Social Security 9-27-12

 Huffington Post (NAT)

Linda McMahon Proposed Social Security "Sunset" At Tea Party Forum

Matt Sledge

9-26-12

NEW YORK -- In little-noticed remarks at a Tea Party town hall meeting earlier this year, Republican Connecticut Senate candidate Linda McMahon proposed introducing a "sunset provision" into the Social Security Act. McMahon, the former CEO of World Wrestling Entertainment, has consistently dodged questions about cutting government entitlement programs in her two Senate runs.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/26/linda-mcmahon-social-security-tea-party_n_1917626.html?utm_hp_ref=elections-2012

 

SSW/SSSC mention**

 

Syracuse Post Standard (NY)

Buerkle's positions threaten safety net

Eric Kingson

9-25-12

Of greater concern, she would radically alter Medicare, privatizing the program and dramatically reducing its protections for everyone under age 55. In 2011, she voted to eliminate Medicare's guaranteed benefits for her 460,000 constituents under age 55, providing them instead with a voucher to buy private health insurance. This change alone, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, would increase out-of-pocket costs for each new beneficiary by an additional $6,000 in 2022 and an additional $12,000 in 2032. In addition, she would raise the Medicare eligibility age by two years to 67 from 2022 to 2033 for people under the age of 55 today.

http://blog.syracuse.com/opinion/2012/09/buerkles_positions_threaten_sa.html

 

New York Times (NAT)

I Was a Welfare Mother

Larken Warren

9-23-12

I was not an exception in that little Section 8 neighborhood. Among those welfare moms were future teachers, nurses, scientists, business owners, health and safety advocates. We never believed we were “victims” or felt “entitled”; if anything, we felt determined. Wouldn’t any decent person throw a rope to a drowning person? Wouldn’t any drowning person take it? Judge-and-punish-the-poor is not a demonstration of American values. It is, simply, mean. My parents saved me and then — on the dole, in the classroom or crying deep in the night, in love with a little boy who needed everything I could give him — I learned to save myself. I do not apologize. I was not ashamed then; I am not ashamed now. I was, and will always be, profoundly grateful.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/23/opinion/sunday/taking-responsibility-on-welfare.html?adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1348760515-CzDQvKnNTcuDdt1O2l3DEA&gwh=9ED6DF457A861E8A3FCB71D627835F38

 

New York Times (NAT)

Let Them Eat Crow

David Brooks and Gail Collins

9-26-12

Gail: Replacement referees have done what Barack Obama couldn’t do – bring the nation together. I hate to drop the subject, but it’s time to go back to disagreeing. Let’s talk about Social Security, which we haven’t heard much about during the campaign. I have a suspicion that Mitt Romney and President Obama aren’t actually all that far apart on this one – and they are equally unwilling to let us see what they’re thinking. Paul Ryan, meanwhile, is on an entirely different planet. In the past he’s called Social Security “collectivist” and “a welfare transfer system.” Perhaps that’s one of the reasons the campaign is so unwilling to let Ryan be Ryan.

 

David: I don’t know. It seems to me that Ryan has been pretty sensible about Social Security. Plus, he had the courage to go to AARP and make his case. When future generations curse us for bankrupting them, I suspect they will view AARP as the epicenter of 21st-century greed.

http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/09/26/let-them-eat-crow/

 

New York Times (NAT)

In Need of Help, and Grateful for It

To the Editor:

I graduated with honors and built two small businesses with an education that welfare helped me obtain. When conservatives talk to me about welfare, I sometimes reveal this about myself. They invariably respond, “Oh, but you were different.” But I was not different. I was lucky to meet someone who steered me in the direction of the safety net, and lucky that it existed.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/26/opinion/about-welfare-in-need-of-help-and-grateful-for-it.html?_r=0&gwh=D38720F22BD44D25447C741C7E98DEC5

 

Our Future (NAT)

Good Jobs First: No Grand Bargain Without A Jobs Trigger

Robert Borosage

9-27-12

The presidential candidates and Congress should be pressed to adopt a budget version of the “jobs trigger.” Putting people back to work is the first step to getting our books in order. So Congress should pass a fiscal trigger as part of any grand bargain – comprehensive deficit reduction measures will kick in only when the economy is moving, and unemployment comes down to 5% or so.

http://www.ourfuture.org/blog-entry/2012093927/good-jobs-first

 

Center for American Progress (NAT)

Social Security Cares

Ann O'Leary, Matt Chayt, and Eve Weissman

9-27-12

This is where our proposed Social Security Cares Act would come into play. The proposed new law would establish a national paid family and medical leave program as part of Social Security. This new program would provide partial wage replacement for workers across the country who temporarily need to take time off from their jobs to tend to their own medical condition, to care for an ill family member, or to take care of and bond with a newborn or newly adopted child.

http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/labor/report/2012/09/27/39331/social-security-cares/

 

NPR (NAT)

Romney's Medicaid Remarks On '60 Minutes' Raise Eyebrows

Julie Rovner

9-25-12

That's because back then, Romney was defending the Massachusetts law he signed as governor. It's the one that requires most people to either have health insurance or pay a fine — just like the federal law he now vows to repeal. He used even more colorful language back in 2007, talking to Fox News host Glenn Beck. "When they show up at the hospital, they get care; they get free care paid for by you and me," he said. "If that's not a form of socialism, I don't know what is."

http://www.npr.org/blogs/itsallpolitics/2012/09/25/161719767/romney-medicaid-remarks-raise-eyebrows

 

CBS News (NAT)

On day of damage control, Ryan promises better social safety net

Rebecca Kaplan

9-18-12

(CBS News) DOVER, N.H. - Vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan told New Hampshire voters Tuesday that President Obama has created a safety net that encourages dependency and "drains people of their will and their incentive to make the most of their lives." He said that he and presidential nominee Mitt Romney would create a better social safety net that will "break the cycle of poverty," but he offered no details for achieving that goal.

 

Ryan's comments came a day after the liberal magazine Mother Jones published a video of Romney telling campaign donors at a private fundraising event that Mr. Obama's supporters are people who pay no income taxes and expect handouts from the government.

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-57515271-503544/on-day-of-damage-control-ryan-promises-better-social-safety-net/

 

Federal Times (NAT)

Social Security and CSRS annuity

9-27-12

A. Being eligible for a Social Security benefit won’t affect your CSRS annuity. However, because you will be receiving an annuity from CSRS, a retirement system where you didn’t pay Social Security taxes, you will be subject to the windfall elimination provision.

http://blogs.federaltimes.com/federal-retirement/2012/09/27/social-security-and-csrs-annuity/

 

Charlotte Observer (NC)

Bowles, Simpson push U.S. to tackle debt

Andrew Dunn

9-25-12

Bloomberg reported last week that a small group of senators, both Democrats and Republicans, seek to bring back the Bowles-Simpson plan in the lame-duck session of Congress next month. Bowles said Tuesday that he and Simpson have 40 senators and 150 House members on board with a version of their plan. For their part, both Bowles and Simpson have kept the plan in the public eye, co-writing op-ed pieces and appearing together around the country.

http://www.charlotteobserver.com/2012/09/25/3556781/bowles-simpson-push-us-to-tackle.html

 

 

Politics

 

Washington Post (NAT)

Kaine ad hits Allen on Medicare, Social Security

Ben Pershing

9-27-12

Timothy M. Kaine upped the ante Thursday in the battle over seniors in Virginia, launching a new ad hitting George Allen for his record on Social Security and Medicare. As Allen (R) and Kaine (D) duel for the seat of retiring Sen. James Webb (D), both former governors are eyeing older voters as a key constituency. A Washington Post poll released last week showed them basically tied among voters 65 and older, a shift from a May Post poll that gave Allen a big advantage.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/virginia-politics/post/kaine-ad-hits-allen-on-medicare-social-security/2012/09/27/5ecca5b2-08a9-11e2-858a-5311df86ab04_blog.html

 

Talking Points Memo (NAT)

Tammy Baldwin Whacks Tommy Thompson For Vowing To ‘Do Away With’ Medicare, Medicaid

SAHIL KAPUR

Video published late Tuesday by the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel shows Thompson telling a conservative group in June that he supports the Republican plan to restructure Medicare from a guaranteed insurance program to a voucher system where seniors shop for their own plans. “Who better than me,” he says, “who’s already finished one of the entitlement programs [welfare], to come up with programs to do away with Medicaid and Medicare?”

http://2012.talkingpointsmemo.com/2012/09/tammy-baldwin-tommy-thompson-do-away-with-medicare.php

 

Public News Service (CO)

Tammy vs. Tommy Debate Tomorrow Night

9-27-12

A recent bipartisan poll from AARP shows non-retired baby boomers in Wisconsin have high anxiety about having saved enough for retirement and want straight talk from the candidates about their plans to strengthen Social Security and Medicare.

http://www.publicnewsservice.org/index.php?/content/article/28482-1

 

Politico (NAT)

Swing-states polls: President Obama tops Mitt Romney on Medicare

Brett Norman

9-27-12

One week before the first presidential debate, Barack Obama is leading Mitt Romney by double digits on Medicare in three key battleground states, a poll released Wednesday morning shows. The new poll by Quinnipiac University, CBS News and The New York Times provides a strong signal that likely voters in Florida, Ohio and Pennsylvania do not like the GOP ticket’s proposal to transform the program into a premium support model for those under 55.

http://dyn.politico.com/printstory.cfm?uuid=84EB5A5E-26BD-4C5F-BB5F-A6EFB692D7CF