Perry on Social Security: They also said Reagan was too blunt

Washington Examiner ^ | September 10, 2011 | Mark Tapscott

[Cincinatus' Wife]

Texas Gov. Rick Perry has gotten all kinds of grief from the smartest guys in the room crowd in New York and Washington for calling Social Security “a Ponzi Scheme,” and “a monstrous lie to our kids.”

I can’t think of a more fitting place to demonstrate a Reaganesque honesty than the Reagan Library, with former First Lady Nancy Reagan looking on benignly as a couple of her crisply-coiffed Liberal Mainstream Media friends do their best to discredit the heirs to her husband’s political legacy.

Reagan himself often spoke just as bluntly about liberalism’s many sacred cows, and he invariably got the same sort of outraged responses from the smartest guys in the room crowd.

Like when he said “government isn’t the solution, government is the problem.” They were scandalized when he called the Soviet Union an “evil empire,” too. And who can forget “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall.” Some of his own advisors were aghast that he was going to say that one.

Now Perry is getting the business from the same crowd. And it started with former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney – who knows a thing or two about appealing to the smartest guys.

“Our nominee has to be someone who isn't committed to abolishing Social Security, but who is committed to saving Social Security,” Romney chirped in response to Perry.

Of course Perry did NOT say he wanted to "abolish" Social Security, he simply called it what it is. It’s a classic Ponzi Scheme because money from the last investors must be used to pay the first investors. The fact Social Security is compulsory while a Ponzi Scheme is voluntary is beside the point.

And it’s a monstrous lie to tell anybody under age 50 because everybody knows and has known for decades that the Ponzi Scheme’s days are numbered by the reality that too few new workers are paying into the system to fund payments to current and projected beneficiaries.

You’ve heard of being “upside down” on a car loan? That’s when you keep trading in for a new model before paying off the old one. You transfer the outstanding balance on the old loan to the new loan. That’s just the way Social Security “works.”

Like Reagan said in 1964, the only thing that “saves” Social Security is that Washington can always raise taxes.

Except that it can’t. Only three workers pay in to Social Security now for every one beneficiary. The day is coming soon when it will only be two workers. Can you say “ruinous taxation?”

And that’s why Perry is way ahead of the smartest guys in the crowd on this issue.

Sure, the politically shrewd thing to say is to we have to “save” Social Security. It reassures the old folks without threatening the younger workers who must pay the taxes that fund the benefits.

What the smartest guys in the room crowd apparently missed is that Perry also said this:

“And people who are on Social Security today, men and women who are receiving those benefits today, are individuals at my age that are in line pretty quick to get them, they don't need to worry about anything. But I think the Republican candidates are talking about ways to transition this program …”

Perry appears to understand something Reagan knew very well: The smartest guys in the room crowd are slaves to conventional liberal wisdom and they are out-of-touch with the values and views of most Americans.

Our political elites in New York and Washington are far more attuned to that conventional wisdom than to everyday Americans. If you don’t grasp that fact, you will never understand why three-fourths of the voters trust the people more than professional politicians.

And that is why Perry’s candor may well prove to be his greatest asset in the months ahead.

[Cincinatus' Wife]

Sept 7, 2011: 4 Minute YouTube VIDEO Clip: Perry Fires At Rove & Romney: Social Security Is A "Ponzi Scheme" And A "Monstrous Lie"

Perry Campaign: Remember When Romney Compared Social Security to a Criminal Enterprise? [quote from Romney's book] " What would happen to the bankers responsible for misusing the money? They would go to jail. But what has happened to the people responsible for the looming bankruptcy of Social Security? They keep returning to Congress every two years.” [end quote]

Did Perry Blow It on Social Security? (Marco Rubio and Ron Johnson certainly didn't)There is a brand of Republican who looks at President Obama’s vulnerability on the economy and says, “Go for it!” They argue that the overriding issue of the campaign should be jobs — and that everything else should be a distant second.

There is another kind of Republican who sees the election of 2012 as a tipping point for the nation — a do-or-die moment when we will either pull back from the precipice of debt and national decline or fall off the edge. This second brand of Republican is hoping that a candidate will emerge who can lay before the American people the nature of the challenge we face in a direct and forthright way. If a campaign is run and won on the need to reform our obese government, the new president will have a mandate to take the necessary steps once in office.

After Wednesday’s Republican debate, it seems that Mitt Romney represents the first group, and Rick Perry stands for the second. ………………”

[Cincinatus' Wife]

Rick Perry’s Air War (with the EPA)...........>>>Texas alone opted for the unfriendly approach. It’s the only state that did not issue a plan for compliance—and Perry has made it clear that Texas has no intention of complying. The move was a blatant slap to the Obama administration—and once again gave Perry the national spotlight. Defying the climate rules offered him the perfect opportunity to loudly decry the science of global warming—which in his book Fed Up! he calls a “contrived phony mess that is falling apart under its own weight”—and to slam EPA as a “rogue agency” with an “activist mind-set” that has “targeted Texas.” Such rhetoric is viral catnip to the tea party voters who could help catapult Perry to the 2012 presidential nomination.<<<..............

Metro - Carolyn and Ron Agnew, center, of Pflugerville, wait for Governor Rick Perry's arrival during the Rick Perry Welcome Home Rally at Abel's on the Lake in Austin on Saturday, August 20, 2011. LISA KRANTZ/lkrantz@express-news.net

In Texas Schools, Perry Shuns Federal Influence ………>>>When Secretary of Education Arne Duncan jabbed Mr. Perry on public schools in mid-August, it was only the latest skirmish between the governor and the Obama administration since late 2009, when Mr. Perry announced that the state would not sign on to common core-curriculum standards.<<<...

The Left is signaling that they hope a President Perry will fix education and get the inner cities out from under the impossible mess they've created.

Will Rick Perry Unravel the Strange Consensus on Public Education?

Trial lawyers prep for war on Perry America’s trial lawyers are getting ready to make the case against one of their biggest targets in years: Texas Gov. Rick Perry.

Among litigators, there is no presidential candidate who inspires the same level of hatred – and fear – as Perry, an avowed opponent of the plaintiffs’ bar who has presided over several rounds of tort reform as governor.

And if Perry ends up as the Republican nominee for president, deep-pocketed trial lawyers intend to play a central role in the campaign to defeat him.

That’s a potential financial boon to a president who has unsettled trial lawyers with his own rhetorical gestures in the direction of tort reform. A general election pitting Barack Obama and Perry could turn otherwise apathetic trial lawyers into a phalanx of pro-Obama bundlers and super PAC donors. …..”

[Cincinatus' Wife]

Ted Nugent: Rick Perry should make US 'more like Texas'

I love how he took it to the BBC.

Rick Perry and Marcus Luttrell

Rick Perry's Medal of Honor Motorcycle auctioned for Freedom Angels

Perry Barnstorms Newport Beach

[shield]

Perry Ping....

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[vicar7]

Unforced error by Rick now he has to travel around defending himself instead of attacking the Obama agenda.

[Cincinatus' Wife]

Metrosexual Rick Horowitz can't understand Texas Tough

Horowitz must prefer the "Chicago Way."

[Dudoight]

A straight shooter always has more respect than a mealy mouthed blathering obfuscator.

[shield]

Oh yes, great article...and it is right on!!!

[Cincinatus' Wife]

I believe you are wrong.

Everyone is listening to what Rick Perry is saying. He’s getting air time to repeat his position (you prefer to characterize it as defending himself— Hell man! He’s promoting his ideas for saving the country!)

His “mistake” about “treating Bernake ugly in Texas” had all the other candidates on the Reagan Library debate state saying “Me too! Me too!” when Williams asked their take.

[SoJoCo]

Of course Perry did NOT say he wanted to "abolish" Social Security, he simply called it what it is. It’s a classic Ponzi Scheme because money from the last investors must be used to pay the first investors

So it's a Ponzi scheme and by any measure a total failure but he doesn't want to abolish it?

[samtheman]

It’s an excellent article. Everyone should read it. Read the whole thing.

[shield]

I know you aren't that stupid, are you? This was a pure campaign strategy by Perry and his team. A while ago this was set up by him and his team. He pulled the fascist moderator goon squad right into his trap and Mittens like the fascist moderators was also pulled into that trap. Which tells me mittens is one of them. All week long nothing but Rick Perry and the Ponzi Scheme have been talked about over and over and over again. This is how he and his team have always campaigned...very smart and very cunning.

[McGruff]

Perry on Social Security: They also said Reagan was too blunt

It's a streeeetch to see how this article backs up the title.

[Cincinatus' Wife]

You don’t abolish it when people are living on it and some are about to enter the program that was forced on them and they’re near retirement.

You transition to something that isn’t unsustainable and run by the Federal government. 30-40 year-olds know it won’t be there (their parents and grandparents know it and want to see their family members out of this financial trap that will not be there for them).

I appreciate that you might be interested in this but if your only point for coming on Perry threads is to be negative and ball up the thread, please go somewhere else.

[Tex-Con-Man]

So it's a Ponzi scheme and by any measure a total failure but he doesn't want to abolish it?

Describing it accurately while at the same time being unwilling to withdraw the promises made to seniors by the federal government seems to be a political concept too complex for you to grasp. But I understand it wasn't really a serious question.

[Lady Lucky]

Your Perry photo reminds me of the famed Erik Estrada image.

[org.whodat]

How much social security money has been spend on supporting illegals. If we are going to talk about it let’s talk about where the money went.

[sodpoodle]

My four adult children (& spouses) are paying into the SS system which more than covers mine & their other living parents’ SS benefits.

These young working adults are smart enough, however, to realize there will be a mere SS pittance for them at retirement, if any. As a result, they are energetically making maximum contributions to 401Ks etc., as well as paying obscene income taxes.

Any candidate who can present a creative solution to the SS mess will win the young and the retireee vote in 2012.

[Just mythoughts]

How much social security money has been spend on supporting illegals. If we are going to talk about it let’s talk about where the money went.

And how much has the system, (positions, buildings, all that energy, etc.) that administers the dollars has pulled out, off the top. Government got the cream and they send out the money like it was government stash since government is in control of printing. Not even to mention all the big dollars that have been diverted to pay for some bridge/federal building, with a Congressman's name attached.

[CA Conservative]

Unforced error by Rick now he has to travel around defending himself instead of attacking the Obama agenda.

Let's see, everyone is talking about Perry and his ideas about Social Security, rather than talking about Romney, Bachmann, Cain... yeah, that's an "unforced error" alright. A few more errors like that and he will only 20 points ahead of his closest competitors, instead of 10 points.