Behind the GOP Social Security Tap Dance

Forget the ridiculous pie-charts, falsified statistics and doomsday prophesies. There is only one idea motivating the White House fascists and their attempts to kill Social Security: The GOP is still fighting Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s New Deal. That’s it. They can’t get over it. They’ll never get over it. But the White House plan to replace the New Deal with the Raw Deal has two problems that weren’t factored into the scheme. It may be that their mania to erase all vestiges of FDR’s legacy from living memory has caused the WH to assume that the huge turds in the punchbowl don't matter. Or perhaps their hatred of the New Deal clouded their judgment. In any event, the sorry fact remains that the Raw Deal Privatization plan is 1) silly and unworkable and 2) the man who is supposed to close the Raw Deal by dazzling the populace with charm and articulate explanations, is an idiot. On March 4th, CNN posted a Fact-Check piece to correct some of the distortions (lies) that President Bush had presented as facts in his "Conversation on Strengthening Social Security" speech in Westfield, New Jersey. In brief: “Claim: ‘One way for a younger worker to come closer to what the government has promised is to be able to take a portion of the money and get a better rate of return on your own money than that which the Social Security system gets.’ CNN Fact Check: The president implies that a "personal" or private retirement account will ‘get a better rate of return’ than the current Social Security system, but he doesn't clarify the risk of getting a lower return or even losing money on the investments. Claim: ‘You can pass that money [from a private account] to whomever you want.’ CNN Fact Check: That is only partially true. The president does not mention that only part of the money in a private retirement account can be passed on to others as an inheritance. Claim: ‘If we don't act, we're looking at about an $11 trillion hole for the American taxpayer coming up. This is a big liability not for me or baby boomers ... but if you're a young worker, you've got a problem.’ CNN Fact Check: The president incorrectly suggests that the young workers of today will face an $11 trillion Social Security shortfall if the program continues on its current course.” But the worst of it is, President Bush doesn’t understand the privatization plan himself. When he strays from reading a printed explanation and says, “in other words”, trying to make the plan clear to the common man, he misspeaks and makes totally false statements about an already fatally flawed scheme. Our President is a delusional nutcase whose brain never functioned well on his best day. So what have we got? We’ve got a White House gang of fascists making plans and policies based on the fact they hate an ex-President’s plans and policies from 72 years ago. And we’ve got a medicated idiot explaining why screwing the elderly and poor and giving aid to the rich is a better plan than giving a helping hand to the elderly and poor. Into the bargain, we’ve got a WH Press Secretary dancing as fast as he can to explain the President’s pixilated explanations of a White House scheme to discredit a president who has been dead for 60 years. I used to think the entire Bush administration should be impeached. I’ve changed my mind. They all should be committed to an asylum for the criminally insane.