My blood reached the boiling point tonight as soon as I watched “The Ed Show” on MSNBC tonight and learned that President Obama is offering the republicans cuts to Social Security benefits in order to reach a ‘fiscal cliff deal’ by changing the way the cost of living is calculated for senior’s benefits to go up each year. And it appears that Nancy Pelosi is ready to go along with it.
I guess I shouldn’t be too surprised, given President Obama’s history of conceding way too much to the crooks across the aisle, but I was hoping that after his reelection and the democrats’ gains in the election as well, and with polls showing overwhelming support for raising taxes on the wealthy and not cutting Social Security, that the President would grow a spine and stick to his guns this time. It even appeared recently that he has gotten his mojo back, but sadly, pathetically, he is already offering big concessions on taxes by raising his threshold to 400 thousand a year instead of 250 thousand for whom the Bush tax cuts will expire, AND, he is now offering to reduce the already small amount of increases seniors receive in their Social Security benefits as a cost of living adjustment. And when asked about his plan, House Minority leader Nancy Pelosi indicated she would be willing to go along with it. I guess this too should not be too surprising, since she has gone on record in the recent past, along with my good democratic senator from New York, Chuck Schuummer, as offering republicans no tax increases for people making 1 million dollars a year or less. Apparently, both of these otherwise fine democrats, are so wealthy that they consider those in their own personal circles making 900 plus thousand a year as middle class, and deserving of a tax cut. Unbelievably out of touch, or just cowards when negotiating with the hostage taking minority party ? It is becoming hard to say which, but I am currently leaning towards both.
Why is Social Security even part of this debt reduction package that the ‘fiscal cliff’ hopes to force? Social Security is a separately funded entity, it is not part of the federal deficit, and it’s board of trustees in charge of its’ financing estimate that under current circumstances, it will be completely solvent until 2036 without any changes, and then able to pay 75 percent thereafter. As recent as November, the White House had said that Social Security was not part of any budget negotiations, but now that the election month is over, and even though Obama won reelection and the democrats made gains in both houses, we are hearing that the White House is offering to make Social Security ‘adjustments’ – cuts by bullshit recalculation of cost of living adjustments. Why in the bloody hell, should senior citizens, and us future senior citizens, be asked to sacrifice more in the most vulnerable part of their lives so that the rich can keep more of everything they have already have in abundance ?
The answer is obvious, and until Obama turned coward negotiator and appeaser once again, it was the position of the White House and democrats that Social Security was not up on the chopping block for the vampire republicans and their blood lust for cutting entitlements. Now they are offering to push up the threshold of tax cut rates to favor the wealthy more like the republicans want, and, they are now willing to offer up Social Security cuts to these greedy bastards as icing on the cake.
What a betrayal, President Obama and Congresswoman Pelosi, what an utter spit into the eyes of the people who voted for you, and supported you vehemently like myself and other progressive commentators and activists, but worst of all, what a cowardly betrayal of senior citizens, who are once again being thrown under the bus so that the most greedy can keep their historically low tax rates. You should be ashamed.
And we will not be fooled by the bullshit your White House spin machine is surely churning up, about how this adjustment is actually more accurate or that the cuts would be minimal. If you are saving money through it, you are making cuts to benefits and are lying, and if it is minimal, it is still too much, since it shouldn’t even be in the negotiations, which you claimed it wasn’t until you were past reelection. You are cowards when it comes to negotiating with the wealthy and powerful and the idiots of the republican house, and you are betraying us.
President Obama, liberals, democrats and the like have been very forgiving of your past concessions, but if this change to Social Security happens, there is a good chance that you will not be forgiven, and all your tough decisions on foreign policy and going after Bin Laden will not be enough to make up for your shitty negotiations with the the tea bagging den of republican thieves. Where is the fight for the middle class and seniors that you promised? I think we can afford to go off that so called fiscal cliff if necessary, and if you don’t think that is acceptable, then why in the hell did you ever agree to it in the first place?
I hope that progressives like independent Senator Bernie Sanders from Vermont and democrats Sherrod Brown from Ohio and Senator Jay Rockefeller from West Virginia keep up the good fight for us, since the democratic leadership in the House of Representatives and in the White House are sorely lacking right now in spines.
I am including a link to a petition from Senators Tom Harking, Brown and Rockefeller asking President Obama to stand up for seniors and the middle class, please copy and paste and sign :
http://www.sherrodbrown.com/petition/e1212fc/