Subject: [SocialistWorker.org] Obama prepares to sacrifice Social Security
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http://socialistworker.org/blog/critical-reading/2012/12/20/obama-prepares-sacrifice-socia
Critical reading [1]: A SocialistWorker.org blog
======== OBAMA PREPARES TO SACRIFICE SOCIAL SECURITY =========================
December 20, 2012 2:49 am CST
As warned [2], Obama is preparing to make a budget deal with Congressional
Republicans that will involve significant cuts to Social Security benefits.
Poor elderly women are to be sacrificed [3] to maintain bloated levels of
military spending [4]. The need for an alternative to the Democrats couldn't
be clearer. --PG
Follow Critical Reading on Twitter: @CriticalReading [5]. Subscribe to
Critical Reading [6]'s public updates on Facebook.
.... Obama’s Historic Assault on Social Security [7]
Source: Black Agenda Report
A Black Agenda Radio commentary by Glen Ford
/“He can accomplish what Republicans only dream about.”/
President Obama and his Republican partners in austerity have choreographed a
kind of bi-partisan ballet, in which the dancers reach out to each other in
slow motion, their fingers almost touching, teasing the audience. These cheap
and transparent theatrics are designed to transmit a soap opera-like sense of
drama: “Can the two parties come to a compromise for the sake of the
country?” But, the fact is, Obama and the Republicans reached most of their
grand bargain more than a year ago, when they slashed $1.7 trillion out of
domestic spending over a decade. As liberal Obamite Robert Kuttner, of Demos,
points out, there’s very little left to cut except Medicare and Social
Security.
Social Security has always been Obama’s Great White Whale; he’s conspired
with Republicans and right-wing Democrats to harpoon the mother of all New
Deal programs since the very start of his presidency. But Social Security is
not an easy mark. George Bush found that out in his second term, when he
suffered his worst domestic defeat in attempting to privatize the program.
It would take a Black Democrat, fresh from a near-landslide election, to put
Social Security on the chopping block, as Obama did in January of 2009. But
before he could move in for the kill, Obama and his allies had to convince
the public that Social Security is a major contributor to the federal budget
deficit – which is a lie. Social Security runs on its own stream of
revenues that go into the Social Security Trust Fund, totally separate from
general taxation and debt. However, by endless repetition of the Big Lie –
that Social Security adds to the federal deficit – Obama and other
corporate Democrats and Republicans succeeded in maneuvering the program into
the austerity debate, where it does not belong.
/“Social Security runs on its own stream of revenues.”/
At this point it must be said that Obama’s insistence on making Social
Security a budget deficit issue shows that he has always intended to make
drastic cuts to the program. One of the reasons Social Security has long been
thought of as “untouchable” is because President Franklin Roosevelt and
his New Deal Democrats purposely insulated it from the conventional budget
process. However, President Obama has largely neutered Social Security’s
traditional congressional defenders, who know perfectly well what their
president is up to, but will not directly oppose him. That’s why we at
Black Agenda Report call Obama “the more effective evil”; he can
accomplish what Republicans only dream about.
Obama’s scheme to cripple Social Security is to change the way inflation is
measured, resulting in a drastic scale-back in cost-of-living increases in
recipients. According to Dean Baker, of the Center for Economic and Policy
Research, the cuts would amount to 3 percent over 10 years, 6 percent over 20
years, and 9 percent over 30 years. In dollar terms, Black Minneapolis
Congressman Keith Ellison says retirees would lose [8] $6,000 in the first 15
years of cuts and $16,000 over 25 years.
And that’s just the beginning. Once the untouchability of Social Security
has been breached, it becomes just another social program to be carved up on
austerity chopping blocks. President Obama’s true legacy will be to have
begun the destruction of the crown jewel of what’s left of the nation’s
social safety net.
For Black Agenda Radio, I’m Glen Ford. On the web, go to
BlackAgendaReport.com.
/BAR executive editor Glen Ford can be contacted at
Glen.Ford@BlackAgendaReport.com./
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[1] http://socialistworker.org/blog/critical-reading
[2] http://socialistworker.org/blog/critical-reading/2012/10/06/obama-gets-ready-sell-out-soci
[3] http://feministing.com/2012/12/19/chart-of-the-day-poor-elderly-women-to-get-screwed-in-fiscal-cliff-deal/
[4] http://action.usaction.org/p/dia/action3/common/public/?action_KEY=473
[5] https://twitter.com/#!/CriticalReading
[6] https://www.facebook.com/criticalreading
[7] http://blackagendareport.com/content/obama%E2%80%99s-historic-assault-social-security
[8] http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2012/12/18
