Extremely disappointing language from Obama on Social Security

[swag]

Jonathan Singer at MyDD


Barack Obama sounding better on Social Security during the MSNBC presidential debate late last month.

I absolutely agree that Social Security is not in crisis.


Barack Obama sounding a lot worse during an interview with National Journal from Tuesday posted yesterday on the magazine's website.

Q: So, welcome to Senator Barack Obama. Welcome to "National Journal On Air." Let me start right away by asking you about the contrasts that you are drawing between yourself and Hillary Clinton. Her campaign people, the people who support her, say by calling her somebody whose word can't be trusted, by suggesting that she's disingenuous, that that's really a character attack -- that that's the very thing that you said you weren't going to do in this campaign.

Obama: Well, I strongly disagree. Look we are offering our plans for the future on health care, on education, on energy, and the American people have a right to judge how clear and how consistent have the candidates been in their positions. Because if they're not clear and consistent, then it's pretty hard to gage how much they're going to fight on these issues. 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. And that's the kind of leadership I think that the Democratic Party has to offer in the years to come. (emphasis added)


"Social Security crisis." For those who weren't politically engaged in early 2005, those three words might not be terribly meaningful. But for the folks who fought tooth and nail to ensure that the Social Security program was not dismantled by President Bush and his Republican lackeys on Capitol Hill those three words come off like a dog whistle, because paramount to the conservative effort to kill FDR's great gift to American society was the attempted propagation of the myth that the Social Security system was in crisis -- a myth that has no basis in reality.

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[TahitiNut]

1. The investment banks want that money so bad they can't see straight.

Trillions. It makes billions look like chump change. They want that money flowing into the equities markets and pumping up the price of mediocre corporate stocks. CEOs love their ISOs. Pump and dump. Fuck Granny.

[Blackhatjack]

2. Privatized Social Security Money really was 'the brass ring' they wanted with Bush in Office...

My calculator will not count high enough to compute the rolling commissions and fees that it would have generated for Wall Street firms.

They came close, but they did not get it.

[nadinbrzezinski]

3. The more that I hear and read about him, the more I go

no, no way no how he wil get my vote

[sandnsea]

4. He should have said problem

But for those who believe "there is no crisis" was a statement in fact, and not a propaganda campaing, well... grow up. Social Security has problems.

[cuke]

5. Nope, SS is one of the best run and solvent social pgms

No corporation can gaurantee that they will be around as long as SS will be, absent privitization or legislation meant to solve the non-existent "problem".

The problem is how are the working people of today going to support themselves when they reach retirement. The problem is the loss of pensions and our low savings rate and an economy in danger of crashing while trillions of dollars are being looted. Now that's a crisis

The SS "problem" is nothing more than a rw lie meant to screw people out of their hard earned money

[Karenina]

6. Bingo!

[trumad]

7. grow up?

You're dead wrong and you're telling the folks who are right to grow up? sheeesh

[B Calm]

8. The only problem social security has, is republicans trying to dismantle it!