The Silence is Deafening

It has been more than a month since I posted and distributed my commentary "Racism Rears Its Ugly Head In The SCOTUS/The Sequester" where I suggested that the focus on preventing any changes to Social Security and Medicare might just be “the concerns of a predominately white middle class, who are more concerned with their entitlements, than with the effects on the most vulnerable.”

I concluded with “It is time to ask that question!!!”

I had hoped that in posing this challenging question, I would start a discussion of our priorities, but as my title exclaims "The Silence is Deafening."

I urge my readers (and I don’t know how many of the approximately 80 who indicated a desire to remain on my distribution list actually read my posts) to read or re-read my post: "Racism Rears Its Ugly Head In The SCOTUS/The Sequester" (click on the title) or the relevant portion, which you can find here and to express their views.

It is instructive that where at one time a main theme of Presidential campaigns was a concern for the poor, that is no longer a subject addressed. The poor vote in very small numbers. The middle class votes in large numbers. But that is precisely why the middle class, or at least the Liberal segment thereof, must represent the poor.

How much we should be concerned with the poor in our midst is illustrated in an article in the New Yorker entitled "Our Invisible Poor" and commented on in Smithsonian Magazine under the title "How a New Yorker Article Launched the First Shot in the War Against Poverty."

At the same time the New York Times reports in an article entitled "Growing Number Are Near Poverty" that in New York City "nearly half of the population (has fallen) into the ranks of the poor or near poor in 2011" but the problem gets scant attention as the Times Public Editor points out in a article about Times Coverage. See here. 

In the meantime the emphasis on raising the federal minimum wage is getting scant attention, even though the Campaign for America’s Future reports: “4.4 million Americans currently earn the federal minimum wage of $7.25, or less. 284,000 of them are college graduates. Worse, the minimum wage has not kept up with the cost of living. After adjusting for inflation, the minimum wage is lower than it was in 1956." 

But it seems that the only thing that matters is preventing any change to entitlements.

It is not as though we were protecting the original conception of Social Security. The number of times the Social Security Act has been amended is legion as can be seen from the listing shown here and here. Benefits paid in 1940 totaled $35 million. In 2009, $650 billion was paid out in Social Security benefits. It wasn’t until the 50’s and 60’s “that domestic labor, household employees working at least two days a week for the same person were added in 1950, along with nonprofit workers and the self-employed. Hotel workers, laundry workers, all agricultural workers, and state and local government employees were added in 1954.”

It wasn’t until 1972 that the average payment per month rose from $133 to $166 and the cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) was instituted. See here.

The payroll tax as set forth in the original Social Security Act of 1935 was 2% (employee and employer combined). It is now 12.4% (employee and employer combined). That is an enormous burden on low wageworkers. Isn’t it time that we addressed this very burdensome regressive tax. See here. 

Don’t get me wrong!! I have no sympathy for the Republican/Ryan approach, which is to gut the program, and I think the President’s proposal for a chained CPI is wrong, for it reduces benefits on all recipients, including those who desperately need an increase in benefits.

According to the AARP nearly nine million older Americans are facing the threat of hunger; Over 20 million low-income people over 50 do not have adequate financial resources. Over 13 million older Americans cannot afford their housing costs. See here.

But people who have an adequate and even generous income from pensions, 401k savings and/ or investments or other income can accept lower benefits, and even none, so that the needs of those who truly need more can be addressed. The payroll tax on lower incomes must be reduced or even eliminated.

My proposal as set forth here is an attempt to at least start a conversation.

If I cannot trigger some thought, and/or some discussion, then I am wasting my time in writing these posts.

Comments, questions, or corrections, are welcome and will be responded to and distributed with attribution, unless the writer requests that he/she not be identified

The Truth is a Sometime Thing? (Discussion)

On Monday February 27, 2012 I posted Paul Shapiro’s reaction to my commentary "Borrowing, Taxes & Deficits – A Discussion Continued" under the heading "The Truth is a Sometime Thing?" I urge the reader to re-read these posts for context.

Paul’s rather short observation prompted a lenghty retort from me that was not a disagreement, but rather an elaboration. I would like to share that with you.

I wrote:

I think it is important to distinguish between those who spread falsehoods and those who are their victims. In the case of Bunny42, I don't think she is wedded to her false impressions, and while people are very reluctant to change opinions, the effort is always worthwhile. I would rather address someone like her, than someone who shares my views entirely, though in the case of those who share my views, it is not a given that are familiar with the facts either. So in either case I consider my mission to be educational and to lay bare the facts.

                       

Lack of knowledge of the facts is not only the province of the Right, but is equally true of those who essentially share my views, and the liberal organizations often distort the facts in the name of their agenda. Thus, there can be no doubt that both Social Security and Medicare need changes (not those proposed by the Right, which would essentially gut them), but changes nevertheless. Allow me to quote from my post of October 28, 2011, entitled "The Deficit – One Big Hoax (Part VI)"

According to the Social Security Administration (I urge the reader to read this report in full.):

Projected long-run program costs for both Medicare and Social Security are not sustainable under currently scheduled financing, and will require legislative modifications if disruptive consequences for beneficiaries and taxpayers are to be avoided. The long-run financial challenges facing Social Security and Medicare should be addressed soon. If action is taken sooner rather than later, more options and more time will be available to phase in changes so that those affected have adequate time to prepare. Earlier action will also afford elected officials with a greater opportunity to minimize adverse impacts on vulnerable populations, including lower-income workers and those who are already substantially dependent on program benefits. 

Both Social Security and Medicare, the two largest federal programs, face substantial cost growth in the upcoming decades due to factors that include population aging as well as the growth in expenditures per beneficiary. Through the mid-2030s, due to the large baby-boom generation entering retirement and lower-birth-rate generations entering employment, population aging is the largest single factor contributing to cost growth in the two programs. 

Thereafter, the continued rapid growth in health care cost per beneficiary becomes the larger factor.

Yet the liberal organizations representing the senior population are lobbying against any changes and are ready to savage our President if he should suggest changes. Please watch this ad from the AARP.

Or from CREDO: 

"Draw a line in the sand. Don't agree to any cuts to Medicare, Medicaid or Social Security benefits."

Or from the Alliance of Retired Americans: 

Whereas Social Security and Medicare are America's binding legal contracts with all workers and retirees that guarantee: (1) Protection against a poverty-ridden old age and health care at an affordable price. (2) Quality health care at an affordable price.  

Whereas tens of millions of senior Americans, who vote and have paid into Security and Medicare all their working lives, count on these programs providing guaranteed benefits.  

Whereas proposed "entitlement reform," "progressive indexing," and/or any cuts in Social Security benefits will adversely affect older Americans and constitutes a betrayal of seniors.  

Therefore Be It Resolved that I urge Congress to reject any and all proposals that would cut funding from Social Security and Medicare or impose any reduction in guaranteed benefits.

Or from the Citizens League: 

Pass 'The Social Security 'Bill of Rights: 

ITEM: Congress shall PAY Social Security recipients a MINIMUM annual Social Security COLA of 3%. 

ITEM 2: Congress shall CORRECT the way the Social Security COLA is calculated so it reflects the REAL increase in the cost of living, and GUARANTEE said COLA under law. 

ITEM 3: Congress shall PROHIBIT the payment of Social Security benefits based on illegally performed work. 

ITEM 4: Congress shall GUARANTEE, under law, that Social Security and Medicare benefits will be excluded from budget cuts and paid as promised. 

ITEM 5: Congress shall GIVE BACK the almost $3 Trillion they have TAKEN from our Social Security retirement reserves. 

ITEM 6: Congress shall IMMEDIATELY pass into law the $5,000 Lump-Sum Social Security Settlement for NOTCH VICTIMS. 

This makes it very difficult, if not impossible to even explore reforms that would make these programs viable into the future.

When one adds the fact that Republicans would jump on any reform suggestions as showing that the Administration plan is no different from their own plan, it becomes apparent that needed changes are not politically viable, and that the organizations that should be working with the President to make needed changes, are instead making it impossible to save them.

And then of course are the conspiracy theories of the left from the Kennedy assassination conspiracies, to the 9/11 conspiracies. See here. 

But what is most annoying is the mainstream media, which out of fear of being labeled "liberal" seeks a phony impartiality and joins in smearing Democratic Presidential candidates. What the mainstream media: The NY Times and the Washington Post did to Clinton, Gore and Kerry is worse than anything Fox could have done. See: "The Media! (Watergate/Clinton)," "The Media II - Falsehoods about Gore" and "The Media III - Falsehoods about Kerry."   

And the Washington Post with its vaunted fact checking tries to show its impartiality by twisting and turning to find equal lies on the part of Democrats for every lie by Republicans exposed by them, giving the Presidents State of the Union Address four Pinocchios. See here for the labored explanation for this absurd rating. 

Ditto for their rating on Democratic charges that Republican's want to abolish Medicare. See here, which argued that since Medicare would continue for those over 55, the plan would not end Medicare, which drew the following justifiably outraged letters:

I’ve unsubscribed from your mailing list, and I wanted to express my reason. Your sense of “balance” has troubled me almost from the beginning, particularly your tendency to give Republicans the benefit of the doubt when you could find any wiggle room to do so, while holding Democrats to a higher (the correct) standard. 

Today’s “fair and balanced” round-up of 2011 whoppers ["The Whoppers of 2011," Dec. 20] was just beyond the pale, with its forced (and patently false) equivalence between left and right. 

It’s not a secret that the lies are bigger, bolder, and far more numerous on one side than on the other. It’s not necessarily your job to point this out, but you shouldn’t be using editorial manipulation to cover it up, either. Your assertion that phasing out the current Medicare program and replacing it with a voucher system that will also be called “Medicare” is somehow different than “ending” Medicare, is a juvenile position you should be ashamed to have twisted yourself into.Imagine making that same argument if all the facts were the same except that the voucher system wouldn’t be called Medicare. You didn’t even mention the fact that “ending Medicare” is a popular idea among Republican legislators, an important piece of context, and the sort of thing you would certainly have included if you were talking about Democrats. But I suppose you had cover on that one from PolitiFact. 

                        - Dan Barnes Thousand Oaks, Calif.

 Your citation of Democratic claims that Republicans voted to end Medicare as one of the “Whoppers” of 2011 is really more of a partisan spin than a “fact check.” 

You can — and should — cite exaggerations with parts of the claim — yes, the Republican plan would only have ended Medicare for those currently under 55, and yes, it would have replaced Medicare with an (entirely different) “Obamacare”-type private insurance scheme. But it most certainly would have eventually ended Medicare. 

I am not a Democrat, but it seems to me that you increasingly measure Democratic claims by the standard of Republican spin, not by the facts, as you did in this case. 

                        - Holle Conley New York, N.Y.

 I found it disgusting that your organization would claim, “Republicans aren’t proposing to ‘end’ Medicare.” Vouchers dispensed to future seniors to obtain health care will not keep pace with ever rising health care costs. The current system covers fees for services rendered for all eligible participants. There’s no guarantee of this type of coverage in the future, and therefore, Republicans ARE proposing to “end” Medicare as it has been known over the decades. 

I find it reprehensible that your organization included this item as a whopper of 2011, and your having done so will only add more muddle to the health care discussion than the Republicans have already. Also, this only gives the Republicans your official imprimatur of this being a whopper told by Democrats.

SHAME ON FACTCHECK.ORG!

                        - Dennis Freeman Carmel, Ind. 

Comments are welcome and will be distributed with attribution, unless the writer requests that he/she not be identified.