Dean Baker | The Budget Deficit Chicken Hawks

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Dean Baker | The Budget Deficit Chicken Hawks

http://www.truth-out.org/the-budget-deficit-chicken-hawks61704

Monday 26 July 2010

by: Dean Baker, t r u t h o u t | Op-Ed

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(Photo: ribarnica; Edited: Jared Rodriguez / t r u t h o u t)

Most people are familiar with the concept of "chicken hawks." Chicken hawks are the politicians who are anxious to send other people to risk their lives in war, but somehow managed to avoid service when they had the opportunity to fight themselves. Former Vice-President Dick Cheney and former President George W. Bush are the leading members of the chicken hawk society.

[DJ13]

1. K&R

Basically, the deficit chicken hawks want deficit reduction, but they only want it to be at the expense of the elderly and the poor, hence, their attacks on Social Security and Medicare. Of course, the public is not anxious to go along with gutting the programs on which they and their parents depend, which is why the deficit chicken hawks prefer to do their work through commissions that hold secret meetings.

The deficit chicken hawks also don't have much commitment to honesty. When America Speaks reported its results to the public and President Obama's deficit commission, it noted that one cut to Social Security, raising the retirement age, got majority support from participants. However, it turns out that this result was based on a software error. When the error was corrected, support fell to 39 percent.

Remarkably, America Speaks did not have the integrity to publicly acknowledge and correct this mistake. It just quietly changed the number on its web site. This is the sort of behavior we should expect from deficit chicken hawks, who want to attack the programs on which so many ordinary working people depend, while protecting the interests of the rich and powerful.