Obama Misrepresents Hillary's Views On Social Security

[Herman Munster]

http://facts.hillaryhub.com/archive/?id=4107


In an interview Tuesday that just posted on National Journal, Barack Obama says that Hillary "is not willing to say" how she would address the long-term challenges of Social Security:

You know, Senator Clinton says that she's concerned about Social Security but is not willing to say how she would solve the Social Security crisis, then I think voters aren't going to feel real confident that this is a priority for her.

In fact she has. Here's an excerpt from an October 9 speech:

Don't you believe all these people running around crying wolf about Social Security. That is exactly what they're doing. They're trying to get people confused and upset and agree to a bad deal.
When I am president, we'll have our priorities in order. We will return to fiscal responsibility and fair tax policies first, and then we will address the long-term challenges facing Social Security.

When my husband left office, because we had a balanced budget and a surplus, there was a plan in place to extend the solvency of Social Security until 2055. That gives us plenty of time to figure out what else we need to do.

Once the country is on the path to fiscal responsibility Hillary will create a bipartisan process to meet the challenge, an approach that has worked before:

"But I am strongly advocating a bipartisan process, similar to what we had in '83, and when that gets set up, as I hope it will be when I'm president, then I'm going to see what the bipartisan members are going to come up with."

Economist and New York Times columnist Paul Krugman says she has exactly the right approach. From his appearance October 28 on ABC This Week:

KRUGMAN: Yeah, Social Security, if you go through the federal government, piece-by-piece, and ask which programs are seriously under-funded and which are close to being completely funded, Social Security is one of the best. It's not even for certain that Social Security has a problem. Why on earth - and, of course, it's something that the right has always wanted to kill, not because it doesn't work, but because it does. And for Obama to go after this program, at this time, you just have to wonder. All of my progressive friends are saying what on Earth is going through his mind to raise this issue.
STEPHANOPOULOS: So you think basically the Hillary Clinton position, which we take care of it by fiscal responsibility, and basically it'll take care of itself, we can look at some small fixes is the right one?
KRUGMAN: Yeah. She is.

Paul Starr in the American Prospect agrees. Not so long ago, Barack Obama agreed too. Here's Obama on May 14:

Everything should be on the table. I think we should approach it the same way Tip O'Neill and Ronald Reagan did back in 1983. They came together. I don't want to lay out my preferences beforehand, but what I know is that Social Security is solvable. It is not as difficult a problem as we're going to have with Medicaid and Medicare.

As The Washington Post's Dan Balz reported: "Barack Obama has spent the past few days calling out Hillary Clinton on Social Security. What has gotten much less attention is that Obama has changed his position on what to do about the government retirement system's financial problems."

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

1. Hillary's take on SS is correct. Don't fix what aint broke.

[Lucinda]

2. The website was such a smart thing to do!

:)

[Karmadillo]

3. I expect Republicans to do this sort of thing, but why would Democrats do this to another Democrat?

nt

[Herman Munster]

4. facts are facts, every statement is linked and sourced

Hillary is fighting back her attackers by exposing them as frauds. I am all for it. :)

[cuke]

5. Does "this sort of thing" mean claiming SS needs fixing the way Obama does?

I'm not sure what you're referring to