Posted on 09/02/2010 9:49:56 AM PDT by Qbert
President Obama is playing “Watch the Birdie” with Americans over the age of 50, diverting their attention with handouts and scare tactics to hide in plain sight the enormous damage his policies are doing to the retirement safety net.
First it was Medicare. The ObamaCare legislation drops a few free goodies like breadcrumbs in front of Medicare recipients (such as free diagnostics and annual checkups) to draw their attention away from the enormous cuts in Medicare being used to help pay the freight for the new national healthcare system...
[Snip]
Now the president is coming after Social Security.
In his Saturday radio address on August 14, President Obama revealed he is already moving on to cut Social Security.
But again, he is playing "Watch the Birdie," this time using scare tactics rather than sweeteners.
In that address, he denounced the idea of solving Social Security’s problems by allowing young workers the freedom to voluntarily choose to save and invest some of their taxes in their own personal retirement accounts, an option federal employees already enjoy. The president rejects fixing the Bernie-Madoff Ponzi scheme currently used to finance Social Security with some form of personal accounts to begin pre-funding Social Security with real saving and investment. Instead, he rails about “privatization,” an incendiary (and false) characterization of voluntary personal retirement accounts intended to scare the bejeebers out of the American people.
[Snip]
So the question remains: What is the president up to?
[Snip]
Leaks indicate that among the options being considered are delaying the retirement age (sounds like a panacea to bureaucratic pencil pushers who never did a day of hard labor in their lives), changing the basic benefit formula to reduce future benefits, and delaying or slashing COLAs...
(Excerpt) Read more at cnbc.com ...
Someone is going to have to. Anyone who claims that they can balance the budget without tackling entitlements like Social Security or Medicare is delusional.
I agree, do something now so that when I retire in 5 years at least there will be something there for me. If I have to take a cut, That is fine by me.
social security and welfare is unconstitutional. it is not the roll of the federal government to provide charity and welfare.
I’ve told my liberal friends for years they were going to pull this shell game.
Oh, no said they. Only the evil Republicans want to “steal” my social security (by actually trying to fix it).
They adamantly refuse to see the HC takeover as anything but more “free” stuff for everyone except the evil rich, who are now going to get their due.
Oh, goody! More hope and change!
He’s managed to piss everybody else off...why not the boomers also?......He is toast!
Social Security is a ponzi scheme. It was a mistake. I'd like to see a solution that doesn't screw over the older workers -- but we need to recognize that Social Security cannot be "fixed" in any meaningful way. It was always a fraud.
Preach it!
That’s fine. Give me back the money that has been taken from me for the past 45 years. Just return the stolen amount and I’ll take it from there.
Since I’m going to need it to buy health insurance SOMEWHERE since I am now UNEMPLOYED and not quite old enough for medicare. Where the heck is that free health coverage Zero promised me?
Imagine a free America 3-5 years down the road without socialist schemes like Socialist Security, Medicare and Medicaid.
The Supreme Court disagreed with you and Joe Miller back in 1937 in the Helvering v Davis decision.
i agree, they need to get rid of SS. maybe allow people are are over a certain age to still receive it, but something needs to be done. id rather put money away int omy savings that i control.
“the role of government is to provide equal rights, not provide equal things..there is no constitutional authority for the government to provide charity or welfare” - Benjamin Franklin
The Supreme Court got Dredd Scott wrong too.
If they want to reign in SS costs - how about booting the 100’s thousands of druggies, alcoholics and BiPolars off - the ones, especially, that are ‘clean’ - but just lay back and continue to not only get the $$$ but FAR better coverage than seniors, who worked all their lives...
Seniors still get a chunk taken out each month for Medicare - rises every year - now about $100...plus a deductible, plus 20% co-pay, plus drugs not covered, plus office visits not covered, plus no ‘counseling’ covered.
ALL of the above is covered, 100%, for the druggies, etc.
I know far too many 20-30-40 year olds, in perfect health, who just lay back on the dole - have far more ‘discretionary funds’ than most of us...can just self-fill a questionnaire every 7 years - SEVEN - and get a pass for another 7.
How sweet it is. Of course, these are the dependent=voters for the Rats.
We need to start listing them as a voting block:
Democrats
Republicans
Independents
Dependents aka “Dole Dependents”
They should just cut everyone a check for the amount that they have paid in to SSI and close the stupid program, lock box and all.
I would too.....but I don't think it can happen.
The underfunding is massive - any true fix will be painful to many.
Politically the important point is to hang this turd around the neck of the Democrats who thought it up and perpetuated the fraud.
These programs need to be addressed, that’s for sure. The only problem I have with the government doing this now is that they want to take more and more money away from the general public to finance their other programs.
The first thing they need to do is payback Social Security the $2.5 Trillion they borrowed and stop spending it on everything else. Same goes for Medicare, then address how it can be changed. If it can’t be changed, start cutting back. Stop spending Social Security on things it was not intended to fund. Like illegals.
I agree with you. But what is going on? Obama seems to view the federal government as a charity and welfare machine. So I ask again, what is going on here?
ML/NJ
Exactly
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