'Trump Said He Wouldn't Cut Social Security. He Lied': Sanders Vows to Reverse President's Attack on Disability Benefits — Jake Johnson

Sen. Bernie Sanders on Wednesday accused President Donald Trump of breaking his repeated 2016 campaign promise to protect Social Security from cuts, pointing to a proposed rule change that could terminate disability benefits for hundreds of thousands of low-income and vulnerable people.

"Trump said he wouldn't cut Social Security. He lied," tweeted Sanders, a 2020 Democratic presidential candidate. "He is working to stop Americans from getting the benefits they paid for and need."...

Is SS still the third rail of American politics?

Common Dreams
'Trump Said He Wouldn't Cut Social Security. He Lied': Sanders Vows to Reverse President's Attack on Disability Benefits

Jake Johnson, staff writer

Newsday Editorial Board — First shots in war on Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security

Poverty is not a scam. Neither is old age or infirmity or serious illness. But making poverty and the need for help look like a scam is a common political strategy, and it’s one President Donald Trump’s administration sought to rekindle last week when it allowed states to impose work requirements on Medicaid recipients in “test” programs.

Such a change, based on fiction about who the 70 million Medicaid recipients are and how almost $550 billion in state and federal Medicaid funding is spent each year, won’t save any taxpayer dollars. Nor is it intended to. What it does is spawn news stories that reinforce a message Republicans have promoted since President Ronald Reagan: The GOP brings down mostly minority “welfare queens” riding high on government largesse in their Cadillacs...

Conservative policy rationale is to make it more painful to be poor by punishing poverty in order to incentivize those in poverty to be more "productive." Basic stimulus-response Pavlovian-Skinnerian behavioral psychology.

But this strategy also has a darker side in creating social divisions that can be exploited politically. The GOP sees "the poor" as a major Democratic constituency that Democrats shower with largesse when in power in order to curry favor to get votes and energize the base. The GOP sees that as a strategic opportunity to attack by creating scapegoats.

Democrats under Bill Clinton realized that the GOP base was really the moneyed class that provides the bribes contributions and so, attacking the rich is self-defeating. Clinton took GOP adviser Dick Morris advice to "triangulate" and attack the poor to please the donor-base. Robert Rueben had already suggested that the Democrats cozy up to Wall Street, since that is where the big money is.

So, now the proles and precariat are left out in the cold with the prospect of a colder season coming.

The new job requirements for Medicaid might not be legal and likely will be challenged in court. Either way, the rules won’t save much even if they do take effect. Since only 70 million Americans get Medicaid and 255 million don’t, the proposals might not cause much uproar. But be warned: As a statement of intent and a first shot across the bow, they should.

House Speaker Paul Ryan and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell have been clear about wanting huge across-the-board cuts in Medicaid and Medicare. The cuts have been included in budget proposals they have introduced, and in their efforts to repeal the Affordable Care Act. Ryan has said cuts to those programs, along with restructuring Social Security to save money, are his primary legislative objectives, although he concedes they probably won’t happen in 2018....

Newsday
First shots in war on Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security

The Editorial Board

Michael Hiltzik — Trump's proposal to eliminate the Social Security payroll tax may be his worst idea yet

The morons believe that the currency issuer has to obtain the currency it issues from the private sector instead of the private sector needing to obtain the currency from the issuer to pay taxes that the issuer imposes on users.

Los Angeles Times
Trump's proposal to eliminate the Social Security payroll tax may be his worst idea yet

Michael Hiltzik

Alan Nasser — The Coming Plague of Poverty Among the Elderly: Clinton’s Plan For Gutting Social Security

Bowles-Simpson. That would be Erskine Bowles, Morgan Stanley alumnus and WH chief of staff under Bill Clinton.

Counterpunch
The Coming Plague of Poverty Among the Elderly: Clinton’s Plan For Gutting Social Security

Alan Nasser

Yves Smith — Blackstone’s Tony James Touting What Looks Like Hillary’s Scheme to Gut Social Security

Hillary's mandatory retirement savings accounts are a twofer: a way to replace Social Security over time and enrich private equity and hedgies.

Now that it is clear that HRC say one thing publicly and another behind closed doors.

Readers may recall that Bill Clinton planned to privatize Social Security in the second term of his Presidency. The Monica Lewinsky scandal derailed his plan.

As the Clintons knew, only a Democrat can dismantle Social Security. Hillary looks to be picking up where Bill left off.

One can only imagine what is in this financially for Bill and Hillary Clinton. They have already pulled in 111 million, 80 reported by Bill and 31 by Hillary. There's no quid pro quo though. Hey, they gave speeches.

Naked Capitalism
Blackstone’s Tony James Touting What Looks Like Hillary’s Scheme to Gut Social Security
Yves Smith

Steven Hill — The 7 Biggest Myths and Lies About Social Security

Anti-Peterson ammunition.

Naked Capitalism
The 7 Biggest Myths and Lies About Social Security
Steven Hill, a senior fellow with the New America Foundation

Here's why bull market in stocks and economic expansion guaranteed for next 20 years

There's only one statistic that you need to know to in order to understand what the outlook is for the economy and the stock market for the next 20 years and it's not how big the deficit is,

It's the fact that for the next 20 years 10,000 baby-boomers PER DAY will be retiring and becoming eligible to receive Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.

Those problems are already 42% of annual Federal spending. ($1.8 trillion out of $4.3 trillion.) However, they're just going to continue to grow and grow and grow for the next 20 years.

You know what that is? It's government guaranteed income support. Just like what they're proposing in Switzerland only maybe half. Still, it's something and in the aggregate, when you consider the numbers--tens of millions of people--it's a massive and ongoing fiscal transfer to the economy.

This is why this recovery has lasted longer without a recession than anyone predicted (other than us, here). And it's why stocks keep going up.

With those kind of guaranteed flows the companies in the S&P 500 can ALWAYS squeeze out their trillion and a half or trillion eight of earnings.

Bull market...next 20 years.

Said Milani — Donald Trump’s Pledge to Defend Spending for Old and Poor Belied by Staff Picks

The odor of bullshit is in the air. Trump is sending contradictory signals, and actions speak louder than words.

Trump’s hiring of two staunch retirement hawks into top policy jobs is not something to take lightly. “Personnel is policy. A candidate’s campaign staff is a useful clue to how that candidate will govern,” political scientist and Bloomberg View columnist Jonathan Bernstein wrote last year. “Including which party groups he or she is close to, which policies the administration would likely embrace, and which party factions may be frozen out.”

The Intercept

Donald Trump’s Pledge to Defend Spending for Old and Poor Belied by Staff Picks
Zaid Jilani

Here's what's single handedly keeping us out of recession

Social Security!

Here's why the economy won't go into recession. The expansion in the Social Security rolls will necessarily mean increasing levels of government spending. It might not be a boom, but it's a broadening, guaranteed, income flow to tens of millions. This is single handedly keeping us out of recession. 

And these idiots in Congress want to do away with it. BUT NOT TRUMP!!!!!!!!

Blast from the past. My interview with David Walker, lying sack of shit.

Just thought I'd post this again.

David Walker, former Controller General and Chief Propagandist in the effort to "reform" Social Security (he's a self-proclaimed, fiscal responsibility expert). Also, an all-around lying sack of shit. This was from an interview I did with him on my radio show back in 2008, where he admitted that the Social Security checks would NEVER bounce. He admitted it. Listen.



I am the only person, EVER to get Walker to admit this publicly and I have no job in the media.

By the way, when I worked at Fox News I offered this audio clip numerous times to the producers and Neil Cavuto, but they didn't have any interest at all even though they had Walker on numerous times. Why not confront him on this comment, especially when he's been leading a billion dollar crusade to strip seniors of Social Security even though he's lying about its solvency.

Barkley Rosser — It's Monday, So "Silent Samuelson" Wants To Cut Social Security Benefits (Yet Again)

Wherein Barkley Rosser roasts Robert Samuelson.

"Silent" refers to the Silent Generation that preceded the Baby Boomers.

Econospeak
It's Monday, So "Silent Samuelson" Wants To Cut Social Security Benefits (Yet Again)
J. Barkley Rosser | Professor of Economics and Business Administration James Madison University

Dave Lindorff — "Now I get it!": Katie Couric's Hit Job on Social Security

Katie Couric, a veteran TV journalist and currently global anchor for Yahoo News, just trashed Social Security in a hit piece misleadingly called "Explaining Social Security" that purported to be explaining the system's financial "crisis." Far from explaining the system, she trundled out tired falsehoods and scare tactics long used by the system's enemies -- notably the Republican Party and including many Democrats in the pocket of Wall Street. (Significantly, the online video was sponsored by a Merrill Lynch/Bank of America, hardly a fan of Social Security.)

First, Couric's long list of whoppers….

Calling BS on US media propaganda based on disinformation to dupe the rubes, who have already been duped into believing that the economic problems of the US begin with public debt.

OEN
"Now I get it!": Katie Couric's Hit Job on Social Security

Dave Lindorff

Mark Hensch — Trump defines his brand of conservatism

GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump offered his personal definition of conservatism on Sunday amid criticism he is not a true Republican.

“Well, for me, conservatism as it pertains to our country is fiscal,” Trump told host Chuck Todd on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”

“We have to be strong and secure and get rid of our debt,” he said. “The military has to be powerful and not necessarily used, but very powerful.”

“I want people to be taken care of from a healthcare standpoint,” Trump added. “I want Social Security without cuts. And to me, conservative means a strong county with very little debt.”

Looks like The Donald can't add, or else he has a plan for the US to become a permanent net exporter.

The Hill
Trump defines his brand of conservatism

Mark Hensch

Social Security Disability Trust Fund (electrons) to "run dry" in 2016 accordig to a report

You know this will end up resulting in cuts to disabled workers. Even though these payments amount to nothing more than the government "marking up" bank accounts (electronic bookkeeping entries--electrons), our leaders will ensure that a mini-catastrophe will happen.

In a report Wednesday, the trustees that oversee Social Security said the disability trust fund will run out of money in 2016, right in the middle of a presidential campaign.

That would trigger an automatic 19 percent cut in benefits. Read here.

So, for sure, there will be cuts one way or another. Either straight cuts of 19 percent to people receiving disability or, the money will be taken from the Social  Security trust fund, but only after big changes (read: cuts) to this program are rammed through.

Never mind that the government "paid back" $68 TRILLION last year without a hitch. (See Daily Treasury Statement Table III-A), we still won't "have the money" to make these social payments.

This will be like the debt ceiling crises we've had in the past only this time Congress will screw these wretched disabled people.

With the debt ceiling they were scared shitless of the Chinese.

Social Security, FICA Taxes and CWICA Taxes

   (Commentary posted by Roger Erickson)

THE ROOTS OF SOCIAL SECURITY [& FICA Taxes], FRANCES PERKINS, 1962

hat tip Dan Lynch

see also the Luther Gulick memo:

FICA Taxes Were Never Necessary, just Pure Politics

We supposedly NEED taxes to fund one policy, but not another?  Bullshit! Please stop and think, what does "fiat" even mean?

The very definition of "fiat" currency means that fiat taxes for fiat revenue was an obsolete concept from day one.

For all nations, a key goal is to dynamically "right-size" currency supply for changing population size and context. Part of that right-sizing involves managing inflation. End of story. Change in population and/or public activity patterns dictates changes in required currency supply.

This is 3rd grade logic.

Why on Earth don't politicians know this?  Simply because their corporate funding depends on them NOT knowing it? That sure seems like the only conclusion.

Meanwhile, yearly or long term changes in currency supply are incidental to yearly changes in population or Public Initiative, and as natural as changing your blood supply as you grow from infant to adult. Does the current generation of cells in your body have a "red-blood-cell" deficit that must be paid back to the succeeding generations of the cells produced and turning over during your lifetime? For both national currency supply & personal red-blood-cell supply, application of the word "deficit" is merely an unfortunate semantic trick that may sometimes snare the uninformed.

It's a sophist ploy used by bankers, frauds and politicians to confuse the peasants and keep the Middle Class down.

So either do away with FICA taxes completely, or impose CWICA Taxes to "fund" corporate welfare. Quit foisting outright lies on the US public. They deserve better, if you want a strong, dynamic nation.

Anything in between is just class warfare ... and failure "to make a more perfect union."

Sure, Tom Paine Predicted Social Security ... but He Did NOT Predict FICA Taxes

   (Commentary posted by Roger Erickson)

Agrarian Justice: With a new Foreword, "Social Security, Thomas Paine, and the Spirit of America"

The "new" forward is by our favorite NeoLiberal Harvard Lawyer, Nancy Altman.

How misleading is Nancy's outlook? It's more insidiously wrong than you could possibly believe. I shudder to imagine what choice words Tom Paine  - if resurrected - would have for NeoLiberals of today, such as Nancy Altman.

Sure, Tom Paine Predicted Social Security ... but He Did NOT Predict FICA Taxes.  Social Security, after all, was practiced by every known tribal society worldwide, for the past 100,000 years. (Hint, FICA taxes weren't invented until ~1936.)

The tragic part is that SS-Works & Nancy Altman TRULY BELIEVE (or SAY they believe) that it is ONLY FICA taxes that make SocSec possible - while that is the exact opposite of the simple truth. What Nancy Altman is spewing is misguided bullshit, of course.

Have YOU ever seen another public policy paid for by a pre-emptive tax on citizens? What? No "CWICA" tax to pay for Corporate Welfare? How about for Air Force bombers? Bank bailouts? You may as well quit looking. Only the working class is taxed this way, and for no good reason whatsoever.

To understand why, please read this historical link all the way to the end.

Then remind yourself that FIAT TAXES FOR FIAT REVENUE ARE OBSOLETE ... and have been ever since 1933.

If more citizens understood that 4 generations of US citizens have been held down ONLY for the exact purpose of holding them back ... there'd be blood in the streets tomorrow. You, your parents, your grandparents and your great grandparents have all been cheated like disenfranchised sharecroppers. There should be reparations for 80+ years of unnecessary FICA taxes.

It's a bitter pill to realize that your own country has a policy of purposefully over-taxing and under-funding the working classes.

And why? Pure stupidity and greed on the part of the "Upper" looting classes, and pure gullibility on the part of the working classes. Doesn't anyone in this country know what counts anymore?

Is it too late? Tens of millions of voters must look in their mirrors and ask themselves that question.

While you're at it, also ask whether you truly love your children, and/or all the future citizens of the USA. If you do (and aren't a moron) you'd cease - forever - urging fellow citizens to try to save public fiat instead of investing it. Conflating current fiat and future public options is suicidal for a growing population.

I have to ask Nancy Altman if she's ever asked herself the following question about our supposed deficit in fiat.

Decide for yourself. What happens when YOU run out of fiat? Does it help if you BALANCE your fiat? (Whatever THAT means.)

Forbes — Harvard Study: Social Security In Far Worse Shape Than Official Numbers Show

More fear-mongering. How come Forbes never writes an article on how the military is running out of money and the can no longer afford its empire?

Over the last 15 years, the Social Security Administration’s Office of the Chief Actuary has consistently underestimated retirees’ life expectancy and made other errors that make the finances of the retirement system look significantly better than they are , a new study by two Harvard and one Dartmouth academics concludes. The report, being published today by the Journal of Economic Perspectives, is the first, the authors say, to compare the government agency’s past demographic and financial forecasts with actual results.
In a second paper appearing today in Political Analysis, the three researchers offer their theory of why the Actuary Office’s predictions have apparently grown less reliable since 2000: the civil servants who run it have responded to increased political polarization surrounding Social Security “by hunkering down” and resisting outside pressures—not only from the politicians, but also from outside technical experts. “While they’re insulating themselves from the politics, they also insulate themselves from the data and this big change in the world –people started living longer lives,’’ coauthor Gary King, a leading political scientist and director of Harvard’s Institute for Quantitative Social Science, said in an interview Thursday. “They need to take that into account and change the forecast as a result of that.” 

In its annual report last July, Social Security predicted its old age and disability trust funds, combined, would be exhausted in 2033 and that after that point the government will have enough payroll tax revenues coming in to pay only about three quarters of promised benefits. King said his team hasn’t estimated how much sooner the fund might run out, but described it as in “significantly worse shape” than official forecasts indicate...

Forbes

Harvard Study: Social Security In Far Worse Shape Than Official Numbers Show

Janet Novak, Forbes staff

Note to Chris Christie and other "entitlement fixing" sociopaths. (That means you, too, Hillary.)

Christie came out the other day with this fucked-up "tough love" message about how we need to "fix" Social Security and how he's the man to do it. I presented my thoughts on that speech here. (BTW...Christie's state is in a shambles.)

Now a little lesson on why Social Security can never be "fixed" and repeating, for the umpteenth time, why it's not broken.

A tax is a tax. It is the removal of all or part of this income. Why should this be put on seniors and workers? It won't make Social Security more "secure." First of all it can never be insecure in a financial sense because the US government cannot run out of dollars. Greenspan explained that already to Paul Ryan in a video/post I have put up many times.

Secondly, all Social Security taxes flow into the Treasury's general account and are used for general expenditures. That's always how it has been. There is no "lockbox" like Al Gore once laughably told everyone. In fact, the government has no means whatsoever to "save" its own fiat. The whole notion is idiotic. Is the money stored up in some warehouse somewhere?

The fact of the matter is, any additional Social Security tax would a) hit workers the hardest and; b) just flow right into the Treasury's general account as it always has and be spent. Probably on war.

So, 10 years down the road they'd be saying we have to save Social Security...again. Then what? More taxes? Come on. Wake up. This is Wall Street wanting our tax dollars so it can play its casino games.

Chris Christie is floating his big, "presidential," idea: Screwing seniors out of Social Security

Guess who's sorta running for president, but hasn't come out and said it, yet? New Jersey Governor, Christie Christie. And guess what appears to be the main idea for his platform? How he's gonna "fix" Social Security.

Never mind that it ain't broken and will never go broke because the Federal Government can never run out of dollars to pay. Alan Greenspan schooled Paul Ryan on this, remember? And the government "paid back" nearly $69 trillion to holders of public debt securities LAST YEAR. SIXTY NINE TRILLION.

So it's pretty clear we can't run out of money.

But don't let that phase Christie; he's just another clueless, callous debt fanatic. A guy who's pretty much run his state into the ground. Near last in job growth. Credit ratings cut by rating agencies. Led the last three years out of four in people leaving. Cuts to education, health care, social programs, but of course, tax cuts for the wealthy. He's right up there with guys like Sam Brownback of Kansas and Scott Walker of Wisconsin

Christie's plan to fix Social Security is to screw seniors out of benefits by cutting payments and raising the retirement age. Wonderful. More taxes on the most vulnerable and those who worked all their lives and contributed to the system and helped build the country. That's fair.

By the way, with Christie coming out with this plan, expect the other ignorant debt fanatics/hypocrites to do the same and, oh yeah, that means Hillary Clinton, too. Her husband is all about cutting Social Security. His "guy" was none other than Erskine Bowles of Simpleton/Bowels infamy.

All I have to say are two things: Are we still really having this discussion about what is causing income and wealth  inequality?

And...

Say goodbye to Social Security as we have come to know it. It's going away.

P.S. Guys ike Christie are truly disgusting.

Bud Meyer — Republicans want 75 Years of Funding for Social Security

But without raising taxes on anyone earning more than $118,500 a year. The only thing thatwas not said at the Senate Hearing on Social Security disability today was: "Read my lips."…

If you'll notice, in their title they used the word "safeguarding" and "fix" — which is just GOP doublespeak for "privatize" and "cut".…

In an interview (The Washington Post: Republicans planning stealth attack on Social Security), Senator Bernie Sanders says: "Republicans have made it clear that they intend to pursue ‘entitlement reform,’ which is code for cutting Social Security and Medicare. This is their first step forward. Whether they will focus on disability, or cuts in the retirement program, I don’t know. But there’s no question that they intend to push forward and try to cut Social Security. Republicans are creating a phony crisis. They are saying the disability insurance program will be running out of money, and therefore one of two things has to happen: Either we cut disability or we have to look at the solvency of the whole program, to protect disability benefits, which means we’re going to have to cut benefits either through Chained CPI, or raising the retirement age, or through privatization.” (Read more here at Bloomberg)

This morning the GOP-controlled Senate Budget Committee held a hearing that they ominously named: The Coming Crisis: Social Security Disability Trust Fund Insolvency….

The Economic Populist
Republicans want 75 Years of Funding for Social Security
Bud Meyer