Tag: Social Security

“Keep Your Hands Off My Medicare”

Where is the Tea Party now that the Republican Party wants to cut Medicare? Does anyone remember the 2010 election that gave the right wing extremists control of the House of Representatives and the disruption these Tea Partiers caused at Democratic Town Halls with their signs and demands that government keep their hands off Medicare? Anyone? Buehler?

So far not a peep from this vociferous crowd now that the Republicans are holding tax reform and budget negotiations hostage demanding major cuts to Medicare and Medicaid and raising Medicare eligibility age to 67 because wealthy white men are living longer.

The popularity for Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security, the three programs that are the major components of the social safety, is overwhelming. According to an ABC News/ Washington Post Poll (pdf) 79% of Americans do not want Medicare cut at all. By a large majority (65%) they would prefer tax hikes on the wealthy than reduction of payments to hospitals and doctors. Meanwhile, the Republicans in the House and Senate, who still think they won in November, are demanding drastic cuts after they campaigned against those very cuts.

Subbing for MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow on her show, Chris Hayes talks about the effort to defend Medicare and making the program more efficient with Rep. Jan Schawkowsky (D-IL), a member of the House Budget Committee.

 

The Great American Scam: “The Fiscal Cliff”

This interview with economist James K. Galbraith, by Paul Jay of Real News Network about why the “fical cliff” is a scam, was posted at naked capitalism in two parts by Yves Smith and Lambert Strether.

This is a very good, high level interview of Jamie Galbraith by Paul Jay of Real News Network. It explains how the fiscal cliff scare was created and why Obama and the Republicans are united in fomenting a false sense of urgency. This is the sort of piece I’d suggest sharing with friends and relatives who’ve been unable to miss the news coverage and want to get up to speed.

Lambert made note of this passage:

[GALBRAITH:] If, for example, [incompr.] suggestion which has been in the news, you raise the eligibility age for Medicare, then what you’re doing is privatizing it in part. What you’re saying is that people who have employer-based insurance or other forms of private insurance have to hang on to that when they’re 66 and into, say, 67 [incompr.] they hit the age when they can shrug it off and get onto Medicare. That’s privatization. That’s what it is. And I think that should also be off the table.

Six Reasons the “Fiscal Cliff” is a Scam: A Mechanism for Rolling Back Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.

by James K. Galbraith at Global Research

Stripped to essentials, the fiscal cliff is a device constructed to force a rollback of Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, as the price of avoiding tax increases and disruptive cuts in federal civilian programs and in the military.  It was policy-making by hostage-taking, timed for the lame duck session, a contrived crisis, the plain idea now unfolding was to force a stampede.

In the nature of stampedes arguments become confused; panic flows from fear, when multiple forces – economic and political in this instance – all appear to push the same way.  It is therefore useful to sort through those forces, breaking them down into separate questions, and to ask whether any of them justify the voices of doom. [..]

In short, Members of Congress: if you can, just pass the President’s bill on middle-class taxes, and, if you can, eliminate the domestic sequester. Then, please go home.  Enjoy the holidays. Come back in January prepared to extend unemployment insurance, to phase out the payroll tax holiday gradually, to restore stable funding to necessary programs and to start dealing with our real problems:  jobs, foreclosures, infrastructure and climate change.

CEO’s Have “A Pension Deficit Disorder”

A group of CEO’s from major US corporations have been lobbying Capitol Hill to put cuts to the social safety net at the forefront of negotiations to “fix the debt’ at the same time asking for more tax breaks while they reap the benefits of billions in government contracts and hand themselves lucrative pay raises and pensions while they bankrupt companies and underfund their employee pension funds.

From the Huffington Post

A group of high-profile corporate CEOs are lobbying Capitol Hill this week to put Social Security and Medicare cuts at the forefront of deficit reduction negotiations. Their own retirement funds, however, are secure: The coalition includes 54 CEOs who have amassed combined pension assets of more than $649 million from their companies’ executive retirement plans, according to a new report from the Institute for Policy Studies, titled “A Pension Deficit Disorder: The Massive CEO Retirement Funds and Underfunded Worker Pensions at Firms Pushing Social Security Cuts.”

The CEOs’ employees are much less secure in their retirement than the CEOs. According to the report, less than 60 percent of the 71 public companies offer pension plans for their employees. Of the 41 companies that do, 39 of them haven’t contributed enough to their workers’ pension funds to enable the plans to pay out their anticipated obligations. Among the companies with employee pension funds in the red, these deficits exceed $100 billion.

The CEOs are among 71 chief executives of publicly traded companies who belong to the Fiscal Leadership Council of the influential Campaign to Fix the Debt, a group which has raised more than $60 million to lobby for a debt deal driven by cuts to “entitlements.” The coalition will meet Wednesday morning with congressional leaders, according to sources familiar with the group’s lobbying activities. The group, funded in part by former private equity magnate Peter G. Peterson’s foundation, has pledged to push for austerity during the lame duck congressional session, and beyond. Peterson has spent nearly half a billion dollars in recent years pushing his austerity agenda.

As the debate heats up over whether to cut Medicare, Social Security or Medicaid in order to maintain federal spending and corporate tax breaks, companies with well-compensated CEOs who preside over underfunded employee pension funds invite a new round of questions about the motives, and methods, of the CEOs pressuring Congress and the White House to cut programs for the middle class.

As Talks Begin on “Fiscal Cliff,” Report Warns “Fix the Debt” a Front for More Corporate Bailouts

As the White House begins a series of meetings today on the looming “fiscal cliff,” a coalition of the largest corporate firms and advocacy groups is lobbying for wide-ranging cuts in government spending, including to programs like Medicare and Social Security. The group, which includes 80 of the country’s most powerful CEOs, is called the Campaign to Fix the Debt. It was co-founded by former Clinton White House Chief of Staff Erskine Bowles and former Republican Sen. Alan Simpson, previously the co-chairs of President Obama’s bipartisan National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform. Critics have accused the group of using the budget crisis to push for corporate tax cuts. We are joined by Sarah Anderson, director of the Global Economy Project at the Institute for Policy Studies and co-author of the new report, “The CEO Campaign to ‘Fix’ the Debt: A Trojan Horse for Massive Corporate Tax Breaks.

The middle class, elderly, students and the poor have paid more than their “fare share” in this economic downturn while Wall St. and these megacorporations have continued to rake in billions. Social security, medicare and medicaid should be removed from any talks about the “fiscal cliff” myth. Lambert Strether at Corrente enumerated it best.

   Not one penny of cuts to Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, or any other social insurance program, and any savings to be paid out as benefits.

The Democrats are defending programs. But they should be defending households. Here are some of the social insurance programs that are on the table, even if Social Security, Medicare, and Medcaid turn out to be off the table:

   Unemployment benefits extension in 2013 ($40 billion): If long-term unemployment benefits are allowed to expire at the end of the year, some 2 million jobless will be affected. Kogan says “there will be some extension, because that’s just brutal. It’s just a question of how much.”

   Pell Grants ($36 billion) (pdf): These need-based grants help some 10 million low-income students afford college.

   Section 8 Housing Assistance ($19 billion): Section 8 vouchers allow more than 2 million super low-income families to afford decent housing in the private market.

   Job Training ($18 billion in 2009): Loads of federal job training programs help millions of seniors, Native Americans, farm workers, veterans, young people, and displaced or laid-off workers with career development.

   Head Start ($7.9 billion):  The program, which helps kids from disadvantaged homes be better prepared to start school, had about a million enrollees in 2010. Research has shown that Head Start generates real long-term benefits for participants.

   Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program ($3.47 billion): In 2011, about 23 million poor folks got help paying the winter heating bills through LIHEAP.

   Community Health Centers ($3.1 billion (pdf): In 2011, more than 20 million patients, 72 percent of whom were below the poverty line, got healthcare through federally-supported community health centers.

   Title 1 Education Grants ($322 million) (pdf): Under the No Child Left Behind Act, school districts serving a big percentage of low-income kids get financial assistance to help them meet state academic standards.

   Women, Infants, and Children ($7.2 million in 2011): The Department of Agriculture’s WIC program helps low-income moms and babies get access to supplemental nutrition and health care referrals. WIC has about 9 million participants, most of whom are kids.

Not one penny should be cut from of any of these programs. Go scuttle an aircraft carrier or something. Stop one of the wars. Whatever, dude. You’re the Preznit.

Know your president by the friends he keeps.

h/t Suzie Madrak at Crooks and Liars

The Fiscal Obstacle Course

Starting with Fiscal Cliff, Obama’s 2nd Term Rests on Organizing, Not Cheerleading

President Obama will open deficit reduction talks on Friday with a call for a $1.6 trillion tax hike on corporations and the wealthiest Americans over the next 10 years. Obama and House Speaker John Boehner are sitting down to avert the so-called “fiscal cliff” of expiring tax cuts and automatic spending reductions set to take effect at the end of the year. We’re joined by Guardian columnist Glenn Greenwald, who says the protection of “entitlement” programs will depend on action from Obama’s progressive supporters. “The question is: Will the Democratic Party, and specifically the progressive and liberal component of the Democratic Party, change its behavior from cheerleader, from blindly supportive, partisan apparatchiks … into some kind of a force where they actually fulfill their duties as citizens, which is to hold political leaders accountable?” Greenwald asks.

Transcript can be read here

Why Washington’s “Fiscal Cliff” is a Myth

by  Mattea Kramer and Chris Hellman, National Priorities Project

They don’t call it the “cliff” for nothing. It’s the fiscal spot where a nation’s representatives can gather and cry doom. It’s the place – if Washington is to be believed – where, with a single leap into the Abyss of Sequestration, those representatives can end it all for the rest of us.

In the wake of President Obama’s electoral victory, that cliff (if you’ll excuse a mixed metaphor or two) is about to step front and center. The only problem: the odds are no one will leap, and remarkably little of note will actually happen. But since the headlines are about to scream “crisis,” what you need to understand American politics in the coming weeks of the lame-duck Congress is a little guide to reality, some Cliff Notes for Washington.

As a start, relax. Don’t let the headlines get to you. There’s little reason for anyone to lose sleep over the much-hyped fiscal cliff. In fact, if you were choosing an image based on the coming fiscal dust-up, it probably wouldn’t be a cliff but an obstacle course – a series of federal spending cuts and tax increases all scheduled to take effect as 2013 begins. And it’s true that, if all those budget cuts and tax increases were to go into effect at the same time, an already weak recovery would probably sink into a double-dip recession.

But ignore the sound and fury. While prophecy is usually a perilous occupation, in this case it’s pretty easy to predict how lawmakers will deal with nearly every challenge on the president’s and Congress’s end-of-year obstacle course. The upshot? The U.S. economy isn’t headed over a cliff any time soon.

A peek at the obstacles ahead makes that clear. [..]

Among all the spending and tax changes in the queue, and all the hype around the cliff, the great unknown is whether it’s finally farewell to the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy. And that’s no perilous cliff. Letting those high-end tax cuts expire would amount to a blink-and-you-miss-it 0.003% contraction in the U.S. economy, according to Moody’s, and it would raise tens of billions of dollars in desperately-needed tax revenue next year. That’s no small thing when you consider that federal revenue has fallen to its lowest point in more than half a century. Ending these tax cuts for the wealthy would bring in cash to reduce deficits or increase funding for cash-starved priorities like higher education.

It’s impossible to say how Congress will come down on this final issue, though we do know how lawmakers will arrive at their decision. At least Congress is consistent. On this, as on all other matters in the fiscal obstacle course, it’s not the economy.

It’s the politics, stupid.

The “Grand Betrayal” Is Still on the Table

As soon as Barack Obama was reelected the austerians were already clamoring for him to enter into the so-called “Grand Bargain” as the only option to keeping the fragile US economy from going over the mythical “fiscal cliff.” Exit polls showed that voters were most concerned about the economy and jobs. They also indicated that raising taxes on the wealthiest was popular, as was preserving Social Security and Medicare as they currently exist. The debt/deficit was at the bottom of the list of voter interests. There has been much talk from Pres. Obama and the Democratic leadership that they now have a mandate to raise taxes on the 1% and they are willing to “bargain” with the Republicans. The problem is the “bargain” they want to cut would increase the burden on the elderly and those most in need of these programs now and in the future by raising the age requirements and tying cost of living increases to a metric that would decrease the ability of social security recipients to stay above the poverty line.

In an interview with economist Bill Black by Paul Jay at RT News, Prof. Black discusses how the “grand betrayal” and the role of the president and “Third Way” Democrats in the destruction of the social safety net:

At FDL News Desk, David Dayen has two important pieces on the “fiscal cliff” and the “grand bargain” and how our politicians are using them as an excuse to cut the social safety net.

The Grand Confusion: The “Fiscal Cliff” is an Austerity Program

Cutting the deficit has been discussed in terms of a moral imperative for the past two-plus years. But now we’ve arrived at a situation where the deficit would get cut a significant amount, and budget analysts make the obvious, inconvenient case that this would throw the economy back into recession. All the alternative explanations from the deficit scolds – a lack of confidence, the threat of higher interest rates – have nothing to do with the fiscal slope. It’s just that it would pull back on federal spending and raise taxes to such a degree that the economy would suffer. [..]

In the hands of someone who didn’t want a bargain on the deficit, this would be the ultimate teachable moment. “All those people telling us for years we have to cut the deficit, suddenly don’t want to cut the deficit,” that leader would say. “They’re warning people of the dangers of cutting the deficit, and saying we have to put a deficit plan together to avoid cutting the deficit!” But Obama wants this deal for his legacy. So he’s not going to disabuse anyone of the confusion over the fiscal slope.

Leaked Woodward Memo Offers Road Map on Grand Bargain

Bob Woodward leaked the deal memo from the proposed 2011 grand bargain, which didn’t happen for a number of reasons, none of them being Barack Obama’s reticence to cut a deal. [..]

This was what the President signed off on, before the Gang of Six embarrassed him by calling for more revenue. He was perfectly willing to not only endorse this deal, but force the Democratic leadership to swallow it as well. And this is why Ryan Grim can be so sure that the next set of talks will include reductions in benefits to the elderly, the poor and the middle class. That’s what happened before, after all. [..]

Any sane observer of economic reality understands that the biggest concern in the near term is that the deficit will end up to small, not too large. We don’t have a deficit problem but a health care cost problem, and it’s not entirely clear we even have that as much as we have a CBO which over-hypes the health care cost problem in their models (the fact that CBO wanted to talk with Naked Capitalism’s Yves Smith for daring to question their model is quite telling). We have countless examples of counter-productive austerity in a time of a slowly recovering economy. [..]

At any rate, we cannot depend on the intransigence of the right this time around. Bill Kristol floated acceptance of higher taxes on the wealthy, following David Koch from a couple months ago. And John Boehner reportedly brought the hammer down with his caucus [..]

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has repeatedly stated that “we are not going to mess with Social Security.” The problem Sen. Reid has with keeping Social Security out of any bargain is President Barack Obama who is all to willing to bargain it away for a deal with the Republicans. The argument over the debt/deficit has never been whether taxes will be raised in any bargain, the goal of the right has been to destroy Social Security and cripple Medicare and Medicaid.

President Obama is still pursuing a “grander bargain” that would betray the trust of the people who returned him to office with the hope that he would change.  

Sen. Schumer Rejects Tax Reform Compromise

In a speech to the National Press Club, Senator Charles Schumer (D-NY) rejected the current compromise for a bipartisan deficit reduction plan that would prevent the trigger of tax increases and automatic spending cuts that go into effect on January 1. He stated that the compromise could not bring in more revenue by lowering the top tax rate and still protect the middle class from tax increases:

Specifically, he’s publicly urging Democrats to abandon a tax reform model that calls for ending tax expenditures, many of which benefit middle income earners, in order to finance a large tax rate cut for wealthier people. It’s a framework that’s popular among economists, particularly conservative ones, but that a group of Democrats negotiating with Republicans to avert large tax increases and sharp spending cuts next year have also embraced.

Instead, he proposes targeting tax loopholes and deductions that benefit top earners and raising their top income tax rate, while simultaneously narrowing the tax code’s preference for capital gains by ratcheting up the capital gains rate from its current, historically low rate of 15 percent. Taken altogether it’s a call for significantly more revenue from high-income earners than Dems have sought by proposing to allow the Bush tax cuts for top earners to expire; and an attempt to strengthen Dems’ negotiating posture, lest they get lured into conceding another large income tax cut for the wealthy.

Sen. Schumer proposes to freeze the top two tax bracket, cut the loopholes and deductions that benefit the top earners and raise the capital gains tax.

David Dayen at FDL News Desk notes that this would be a “major blow” to the Simpson-Bowles plan that would see the tax rates reduced to 23% for the top earners.

So how would Schumer get the Republicans to sit down at the table? As David point out, simple by dangling “entitlement” reform:

But there’s a giant caveat to all of this, based on the excerpts (haven’t yet found the full speech):

  But he says that Republicans should be drawn to such a deal by the prospect of a bipartisan bargain that also includes changes to improve the sustainability of entitlement programs. Those programs – such as Social Security and Medicare – are expected to run substantial shortfalls in the future, adding dramatically to budget deficits.

   “The lure for Republicans to come to the table around a grand bargain should be the potential for serious entitlement reform, not the promise of a lower top rate in tax reform,” Mr. Schumer is expected to say, according to excerpts of his speech.

So Schumer wants to trade unworkable “tax reform” for deeply unpopular “entitlement reform.” That’s not really a great trade. It’s good to acknowledge that tax reform will never work the way its most passionate advocates suggest. But if that doesn’t exist as a “get” for Republicans in a grand bargain, and entitlement cuts are the substitute, we have a whole different problem.

While Schumer claims that the concession on “entitlement” reform would not include privatization or a voucher program,  Atrios noted the Republicans have no interest in “reform” of entitlements unless it includes privatization and tax cuts for the wealthy. In other words, the chances of getting anything done have greatly increased.

Who Will Protect the Vulnerable?

Adapted from Docudharma

The Jewish philosopher Rabbi Hillel asked, “If I am not for myself, then who will be for me? And if I am only for myself, then what am I? And if not now, when?”

With our social safety net, Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, under attack from the plutocrats who run our government, we need to ask all our representatives these questions.

Former Senator Alan Simpson (R-UT)

I get so damn sick and tired of listening to the little guy, the vulnerable, the veteran – I am a veteran, and the seniors and this and this and this and the meanwhile this country is headed for second-class status while everybody just babbles into the vapor.

I think we are sick and tired of hearing from Mr. Simpson.

In this excellent article at AMERICAblog, our friend Gaius Publius, offers not just an explanation of why he believes Obama will try cut Social Security but action we need to take:

Action opportunity

Folks, this is not over. The campaign still has about a month to run. Obama can take this issue off the table any time he want to. And if he doesn’t want to do that voluntarily, you can help him. How? Ask him point-blank:

   Are you planning any cuts to Social Security benefits? If so, which ones?

Or, if you want to go for more positive framing:

   Mr. Obama, you’ve said you want to strengthen Social Security. The electorate is solidly behind you but they’re nervous about cuts. To reassure the public and clarify your differences with Romney-Ryan, will you promise to veto any bill that contains any cuts whatsoever to Social Security benefits, no matter what else the bill contains?

Journalists, you can ask either question any time you like – you don’t need permission. The public would love to hear the answer from the candidate’s mouth. You have column inches and access; that and boldness is all you need.

Readers, you too can ask these questions – you don’t need permission either. Can you get into an Obama event? Then go. Bring your friends. (And your cell-phone cameras.) Help Obama not sink the Democratic Party. Help Obama re-clarify his own position. Help Obama race from waffling language like the plague – which he will certainly do if asked these questions often enough in public enough places. With cameras.

You can also urge your senator to sign Senator Sanders letter (pdf) swearing not to support any cuts to Social Security as part of a deficit reduction package (pdf). The letter has 29 signatures and needs 41. This action is also urgent.

Debate moderators, you too can ask these questions – though I don’t know whether the terms of your contract with the campaign-controlled debate commission requires you to get permission or not. It’s certainly true that just like Romney, Obama must also list the program cuts he would make – including cuts to Social Security. Before the election. [..]

And that’s not nothing. Guarding the progressive frontier; if you’re a progressive, that’s the job. Joe Sudbay did it by himself, and so can you. Always remember, you don’t need permission to act.

Who will protect the vulnerable? We will.

The President Agreed With Mitt Romney on Social Security in the Debate

And it’s not just people like me that support the Democratic Party Platform over any politician that noticed this. It was one of the President’s biggest most enthusiastic supporters; Ed Schultz of the Ed Show on MSNBC.

Let’s look at the transcript:

LEHRER: All right? All right. This is segment three, the economy. Entitlements. First — first answer goes to you, two minutes, Mr. President. Do you see a major difference between the two of you on Social Security?

OBAMA: You know, I suspect that, on Social Security, we’ve got a somewhat similar position. Social Security is structurally sound. It’s going to have to be tweaked the way it was by Ronald Reagan and Speaker — Democratic Speaker Tip O’Neill. But it is — the basic structure is sound.

And yes, I know the President offered a touching anecdotal of what SS has meant for his family and I respect that; however I’m going to borrow a line from someone whom I won’t speak for, but it’s a good line anyway so I’ll tweak it for my POV on this. Mr. President, don’t tell me what you believe about Social Security, you have shown what you plan to do with Social Security by agreeing to another Greenspan commission like “tweak.” So I’ll tell you what you really believe and why that is a problem.

Definition of Insanity: Obama

 In an interview with AP reporter Ben Feller, President Obama gave his “vision” of how his second term would be different. If he really believes that this will happen, he has a big problem with the reality of what has gone on for the last three and a half years:

“Obama also offered a glimpse of how he would govern in a second term of divided government, insisting rosily that the forces of the election would help break Washington’s stalemate. He said he would be willing to make a range of compromises with Republicans, confident there are some who would rather make deals than remain part of “one of the least productive Congresses in American history.”  [..]

Obama’s view of a different second-term dynamic in Washington, even if both he and House Republicans retain power, seems a stretch given the stalemated politics of a divided government. He said two changes – the facts that “the American people will have voted,” and that Republicans will no longer need to be focused on beating him – could lead to better conditions for deal-making.

If Republicans are willing, Obama said, “I’m prepared to make a whole range of compromises” that could even rankle his own party. But he did not get specific.”

Pres. Obama doesn’t need to “get specific” because we all know it would mean implementing the “Grand Bargain” that would destroy the social safety nets and making the Bush tax cuts permanent. He has already told the New York Times that he’s frustrated that he and the Democrats have not gotten credit for their willingness to accept cuts in Medicare and Social Security.

Transcript of the entire interview is here. h/t David Dayen at FDL News Desk

The problem here is 99% of Americans are getting screwed by Obama’s insane fetish with bipartisanship that hasn’t worked. Obama has been the best thing to happen to the Republican Party since Ronald Reagan.

Honest Questions All Democrats Must Ask Themselves

Ever since last weekend, I’ve been seeing Paul Ryan’s mug everywhere and it is all anyone can talk about. I can’t help but think this constant attention elevates him a little, even though as Elliot Spitzer said, if he turned his budget to the SEC he would be fined for turning over fraudulent documents. I also don’t believe Ryan helps the Romney ticket at all, except for the pretense by the corporate owned media that he’s an intellectual instead of someone who just likes crazy immoral Ayn Randian ideas and terrible mathematical projection fantasies.

Regardless, there are too many negatives and a lack of anything at all for Romney to run his campaign on. It won’t be a contest, in my opinion, when you look at electoral votes(though the media will have fun playing up the head to head match-ups as if the popular vote still matters) and the President is lucky he doesn’t have an opponent who excites the base at all. He’s lucky because his record is a mediocre one at best when it comes to what should have been pursued in what many are now calling a depression(economic inequality and private debt overhang is on par with the Great Depression).

This isn’t the 90s. He shouldn’t have hired people from the 90s that helped crash the economy. He wasted this crisis, which conservatives never do when they get a chance to exploit one, ruining any chance for real reform and stability. It’s really not OK because the opportunity only comes once every 20 or 30 years and he blew it. There will be more financial panics and bailouts in the nearer than you think future because of this wasted crisis.

History shows that Dodd Frank will not stop implicit bailout guarantees, specifically, with the massive political power, the biggest power, of TBTF banks. Our safety net is not safe even if Democrats win this election. The banks own our government, so we must be on guard when the lame duck period comes after next November.

I hope there is a major moment of self reflection for a party I’m having trouble recognizing by the second so I’m asking these questions to spur one. I’ll give my take on each of them, but you all can answer them for yourself.

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