to replace all the money that WAS going into SS and is NOW staying in a private investment account. Wasn't this the big problem last time we talked about it?

What do Boehner and McConnell say about this?

This guy is from TX, that peculiar state with high % of uninsured population that hated mandates and HCR as it was proposed.

Yep...great plan Jim....errr Jeb. Turn over more of our money to the people that helped destroy our economy. I am sure the American people will love that plan. Hey America!! Do you think Wall Street deserves even more of your money?

Please tell me why would any rational human being want to turn Social Security over to the private sector? What is the "private sector's" track record? As an alternative response to this inane ans sucidial proposal, I recomment we NATIONALIZE BANKS!!

Fix Medicare by growing it down to younger peoplem, including allowing buy-ins for older employees of large and small businesses. First go to 55, then 40, then universal. I don't like is the grandfathering clause in the Republican proposal: Everybody above the cut-off gets a pretty good deal and everybody below gets screwed. It's also dumb politics (if it were a Democratic proposal) because the Democratic base is younger anyway. Better to cut benefits by an incremental process by which Medicare works with providers to lower the amount of care per patient, trying to separate out vital procedures from unnecesary ones. Remember how ridiculously expensive US health care is compared to other industrialized nations. Health outcomes wouldn't necesarily suffer that much.
This process may not be popular, but I think it would be a lot more popular shutting down Medicare for everybody 54 and younger and pushing them into private insurance with much reduced benefits.
The problem with Hensarling's approach is that it will inevitably (by-design) lead to Medicare being dismantled in then next 40 years as there will be no more new patients, and the existing Medicare recipients will become increasingly few, old, and feeble. All the Democrats have to do is repeat "the Republican plan to dismantle Medicare" a million times. Don't screw this up.

Cut benefits, eliminate any guarantee of benefits, and turn your social security money over to the Wall Street financiers who showed such wisdom and fiscal responsibility over the past few years. Brilliant! The Dems now have their first line of attack.

I only have one objection: "screw over the middle class and poor" is hardly a new GOP position, don't you think?

For 2009, the employee's share is 6.2% of gross compensation up to a limit of $106,800 of compensation (resulting in a maximum tax of $6,621.60)

Since Wall Street caused many Seniors and Retirees and Pension Recipients to Lose tons of money and their Future Financial Security - Raise the Cap to $200,000 and make those Wall Streeters contribute more.

I hope the republicans try and resurrect this issue because it is revelatory of their true intent and counters the populist foothold they are trying to establish. This idea is such a nonstarter for most working people. When you see the stats on how many people rely primarily on SS for their retirement, this proposal is downright scary to them, and it will fall flat, as it did when Dubbya tried to sell it 5 years ago.
So go for it! Unleash those market forces and let us all retire in comfort!

The rational part of me says this is horrible politics for the GOP and leaves the door wide open for the Dems. Then I remember: this is the United States of America in the year 2010. My prediction: by November the American public will be rabidly anti-Social Security, including many senior citizens living on fixed incomes. GOP pols will claim that Obama wants to have our Social Security numbers tatooed on our wrists, George Stephanopoulis will nod his head.

Apparently nobody else has noticed, so I'll put on the Admiral Akbar hat and say: IT'S A TRAP!

The idea is to propose utterly ridiculous "deficit control" policies, then campaign on the idea that Democrats don't want to listen to Rethuglican ideas about how to control the deficit.

So this is why most Republican consistently refuse to offer actual alternative proposals to Obama's agenda. That;s one dumb Jeb...

http://www.political-buzz.com/

After what the private market just did to so many people's money this guy must have just crawled out from under a rock. Who do we make the check out to? AIG, Goldman Sax, I know Bernie Madof!
Why does no one say raise the tax ceiling for more funding? Give a break to the self employed, (under a certain level) and keep the funds out of general revenues.

There is no way this idea goes anywhere. I'd love to see the Repubs waste time and energy campaigning & trying to sell this one.

What's really fun is that the GOP is not telling you everything about why they want to privatize the trust fund. There is no money in the trust fund.

You see... Back in the 80's their icon Reagan, (with Greenspan's help), emptied the trust fund of cash and replaced it all with set rate Treasury Bonds.

http://www.socsec.org/publications.asp?pubid=540

That's right, about 23% of U.S. debt is held by the social secuirty administration. So their thinking is... By privatizing they can sell off the bonds, use the money for whatever, (like Reagan), and wipe the slate clean. Who cares if the market tanks and wipes out peoples accounts. Theirs hands will be clean and they can all lament about the bad bankers and how they took your money.

Let it go. Wait until more people start saying it. Like their presidential candidates.

Why hasn't sailormanlove been around to defend this newest dim bulb in the republican low watt chandelier? I can't wait to tell my brother about this. I squawked so much about Bush wanting to try it no one in my family dares mention Social Security and private in the same day around me! Jeb probably thinks he is a genius.

Can we give Obama credit for baiting the republicans into talking about their ideas. THey were better off being the party of "NO" until he publicly ridiculed them for it in the SOTU and his televised Q&A. So now they are coming out, full of bluster, with their crack pot ideas to radically undo the major underpinnings of our social economy. Total morons, they are.

Let's go back to the beginning. The Social Security Act was drafted by Gov. Robert Moran Jr.'s committee on economic security, under Frances Perkins, and passed by Congress as part of the New Deal. The act was an attempt to limit what were seen as dangers in the modern American life, including old age, poverty, unemployment, and the burdens of widows and fatherless children. From the start, it was an emergency measure. There were supposed to be needs tests for all of those who applied at retirement. Many were excluded from the first generation of the program. Benefits were very small. Almost from the first it expanded covering more and more people and providing more and more benefits.

The long term health of the Social Security (and Medicare System) was based on three conditions:

a)There would always be a lot more wage earners paying payroll taxes into the system than recipients of benefits.

b)The economy would continue to expand and diversify so that more and more young people would enter the work force with better and better jobs.

c)When necessary, as during a recession, the funds that provided the benefits could be supplemented through injections from the general budget (borrowing against the future, per Keynesian economics).

Where are we now?

a) There are a lot of folks in retirement and they are living longer and longer.

b) The economy stopped expanding and the U.S. is no longer the world's premiere economy.

c) Deficits and debt have been building for years and are now reaching a critical mass.

IF, Social Security and Medicare are two of the biggest items in our budget, (AND BOY ARE THEY) then the message is clear.

Obviously, Rep. Hensarling just secured a boat load of advertising money for his political campaign.

Our Reps and Senators aren't just in bed with the wealthy, regardless of political party, they are part of the wealthy class. 90% of the house and senate are millionaires!

If SS was privatized during this (it's not over yet) financial crisis, even more citizens would have lost their retirement savings to our genius bankers.

Social security would be solvent if a few small things were changed:
1) When the government borrowed from SS to fund the deficit, it paid the same interest rate that it pays the Chinese or the big US banks for borrowing money. But because SS is for avg. Americans, we will NEVER get a market rate on what they borrow from OUR pot.
2) Raise the FICA limit so that even the super rich pay the same as the working stiff. Some might call that a tax increase......but it's really saying the rich has to pay just as much as the working stiff....
3) Require all government employees (especially the white house, the senate, and the house) to move into the social security system.....from their very generous government retirement system. If they were in this pot, it would be fixed and it would be solvent forever. But the millionaires in DC (including this bozo Hensarling) want to be treated better than the rest of us.....and so they'll continue to defend their own little GOVERNMENT plan while pushing to have our plan handed to greedy and corrupt banksters!

If I wanted to be 'unchristian' about it, I would welcome all those who subscribe to the Republican vision of greatly reducing Medicare benefits and investing your SS in the stock market. Having lost literally 2 years of survival money from the annuity I depend upon because of the banking/Wall St debacle and being forced to drop the extremely expensive $10,000 deductible insurance policy I had but could never afford to use...the Republican plan seems destined to bring countless seniors to dwell with me on the streets. Maybe the Republican administration could be convinced to offer us some horribly polluted land were we could form car and cardboard box 'retirement' cities. I'm going soon, so I'll save you a space.

Heck with that. Privatize the military and have done with it. Cut out the middleman and let the corporatocracy pay for its wars of conquest directly.