Posted on 09/16/2005 12:18:33 PM PDT by steveegg
WASHINGTON - Reforming Social Security, a centerpiece of President Bush's second-term agenda, may be endangered because of Republican fears that the issue could hurt the party in the 2006 elections.
On Thursday, House Speaker Dennis Hastert suggested the head of the House Republican campaign committee spoke for himself when he urged fellow GOP leaders to drop plans for Social Security legislation this year, citing the potential repercussions next year's elections.
“I think Tom Reynolds may have been talking about what his feelings are,” Hastert told reporters late Thursday. “Social Security is something very important. It’s something we’ve talked about doing, and when we decide to move forward we’ll let the press know.”
In the latest blow to the White House on the issue, Rep. Tom Reynolds, R-N.Y., conveyed his views Wednesday in a meeting with Hastert as well as a larger gathering of Republican lawmakers on the House Ways and Means Committee, officials said Thursday....
(Excerpt) Read more at msnbc.msn.com ...
It also outlined the House Pubbie half-hearted reform plan (barely touch Social Security, expand IRAs slightly, and rework pension laws) that was to be attached to larger legislation, and then goes on to slam it.
Well, personally I'd rather see FairTax than a SS revision. Given Katrina, I doubt we will see either.
In order to get FairTax to work, you'll need SS elimination as well as a quick reversal in the feds taking on primary responsibility for disaster relief and mitigation.
I am SICK and TIRED of these linguini-spined wusses called republicans. We elected you to fix these socialist anti-freedom programs. DO IT ALREADY!
I am so FRUSTRATED.
Do these Republicans understand their political careers and legacies will be jeopardized when it collapses? Obviously not.
Do they understand that sheving the plan will actually hurt their chamces in 2006?
I have written lots of letters about SS reform to lots of poloticians. This gets my dander up!!
And this is not a Fair Tax thread.
If they would sell it right, it could ASSURE a 2006 victory!!! People want this!
Not true. Fairtax will by it self eliminate SS payroll taxes but not the benefits. It replaces all taxes with a National Retail Sales Tax.
Nor is there any requirement to drop responsibility for disaster relief. (Or any other spending program). FairTax is revenue neutral, and could be adjusted up or down to meet spending needs, but such adjustments would be obvious and visible.
I think you greatly misunderstand FairTax.
Yes Sir, Mr. Thread Police Sir.
The problem is not just SS, it's the entire agenda; health care, liability reform, tax cuts, everything. Unless this can be put into the context of rebuilding the country, none of these will go anywhere.
I hear you. It seems Senate Disease has spread to the other end of the Capitol Building, and not only federally. In Wisconsin, we can't even get the RINO-dominated Legislature to take up a 1-month break in the gas tax, a repeal or rewrite in the gasoline minimum mark-up law that currently guarantees gouging (and that's a rare thing that DemonRAT governor Jim "Craps" Doyle said he would actually sign), or moves to put either TABOR, a photo/voter ID, or concealed-carry in the state Constitution (it seems they prefer to keep them as "issues" that Craps keeps vetoing).
Ditto.
And this is not a Fair Tax thread.
Hey; who started this thread; you or me? :-)
I think the political problem with social security is that it will take a few years before people see the benefit. If the senate won't even consider it, it is unlikely that simply voting for the plan would be that helpful to the republicans in the house, and it could be used to hurt them because they wouldn't be able to point to results.
Frankly, given everything else that will be on the table now, I'd rather they use their energy to reconsider the last few bills passed, to strip the pork to pay for rebuilding the south in our image.
Then use the democrats failure to even consider fixing social security to bash them in the 2006 elections.
We can at least hope there hasn't been a complete spinectomy on the Hill.
I know what FairTax is. At the current level of fed gubmint spending (much less the ever-increasing levels promised by both parties), any single-source tax would only encourage "non-compliance" (for income, it would be "under-the-table" work; for sales, it would be the black market).
Why do you suppose I excerpted the parts I did, and then pointed out that further on down, they out-and-out lied about President Bush's proposal?
#1. I want the same options Congress gave themselves when they withdrew from SS in '82. When they formed another type of retirement program for themselves, realizing their money would grow at a faster rate in another plan a plan that can be passed on to family, Congress did not say it is one way or the other way. They said -- if you have your 10 quarters in you get BOTH - the old and the new. DOUBLE DIP!!!! I believe I have that right!! So now the $$'s are dwindling down, yet they double dip. The base has been depleted with fewer employees (the workers) and women's choice. I want:
a. The choice of taking a very small % and investing for a higher return.
b. The choice of passing it on to my children - instead of putting it back in the kitty.
The money we put into Social Security is the Congress's play ground.
All anyone, who is serious about reforming SS, needs to do is inform everyone of what congress did for themselves in 1982 and ask they why would they not vote for doing the same for us?
c. There people in Congress who do not want President Bush's reform. They wish to wait for a Democrat to be in office so reform will be ---- more entitlements, more dependency. Remember the democrats feel ----- We are far better to care for you than you are capable of caring for yourself.
Just keep steady on the course ruled by FEAR and see where your counsel takes us.
No thanks. Allow the President to do his job and follow his the counsel of his experts.
Arm chair strategists are free to play worry wart till the cows come home.
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