[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vOygV8lvaaU[/youtube]
At Thursday’s healthcare reform rally (you know, the one the Seattle Times insists never happened), there didn’t seem to be much to be gained from hanging with my fellow travelers, so I wandered across the street to the couple dozen, sign-waving counter-protesters, and attempted to strike up a conversation. I eased into it with a subject on which we could all agree—cupcakes—and then moved into a policy discussion from there.
Posted above is a six-minute conversation with the guy with the bullhorn, in which I present his answers unedited, and totally within context (my snarky subtitles and inserts aside). If at times he comes off as a tad inconsistent, it had nothing to do with any iMovie magic.
That said, I think he does make a point which is worth considering when attempting to refute the arguments coming from the other side. When talking about Social Security and Medicare he freely acknowledges that “these programs might seem like they take great care of people, which is wonderful, they do,” but he simply doesn’t believe that the money will be there long term to continue to provide this care in the future… and this is the same financial trap he sees our nation falling into with a public option.
This is different from the government can’t do anything right sentiment that seems to be shared by some of his companions (even while lovin’ their Medicare, which I’ll get to in a later clip), and deserves a different and more thoughtful response. Bullhorn man clearly doesn’t believe that he will ever benefit from these programs, and thus resents paying into them now, and he doesn’t want to pay for yet another social program—healthcare reform—that won’t benefit him in the long run either. And who would?
When he talks about the current systems having already been “robbed of their money” by Congress, it appears that he doesn’t seem to understand that Social Security et al have always been “pay as you go” programs, in which payroll deductions from the current generation of workers pays the benefits of the current generation of retirees, but it would be a mistake to dismiss these concerns nonetheless. Republicans may have lost the political battle to privatize Social Security, but their rhetoric about its imminent collapse is clearly paying dividends in the current healthcare debate.
Anyway, make of the video what you will, and please excuse the shoddy camerawork. In such close quarters I have to hold the camera so far back that I can’t actually see the view screen, so I don’t always get everybody in frame; such is the life of the amateur video blogger.
The bullhorn guy must be a big fan of pudge!
I was half expecting him to whip out a geetar and start singing “Obama is Hilter”.
Social Security won’t collapse. That’s another rightwing myth. Government can pay all its Social Security and Medicare obligations simply by running the printing press. Of course, that will create inflation, but people need to understand there’s no such thing as government running out of money.
Now, more responsible heads will want government to pay its obligations without debasing the currency. It should be remembered that inflation is a tax, and therefore printing more currency to pay goverment’s bills is taxation, and we all hate tax increases.
Social Security is designed to increase recipients’ prosperity along with that of the general economy. That’s why SocSec COLAs are tied to wages instead of the CPI, and in theory go up faster than inflation, so that retirees will also benefit from the rest of the country’s rising standard of living.
What people often misunderstand about the Social Security funding issue is that even if benefits have to be scaled back, future retirees (say, those retiring in 2042, when the Trust Fund supposedly will go into the red) will still receive higher inflation-adjusted benefits than today’s retirees.
So, it’s absolutely wrong to believe those benefits “won’t be there” for current workers. Balancing accounts may require higher taxes and/or working longer and/or slowing the rate at which benefits grow. But even if all of that happens, these workers will retire with benefits equal to or higher than current retirees get in relative terms.
But the more important aspect of this debate lies in the fact that over half of all Americans have no retirement income other than Social Security. Even those with defined benefit pensions experience the gradual destruction of their private pensions by inflation, and Social Security becomes more important as they grow older. My father, for example, got a monthly pension of $500 when he retired in the 1970s, which was an adequate (albeit not princely) amount in those days when combined with Social Security. Now, he is nearly 100 years old, and he still gets his $500 corporate pension, but today his Social Security comprises most of his income. He’d be damned hard-pressed without it, especially with investments paying only 1% to 2%, if anything at all.
Today’s workers should take a lesson from today’s financial situation: YOU CAN’T COUNT ON PRIVATE SAVINGS AND INVESTMENTS. BUT YOU CAN COUNT ON SOCIAL SECURITY. You can save your ass off, and even if you grow your investment pool and don’t lose your nest egg to capricious (and vicious) markets, the return it produces may be next to nothing. Your private pension may disappear, too, as many corporate retirees are finding out. But SOCIAL SECURITY IS ALWAYS THERE. Never, since its inception in the 1930s, has Social Security ever failed to pay one penny of promised benefits on time. Social Security is the safest retirement program in the world. It is backed by the full faith and credit of the U.S. government. The only way it could fail is if the gun-wavers overthrew our government.
If they try it, I’ll join the Loyalists defending the Constitution and our elected government, and I’ll shoot to kill.
I would think that with all of your genius moves in the stock market you brag about that your elderly father would benefit from the windfall. Doesn’t sound like it if he’s hard pressed. Hmmmm.
I think we have located video footage of Roger in Army basic training.
Most who’ve been in the military and seen combat don’t feel the necessity to brag about it like ol’ codger Roger. Especially if most of that was Army reserves (i.e. playing cards for 2 weeks a year and 2 weekends a month).
Personally, I think he’s a lying sack of shit, but then…I’m just sayin’
4 – Is it ESO or PBJ?
“Government can pay all its Social Security and Medicare obligations simply by running the printing press. Of course, that will create inflation, but people need to understand there’s no such thing as government running out of money.”
Of course that will give us an economy or country like…..say MEXICO!!!
“Social Security is designed to increase recipients’ prosperity along with that of the general economy.”
Wrong again….That is not what SS was intended to do.
http://www.ssa.gov/history/35actinx.html
“YOU CAN’T COUNT ON PRIVATE SAVINGS AND INVESTMENTS. BUT YOU CAN COUNT ON SOCIAL SECURITY.”
Speak for yourself…Plenty of people can and do count on their private savings and investments and are just fine…Go ahead and concede your freedom to the state, as for me? No thanks..
“Never, since its inception in the 1930s, has Social Security ever failed to pay one penny of promised benefits on time. Social Security is the safest retirement program in the world.”
Except that the retirement age can keep going up and the % payout can be decreased per congress..
http://www.socialsecurity.gov/retirement/1960.html
As the boomers hit the SS roles, watch as the min. retirement age goes up and up and the % payout goes down and down…
No Thanks…I prefer to be the master of my own destiny, not a ward of the state.
You know, Rog, you can make all the claims you want about how Social Security will always be there, but being there and getting the job done are two different animals.
Ever heard of the “Notch Years?” My dad has. He was born in 1918, and when Congress tinkered with the Social Security regs in 1977, my old man wound up on the short end of the stick. As did most people born between 1917 and 1921. In fact, the longer he delayed retirement, the worse it got. People who retired at age 62 were generally okay, but my dad worked until he was 75.
In 1992, Congress established the bipartisan Commission on the Social Security “Notch” Issue, and charged it with examining the question of whether those born in the “Notch” years had been treated unfairly, and recommending, if necessary, remedial legislation and the means to pay for it.
The Commission’s principal conclusion was that the “Notch” is a “necessary and appropriate result” of the 1977 legislation, which was designed to substantially reduce the growth of future benefit costs and to restore fiscal balance to Social Security, and “no legislative remedy is in order. The Commission did not believe that benefit increases for people born after January 1, 1917 are appropriate, or that they can be justified.”
Easy for them to say. They all get Cadillac health care and fat pensions paid for by you and me.
But my dad, who is now 91, spent 60 years paying into a system that kicked him in the ass.
Anyone who thinks similar legislation and rip-off “adjustments” aren’t on the horizon in the very near future needs to put down the crack pipe. I’m 63, and my latest SSA statement says if I retired right now I’d Come On Down! and pick up a whopping $455 a month. That’s $200/mo less than my rent, and only $130 more than my monthly health insurance premium.
But hey, if I can hold out til age 70, it skyrockets to the dizzying heights of $759.
You’re welcome to stop by the culvert any time for a nice can of Alpo. You may have to eat it cold, though. And bring your own can opener.
@ 2 That’s why SocSec COLAs are tied to wages instead of the CPI
———–
SS COLA’s are tied to CPI-W:
http://www.ssa.gov/cola/colafacts2009.htm
More on CPI and CPI-W can be found here:
http://www.bls.gov/cpi/cpiovrvw.htm#item2
YOU CAN’T COUNT ON PRIVATE SAVINGS AND INVESTMENTS. BUT YOU CAN COUNT ON SOCIAL SECURITY.
———-
This is nonsense. Social Security is supplemental income – it’s not meant to be your entire retirement account. If rely on it for this, you’ll be sadly disappointed.
You absolutely need alternative investments.
>>>he doesn’t seem to understand that Social Security et al have always been “pay as you go” programs, in which payroll deductions from the current generation of workers pays the benefits of the current generation of retirees,<<<
I thought the 1983 Greenspan Commission “reforms” [increased payroll taxes] were to build up trust fund for baby boomers…
If anything mister bull horn said made any sense, I must have missed it.
There are legitimate reasons to be concerned about health insurance reform, about social security, about medicare, but all we’re hearing is crazy talk.
and he doesn’t want to pay for yet another social program—healthcare reform—that won’t benefit him in the long run either. And who would?
As I am covered by my union-negotiated retiree health plan until I’m eligible for Medicare, there’s a good chance that I might not be a candidate for the public option. I still think that I could benefit from it though, through a) lower premiums brought about by the gov’t competition, and b) living in a society where all of my neighbors, friends and relatives can afford the care they need.
A friend who teaches in the poorest neighborhood of Las Vegas tells me about kids who come to class not being able to read because their mothers (most of her students are in single-parent households) can’t afford eyeglasses for them. How does that help our nation?
To me, healthcare for all is an investment in our country’s future. I want to see healthier students and healthier workers. Healthy citizens are assets that will pay dividends forever.
Instead of putting a band aid on a gaping chest wound, it would be more sensible to isolate and treat the the problems in the community. Of course, in todays politically correct climate, we can’t pass judgment to keep social order. The result? exactly what’s described in the above quote.
It’s time people start taking some fucking responsibility for their lot in life and make better life choices. Double that for those wanting to procreate and bring some innocent child into this world so they can suffer along with their parents.
Liberalism only breeds this attitude of learned helplessness.
Absolutely. But, they’re not going to know about those better choices and be able to make them without a little help.
Liberalism doesn’t breed learned helplessness, it offers a hand up out of their hopeless, helpless state.
History is not on your side, Michael. Exhibit A is the black family unit in this country and its deterioration since the 1960’s modern liberal revolution. The statistics don’t lie.
Was that Don Ward at the beginning of the video?
What a dork! How fun for him to be “working” for publication with “Seattle” in the name.
And it’s NOT the Times.
YLB @16,
Yes, that was Don.
waguy spews–
How generous you are! Sounds like the Union is probably the State Employees Union which has bankrupt Washington State with excessive benefits.
Plus, one of the problems with Government Controlled Health Care adding 47 million to the insurance rolls is that many of your neighbors, friends and relatives will seek care they DO NOT need. They will also clog a system that is barely able to handle what they have now.
Listen KLOWN–You make it sound like somehow Government-controlled Health Care will reduce costs for folks?? Who will pay for it? Rich guys??
How about retired Union employees like you for a change.
Lower your benefits and help the poor!!
It’s easy to spend other people’s money, ain’t it dumbass.
@15
Um… Income is up, education levels are up, literacy rates are up, teen pregnancy is down…
Finland, Norway, Germany, Denmark, Holland & Japan all have more extensive social programs than we do. They, also, are happier, more educated, have less poverty, less teen pregnancy and live longer than we do.
Many of the great society programs of the 60’s didn’t work out that well, but that was 40 years ago and things have changed since then.
I believe I said the “family unit” within the black community. Are you suggesting it has improved since the 1960’s? If so, you’re not looking at the facts.
A site for you to check out Michael
http://www.akdart.com/culture2.html
19. Michael spews:
Why not move to one of these Countries??
How much of their GNP do they spend on defense?? They rely on us to save them. They also have few ILLEGAL ALIENS.
Happy?
See how happy they are if they are forced to accept 20 million+ ILLEGALS…or if they get hit by a terrorist strike and the US let’s them deal with it.
@21
Why not learn from those countries successes?
The cheap labor right is as big or bigger stumbling block to immigration reform as anyone on the left is.
Briton, Spain and France have all been “hit” by terrorists since 9/11 and have dealt with those incidents.
My grandmother used to live at 35th place & vermont, 3 houses away from the watts riots. Looking at pictures all the homes look well kept up as do the yards. You see people doing stuff. Much like a norman rockwell painting.
Today, the houses are run down, bars on windows and doors, graffiti all over the place. Because of the high rate of violence, kids don’t play in the street anymore.
If not for the liberals “helping” them, what caused the deterioration of the black community?
@4 Hey, I was just kidding! That’s just a Glenn Beck laugh line. I used to be a Republican, and I still occasionally suffer from Stranglovian impulses that make me talk and behave like a Republican.
@4 I can tell you’ve never been in the Guard or Reserves, because it’s only one weekend a month. Unless, of course, you get called up to active duty to fight a Republican war.
@6 “Of course that will give us an economy or country like…..say MEXICO!!!”
Or Argentina.
Wrong again….That is not what SS was intended to do.
I didn’t say anything about what SS was intended to do. My comment related to what it’s designed to do. Read the fucking question before you write your fucking answer, idiot!
“Speak for yourself…Plenty of people can and do count on their private savings and investments and are just fine…”
Goody for them. Btw, what country do they live in?
“Go ahead and concede your freedom to the state, as for me?”
What freedom have I given up by collecting my Social Security?
“No thanks..”
Fine. More for me. I’ll take it.
Except that the retirement age can keep going up and the % payout can be decreased per congress..
Asteroids could collide with earth, too.
“As the boomers hit the SS roles, watch as the min. retirement age goes up and up and the % payout goes down and down…”
First of all, that’s “rolls” not “roles,” dumbass! Is it possible Congress will raise the retirement age? Yes, but I don’t think that’s a given, and there are powerful arguments against it. Is there likely to be some adjustment to benefit payments? Even if there is, under no scenario that’s been discussed, will you be worse off than today’s retirees.
“No Thanks…I prefer to be the master of my own destiny, not a ward of the state.”
Like I said, fine, nobody will make you apply for Social Security. Leave your benefits in the Trust Fund if you like. Uncle Sam will thank you! While you’re at it, you might as well refuse Medicare on ideological grounds, too. And, for good measure, shoot your own balls off. After all, it would be too bad if some poor hapless zygote inherited your brains.
If not for the liberals “helping” them, what caused the deterioration of the black community?
There are many reasons: White flight; tax subsidies for suburban development (jobs follow); trade policies favoring capital at the expense of labor; the ‘war on drugs’, oh, and simple racism. Somehow I am not suprised you tend to lazily infer a so called answer that conforms to your ideological predillictions i.e., it’s the fault of liberals.
Some of us in libertarian circles have a saying that goes; “when you get the rich of welfare the poor won’t need it”.
Those on the so called left need to remember that the medical profession fought long and hard to outlaw, or severely regulate any group that competed with them. Especially hard hit were midwives who found it difficult to practice and still do in many states, but we don’t see or hear much from the so called reformers about giving expectant mothers more choices when it comes to childbirth by removing the barriers to midwives that still exist in some of the states. Btw midwives generally have lower maternal mortality rates, lower infant mortality rates then do MDs and do so at lower costs.
So tell me again about this concern you have for the health of children when you won’t opt for better outcomes by opening the market to midwives when it remains closed in some places.
@7 Your outrage is touching, but mitigated by the fact your comment is full of factual errors.
First of all, if you father was born in 1918 and worked until he was 75, he didn’t pay SS taxes for 60 years, because SS taxes weren’t even collected until 1937.
Second, the so-called “notch” beneficiaries didn’t get their benefits cut and didn’t get screwed. They simply didn’t get the unintended windfall that those born in 1917 or earlier got. The AARP, which advocates for senior citizens not the government, says the “notch” group receives “fair” benefits.
http://www.aarp.org/money/soci.....notch.html
Third, if he delayed applying for benefits past his 65th birthday, he got an actuarial increase of benefits, so he didn’t lose any money. And anyone over 70 can earn unlimited income without benefit reduction. So, if he applied for SS at age 70 and worked until age 75, he got an enhanced SS benefit in addition to his earnings. In other words, he got everything that he paid SS taxes for.
Fourth, congressmen don’t “get Cadillac health care.” Rep. Inslee addressed this myth at his townhall last week. Members of congress are enrolled in the same health plan that all other federal employees get, and on the same terms and conditions.
Fifth, you assertion that “similar legislation and rip-off ‘adjustments’ [are] on the horizon in the very near future” is (a) not a fact but merely your opinion or assumption, and (b) is false to the extent it argues that current retirees or people like you who are near retirement will have their benefits reduced by future legislation. Even if Congress does change future benefits, you will be protected from any reduction by “grandfathering.”
You stated, “I’m 63, and my latest SSA statement says if I retired right now I’d … pick up a whopping $455 a month. … But hey, if I can hold out til age 70, it skyrockets to the dizzying heights of $759.”
It’s hard for me to respond to this without seeing your statement. SSA statements contain several potential benefit figures, so you may be reading the wrong line, for example what your child would get if you croaked right now. I have reason to doubt the reading skills of our trolls, so that’s the first thing I would look at.
But let’s say your monthly retirement benefit would be $455 if you retired right now. That’s less than a third of what I get, and I started getting benefits at age 62, and I never earned a high income, so something is going on here.
The most obvious explanation for a benefit that low is that a person worked in covered employment for relatively few years. That could mean that he was a career military man or Coast Guardsman who is getting a military pension, or was in federal employment, or was a railroad worker getting a Railroad Retirement Benefit, or someone who was out of the workforce for 15 or 20 years because he was serving a prison sentence for armed robbery or was a bum or some other reason. In any case, if your SS retirement benefit is only $455, then you didn’t earn a middle class income for at least 35 years. But if you did, and you feel SSA miscalculated your benefits, you have the right to appeal the calculation to an administrative law judge.
Given that your comment rests mostly on bullshit, instead of facts, I’m not inclined to share your apocalyptic view of Social Security. I like my $1500 a month SS benefit. It helps pay the bills, and unlike my state pension, it goes up over time which helps compensate for inflation. Because it comes from the U.S. government, I can count on it no longer how long I live, and no matter what the stock market does. If I had $100,000 to invest right now, a 12-month bank CD would pay a measly 1% or $1,000 a year. I would need $1.8 million of savings — an impossible figure for someone in my salary bracket — to earn interest equal to what I get from Social Security. So, you can hate Social Security all you want. It’s a free country and that’s your privilege. I like my Social Security a lot. If you read your statement correctly, then I’m sorry you didn’t work as hard as I did or earn the benefits that I did. You have my sympathy. Maybe somewhere along the line you could have made better choices about what to do with your life.
Hmm, I’m trying to respond to comment #7 but it’s not posting, so I’ll split it into multiple posts and see what happens.
@7 (Part 1) Your outrage is touching, but mitigated by the fact your comment is full of factual errors.
First of all, if your father was born in 1918 and worked until he was 75, he didn’t pay SS taxes for 60 years, because SS taxes weren’t even collected until 1937.
@7 (Part 2)
Second, the so-called “notch” beneficiaries didn’t get their benefits cut and didn’t get screwed. They simply didn’t get the unintended windfall that those born in 1917 or earlier got. The AARP, which advocates for senior citizens not the government, says the “notch” group receives “fair” benefits.
http://www.aarp.org/money/soci.....notch.html
Aha, it didn’t like my link to AARP, so I have to delete that.
Let’s see if I can post the whole thing without the link.
@7 Your outrage is touching, but mitigated by the fact your comment is full of factual errors.
First of all, if you father was born in 1918 and worked until he was 75, he didn’t pay SS taxes for 60 years, because SS taxes weren’t even collected until 1937.
Second, the so-called “notch” beneficiaries didn’t get their benefits cut and didn’t get screwed. They simply didn’t get the unintended windfall that those born in 1917 or earlier got. The AARP, which advocates for senior citizens not the government, says the “notch” group receives “fair” benefits.
Third, if he delayed applying for benefits past his 65th birthday, he got an actuarial increase of benefits, so he didn’t lose any money. And anyone over 70 can earn unlimited income without benefit reduction. So, if he applied for SS at age 70 and worked until age 75, he got an enhanced SS benefit in addition to his earnings. In other words, he got everything that he paid SS taxes for.
Fourth, congressmen don’t “get Cadillac health care.” Rep. Inslee addressed this myth at his townhall last week. Members of congress are enrolled in the same health plan that all other federal employees get, and on the same terms and conditions.
Fifth, you assertion that “similar legislation and rip-off ‘adjustments’ [are] on the horizon in the very near future” is (a) not a fact but merely your opinion or assumption, and (b) is false to the extent it argues that current retirees or people like you who are near retirement will have their benefits reduced by future legislation. Even if Congress does change future benefits, you will be protected from any reduction by “grandfathering.”
You stated, “I’m 63, and my latest SSA statement says if I retired right now I’d … pick up a whopping $455 a month. … But hey, if I can hold out til age 70, it skyrockets to the dizzying heights of $759.”
It’s hard for me to respond to this without seeing your statement. SSA statements contain several potential benefit figures, so you may be reading the wrong line, for example what your child would get if you croaked right now. I have reason to doubt the reading skills of our trolls, so that’s the first thing I would look at.
But let’s say your monthly retirement benefit would be $455 if you retired right now. That’s less than a third of what I get, and I started getting benefits at age 62, and I never earned a high income, so something is going on here.
The most obvious explanation for a benefit that low is that a person worked in covered employment for relatively few years. That could mean that he was a career military man or Coast Guardsman who is getting a military pension, or was in federal employment, or was a railroad worker getting a Railroad Retirement Benefit, or someone who was out of the workforce for 15 or 20 years because he was serving a prison sentence for armed robbery or was a bum or some other reason. In any case, if your SS retirement benefit is only $455, then you didn’t earn a middle class income for at least 35 years. But if you did, and you feel SSA miscalculated your benefits, you have the right to appeal the calculation to an administrative law judge.
Given that your comment rests mostly on bullshit, instead of facts, I’m not inclined to share your apocalyptic view of Social Security. I like my $1500 a month SS benefit. It helps pay the bills, and unlike my state pension, it goes up over time which helps compensate for inflation. Because it comes from the U.S. government, I can count on it no longer how long I live, and no matter what the stock market does. If I had $100,000 to invest right now, a 12-month bank CD would pay a measly 1% or $1,000 a year. I would need $1.8 million of savings — an impossible figure for someone in my salary bracket — to earn interest equal to what I get from Social Security. So, you can hate Social Security all you want. It’s a free country and that’s your privilege. I like my Social Security a lot. If you read your statement correctly, then I’m sorry you didn’t work as hard as I did or earn the benefits that I did. You have my sympathy. Maybe you could have made better choices about what to do with your life somewhere along the line.
Now let’s see if it’ll take the link.
http://www.aarp.org/money/soci.....notch.html
Now let’s see if it’ll take the link. … Nope, doesn’t like that link.
Let’s try it this way: http://tinyurl.com/ne2xp7
There we go.
You gotta love the obama administration…
Labor Sec. Solis: surprised at unemployment spike
…
“I am somewhat surprised that we are seeing that continued rise in the unemployment figure, but we knew that was going to be happening and we know that it will continue for a few more months,” she said in an interview with Reuters TV
How many people, besides those in the obama administration, are surprised when what they expected to happen happens?
I think #7 exemplifies the problem of trying to discuss these issues with some people. They’re misinformed; they’ve got the facts wrong; they believe myths; so you can’t have an intelligent conversation with them. It’s like trying to teach algebra to someone who thinks 2 + 2 = 3 and 5 x 4 = 54. It can’t be done. So they stay ignorant.
@27
And the many, many, people that were helped moving up and out of the ‘hood and leaving the less stable folks behind.
Assuming RR is a white guy, he was a minority over in ‘Nam. You had a whole lot of guys coming back from there with PTSD and no job to come home to.
And it ‘aint like whitie is doing so hot, 50% of marriages end in divorce, childhood obesity is a epidemic levels and have you seen juniors grades? An Average kid from Finland can run circles around an AP American kid.
@35 Well Marvin, I’ve read stuff in the business press written by business commentators (not economists, and certainly not government flacks) who say they think businesses overreacted with layoffs and cut too deep into their workforces and will be sorry later.
Be that as it may, the Department of Labor doesn’t control hiring, it only collects and reports the employment data. So, if you want to blame someone, blame employers.
I tend to agree with the very experienced professionals who say employers have miscalculated. Leading eocnomic indicators are now pointing upward and the recession may in fact be over. The economy may be growing now. Employers who went too far with layoffs are likely to find they can’t get those people back, because they’ve gone to other employment, and they’ll end up with higher costs because they’ll have to recruit and train a whole new crop of replacements when their business activity picks up and they need to fill orders again.
That’s their tough berries.
15 ESO
Yes, because the “black family unit” was totally in such great shape from 1865-1960. After all, they were so damned resilient when their men were lynched; why didn’t we just let that can-do spirit carry on?
Hey, they couldn’t vote, and racial discrimination was more or less legal (racial segregation in education certainly was unopposed); things were great for white people. Damn Democrats messed everyting up with the Voting Rights Act, the Civil Rights Act, and he elimination of discrimination in federal contracts. Those measures were aimed at destroyong the “black family unit” for sure.
I’ve got to go run some errands now. I may have to leave town on short notice because Pop Rabbit, who is nearly 100 years old, is in the hospital with a blood infection. They’ve got him on antibiotic IVs, and if that doesn’t knock the infection down, he probably won’t make it to next week. So, Roger Rabbit may have to hop on a plane without notice. If I suddenly disappear from HA, it doesn’t mean I’ve been arrested, it means I’m going to Pop Rabbit to say goodbye.
Best wishes for the parental unit.
@ 39 daddy lover ~ the fact remains that the black family unit has deteriorated since the 1960’s/ age of modern liberalism. I don’t believe in coincidences. The rise of liberalism has resulted in a feeling of “learned helplessness”.
Now, how proud are you that a Democrat party leader such as Robert Byrd (D-WV) voted AGAINST the civil rights act of 1964? Any self respecting anti-racist demcorat would have called for his resignation decades ago….but not the cowardly democrat party of today.
The Last two real Democrats were Zel Miller and Joe Lieberman…
Roger Rabbit: I hope that your visit with your pop goes well.
And what has Scary Harry Reid (Dummocrapt – NV) done as the leader of the senate all these years? Oh yeah, his constituents are pizzed at him right now.
27 p
I always find it amusing when MS and others
a) blame local conditions on federal decisions
and
b) when considering federal decisions, never seem to think that Republican federal decisions have EVER had any possible negative effects (like the Reagan/Bush years have not affected inner-city neighborhods in any way–no, never, only since 1/20/2009 have federal decisions on spending made a difference)
They’re fun guys. Strike that. They’re fungis: always in the dark and full of bullshit.
While I don’t have the attention span to read the post or watch the video, I’m impressed that Goldy went out and did a little in-person interviewing and reporting. I hope he does more of this in the future!
45 ESO
It’s just as though Ronald Reagan and the 30-year rise of modern conservatism never existed. What a short fucking memory you guys have.
One of the proposals to pay for the public option is to cut somewhere in the ballpark of $500 billion from Medicare. It’s that, or end the deferral of the foreign corporate tax.
Current projections on the entitlement programs you discussed with this guy, indeed show they eventually go bankrupt. But apparently you want to talk about cupcakes.
Classic David Goldstein.
45 ESO again
A favorite conservative straw man. Robert Byrd renounced his KKK/anti-black viewpoints long ago, which is why we still welcome him into TODAY’S Democratic party.
On the other hand, the unreconstructed racists such as Strom Thurmond left the Democrats to join the Republican party. Wow; again, it’s as though Nixon’s “Southern Strategy” never existed. If you hadn’t noticed, the South is now the only viable region for the GOP these days. Hmmmm…I wonder why. Maybe it’s because of Trent Lott telling them “if Strom Thurmond had won his [racist Dixiecrat] presidential campaign, we wouldn’t be having all “the trouble” we’re having today.”
Right? Those damn poor blacks are the problem, right? I know you think it, why don’t you SAY it?
51 lignowski
Only if you never read any of the bills or the CBO report. But why quibble?
I mean, you know, you could cite a source, but that’s just a lot of reading, and you never did learn to do that well, so why not just copy and paste what you read somewhere?
It’s not like anyone will ask you to defend your ignorant viewpoint, after all.
51 l
BTW, you should really read somewhere (I know, it’s HARD) and learn what “bankrupt” means,and why i does not apply to government programs, and to SS in particular.
You can see proudASS@27 never lived in the inna city with that worthless answer. Must be a whitey looking for the answer.
Puddy has discussed on this blog over and over what the answers are to inna city problems. Dummocrapts can’t address them.
So Puddy asks ProudASS, do you remember what Maxine Waters claimed on the War on Drugs issue? Puddy wrote about it last week fool!
51 L
Do you think that cost increases in Medicare are somehow different from cost increases in medical care in this country in genreal, and that they are somehow also resistant to cost mitigation efforts in the general economy?
I know, once we get off the GOP talking points it’s tough to compete, isn’t it?
It appears the Superintendent of Bellevue Public Schools has been talking to teabaggers, and she must like what she hears – She made the decision to censor the President. Can’t have the scary black man talking to the nice white children in Bellevue – who knows where that could lead. I sent her this message:
Superintendent Cudeiro,
I am writing to express my outrage over your cowardly decision to censor President Obama. The speech to America’s students scheduled on September 8th is a simple message of encouragement. The faux outrage ginned up by the extremist right wing fringe of this country is based not on fact or reason, but on hatred, racism, ad hominem attacks and obstruction. What message have you sent the students under your charge with your decision? That President Obama is not worthy of respect because he is of African descent? That he should be ignored, minimized and mocked because he is a “liberal? That when a small handful of “teabaggers” say jump, the Superintendent of Bellevue Public Schools says, “how high?” Beneath is a letter sent out by a much more level headed and competent Superintendent than yourself. Read it, you may learn something useful for the future.
Dear Parent:
The President of the United States, Barack Obama, duly elected by the people of the United States, will be addressing our Nation’s children on Tuesday, September 8. In so doing, our President, like his earlier predecessor, George H.W. Bush, will be delivering an important message to the young people of our great country that calls on them to do their best in school by working hard so they can be successful in their personal lives and in the global environment in which they will live and that will challenge them in every way in the years to come.
As Superintendent of Schools, I am pleased that the President of the United States will be taking time from his busy schedule to deliver this important message to our students.
I have instructed our building principals and classroom teachers at all school levels that I am fully supportive of having them integrate the message of the President of the United States into their lessons on Tuesday, or on any subsequent date. Toward this end, we will be televising President Obama’s speech, video streaming it, or recording it on DVDs for teacher use. I anticipate that our professional administrative and teaching staffs will incorporate the President’s presentation into classroom instruction in the best way possible to enhance this learning opportunity for our students.
As the integration of the President’s speech into our instructional practice will constitute a vital learning experience for all our children, it is my expectation that any child in any class where the President’s speech is incorporated into instruction will be a part of that instructional activity. Being a part of an instructional activity means that the child can participate fully or elect not to participate fully while remaining in the classroom, as would be the case with virtually any instructional activity.
Thank you for cooperation and understanding.
Sincerely yours,
Elliott Landon
Superintendent of Schools
Westport, CT
I am happy that the children of Westport, CT, have as their superintendent a true leader who is not cowed by a radical, violent minority seeking to tear asunder our civic institutions. How sad the same can not be said for the unfortunate students of Bellevue.
55 Pud
The choices in this country are not between Democratic solutions and your solutions. Is that a surprise to you? We already knew this.
Republican “solutions” have in fact made our inner-ciy problems worse.
For example, the Reagan-era and beyond “mainstreaming” of our mentally ill have just pushed them from the medical system into the prison system without any perceptible improvements in our medical system.
I have friends who used to live in group homes prior to 1980 who are in prison now.
Well, when the scary black man who was elected President of the United States encourages kids to work hard and stay in school, what are we to think? SURELY he’s a dangerous radical.
Anyone up for the “Medicare is bankrupt” myth now? Yeah, I didn’t think so.
Daddy Love,
Dummocraptic Choices? Puddy from da inna city. Puddy seen Dummocrapts in action. Where you from? Suburbia? What side of the tracks you come from? I’d even challenge ROTCODDAM on her tracks. Who had controlled the congressional purse strings from 1954 to 1994? Republicans? If you say yes , they controlled the congressional purse strings then you are as stupid as clusterfucked cinderblock and spongebob wondermoron. Who controlled just about every major city since the Johnson Administration? Dummocrapts. Puddy speaks from experience of Philly. Puddy felt right at home in Veterans Stadium. Dems my peeps Daddy Love. That and a great cheesesteak you were a happy person on a Sunday in the fall.
Van Jones resigns!! That is excellent. Obama’s government may be headed in the right direction!!
http://www.foxnews.com/
http://www.nbcwashington.com/n.....78192.html
@Daddy Love: Costs have risen much faster in Medicare than in private insurance plans. http://tinyurl.com/la8yfg
And since you asked for a source on the proposal to cut up to $500 bil from Medicare to pay for the public option, visit PolitiFact.com for more analysis.
Yeah Daddy Love @59, more revisionist history from the revisionist himself… Here is what the original lesson plan statement was…“write letters to themselves about what they can do to help the president.” The other activity for teachers after the speech was to start a discussion about what “the president wants us to do.”
“We’re clarifying that language,” White House spokesman Tommy Vietor said.
Did you miss the memo Friday Daddy Love?
Van Jones gone. One commie gone how many left? Only time will tell.
Worf@57, Bellevue censoring “the messiah”? Back in 2005 thor (he thought he was the “god of thunder”) told us Bellevue was going blue.
Ya see, Puddy remembers what the NorthWest Division of Lunatic Libtardo Moonbat!s say.
With Van Jones gone who will coordinate the the Glenn Beck advertiser boycott now for the whitey house?
Rolling Stone “Sick & Wrong”
lignoski@63: You better watch it when you use PolitiFact.com against a libtard. Daddy Love used the St Petersburg Times for a teabagging attack so he’ll be confused by the source. Recently Puddy used Politifact.com to discuss “the messiah’s” broken campaign promises and correctnotright called it right-wing trash. Puddy had to remind correctnotright the St Petersburg Times endorsed “the messiah” in 2008. correctnotright not too well read.
And judging by your words, it’s almost as if the democrat party didn’t organize the KKK, beat blacks, kill blacks, etc.
Tell me something about that southern strategy… how many blacks were forced to be slaves? How many blacks were lynched?
Glenn beck punks obama and his communist truther friend.
Priceless.
Of course, the news was released late saturday night on a holiday weekend. That way a lot of those ignorant democrat voters will never even know that obama selected a communist truther for a government job.
@60 Anyone up for the “Medicare is bankrupt” myth now? Yeah, I didn’t think so.
—————–
If we don’t come stem Medicare’s rising costs, it WILL bankrupt the country:
http://www.cbo.gov/publication.....health.cfm
No one who is serious about this country’s finances argues this point, and that includes Obama, who has made ballooning health care costs a primary reason for health care reform. If you don’t turn that curve down and down significantly, everything else will be for naught as more and more federal revenue is consumed by entitlement costs and interest on the debt. Thus far we’ve seen no plan that shows how these long-term costs are being tamed, sorry to say.
You’re a dope, Daddy Loveless, but you can’t be that big of a dope.
I already provided this for you on the other thread
that I kicked your ass in Daddy lover. Their own CMS website admits they’re going bankrupt.
Some folks are just born stupid I guess.
The deficits will be made up by redeeming trust fund assets until reserves are exhausted in 2037, at which point tax income would be sufficient to pay about three fourths of scheduled benefits through 2083.
————–
This is actually a somewhat misleading/confusing statement. When SS begins turning deficits for good – now 2016, according to CBO – the shortfall will increase year after year unless the system is tweaked. That shortfall on paper will be made up by redeeming fund assets. However, in reality this means higher income taxes and/or deficits as a means of redeeming them. This will no doubt come as a great surprise to many taxpayers who thought they’d already paid once through their payroll taxes.
One last note: all the surplus SS funds are moved into the general fund where it is spent. As this excess goes to zero and then into deficit those dollars going into the general fund will have to be found elsewhere (including deficit spending), or general fund spending will have to be reduced.
Social security won’t fail because the older voters will simply vote-in guys who’ll print money to pay for the oldsters’ social security payments. This will cause incredible inflation and destroy the value of fixed income securities as the FED raises interest rates. The only way to prevent this scenario is to allow people to opt-out of social security when they enter the work force. Money diverted away from the system and into private account will mean the death of social security.
@57 The rightwing tirade against President Obama’s planned pep talk with schoolkids to encourage them to stay in school and complete their educations would be comical if it wasn’t so pathetic. The entire Republican Party is insane.
@59 What do you expect from people who think public schools are socialism?
@62 Yes, things have changed in D.C. since last year. If he’d been a wingnut working for the Bush administration who got caught spewing rightwing vitriol he’d still have a job.
@66 Seems to me the lunatics are concentrated in Bellevue School District right now.
Does anyone know if the Seattle Times, our region’s “newspaper of record,” carried any coverage of the Bellevue school superintendent’s banning of the President of the United States?
@74 “However, in reality this means higher income taxes and/or deficits as a means of redeeming them. This will no doubt come as a great surprise to many taxpayers who thought they’d already paid once through their payroll taxes.”
Well whaddya know, taxpayers will have to pay back all the money that Republican congressmen borrowed from the Social Security Trust Fund to pay for a trillion-dollar war in Iraq and give trillion-dollar tax breaks to billionaires.
I wonder who the taxpayers should blame for that?
Obama is simply going to talk with the only demographic that still believes what he’s saying.
A fertilizer salesman like him needs to at least keep one customer believing in his product.
@75 “Social security won’t fail because the older voters will simply vote-in guys who’ll print money to pay for the oldsters’ social security payments.”
That’s right.
“This will cause incredible inflation”
It might, but not necessarily. The inflationary effect might be offset by the deflationary effect of laissez faire capitalism doing its thing. The two could turn out to be a wash.
“and destroy the value of fixed income securities as the FED raises interest rates.”
I, and the rest of America’s senior citizens, can’t wait for the Fed to raise interest rates. I’m sick and tired of getting less than 1% interest on my savings and investments; and, frankly, if this situation doesn’t improve soon I’m going to send my money overseas where the returns are better. I sure as hell won’t continue loaning it to the American economy forever at the current rates of return.
“The only way to prevent this scenario is to allow people to opt-out of social security when they enter the work force.”
That isn’t necessary. All we need to produce the economic growth that will produce the tax revenues that will sustain Social Security is to re-regulate the economy so it doesn’t blow up the way it has under every Republican president since Nixon.
“Money diverted away from the system and into private account will mean the death of social security.”
Nope. See item #1 above, i.e., printing money. Congress will fulfill its promises to senior citizens like me who spent a lifetime paying into the system in exchange for those promises, or there will be blood at the ballot box. If my congressman doesn’t want to pay me the benefits I earned, I’ll fire him and hire someone who will. And so will every other voter over the age of 55 in this country.
@82 “Obama is simply going to talk with the only demographic that still believes what he’s saying.”
The majority who elected him? That’s the only demographic he needs. He can, and should, ignore you guys — because you have nothing constructive to say.
Well whaddya know, taxpayers will have to pay back all the money that Republican congressmen borrowed from the Social Security Trust Fund to pay for a trillion-dollar war in Iraq and give trillion-dollar tax breaks to billionaires.
———–
Administrations, Dems and Republicans have been doing this for years. Without these funds some of Clinton’s surplus years would have been deficits. Without the wars and tax breaks the surplus STILL would have gone into the general fund.
Fiscally, the last administration was irresponsible.
No, the 42% that give him a positive job rating…
I think people should be allowed to decide, once they get their first job, whether they want to participate in the system or not. If they choose to do so, then things will go on as before. If they don’t, then their social security taxes withheld from their paychecks could go to an alternate retirement investment – annuities, CDs, mutual funds – whatever the person chooses to invest his or her money in over their working career.
THAT is what would destroy the social security system.
…and Goldy and his high-pitched, whiny voice wonders why he didn’t make it in radio…
at least the physically (and intellectually) diminutive Dave Ross has a masculine voice.
A $1,000 one-year CD at 1% yield is worth only $952.38 if the interest rate goes from 1% to 5%. Interest rates and fixed income yields are inversely related.
Funny you say there was a trust fund.
Goldy says the system was designed as pay-as-you-go.
Which one of you is a liar?