Mr. President, Please do not cut Social Security!

By Robert Reich, former U.S. Secretary of Labor

To be delivered to: President Barack Obama

Petition Statement

Mr. President, the chained CPI is a cut to Social Security benefits that would hurt seniors--it's an idea not befitting a Democratic president. If you want to reform Social Security, make the wealthy pay their fair share by lifting the cap on income subject to Social Security taxes.
Petition Background

Social Security is not driving the deficit, therefore it should not be part of reforms aimed at cutting the deficit. The chained CPI, deceptively portrayed as a reasonable cost of living adjustment, is a cut to Social Security benefits that would hurt seniors.

There are several sensible reforms to Social Security that should be considered to help make it sustainable, including lifting the ceiling on income subject to Social Security from $113,700 to $200,000 or more, as well as instituting a 1% raise in the payroll tax rate, a rate that hasn't changed in over 20 years.

Both of these reforms would go a long way toward protecting the long-term health of Social Security, but neither should not be conflated with efforts to reduce the federal budget deficit.

President Obama needs to stand by his Democratic principles and fight to protect Social Security benefits.

Dear MoveOn member,
We've just gotten some really bad news—and need your help to respond.

According to multiple reports, President Obama is planning to propose Social Security cuts of $112 billion over the next decade when he unveils his budget next week.1

Politically, this is a terrible idea. Social Security is such a popular and successful program that even Republicans didn't touch it in their budget.2

And as a policy matter it's even worse. Social Security doesn't add one dime to the debt, and according to the AARP, a typical 80-year-old woman will lose the equivalent of three months worth of food annually under this plan.3

There's still time for President Obama to reverse course and stop supporting these cuts, but that's unlikely to happen unless progressives push back in a big way. We're aiming to raise $200,000 to launch a rapid-response campaign to convince President Obama not to support cutting Social Security. Can you chip in $5?

Yes. I'll chip in 5 dollars to help convince President Obama not to support Social Security benefit cuts.

President Obama knows he can't move forward on his second-term agenda without strong support from the progressive base. So if MoveOn members are vocal in opposing this plan, we have a real chance to change his thinking.

And because House Republicans didn't propose cutting Social Security in their budget, it would likely take cuts off the table for the year if President Obama didn't propose them.

If we have to fight the president on this, we will. But it's going to be a battle. Here's what we have in mind:

We'll make a major public media announcement to draw attention to the fact that progressives are prepared to split with the president over Social Security cuts.
We'll help elevate a video ad campaign from Clinton economic adviser Robert Reich.
We'll run a massive online advertising blast in Washington, D.C., that'll get noticed by members of Congress and the administration itself.
We'll launch a campaign to flood the White House with phone calls.
We'll make sure that champions of Social Security in Congress know we have their backs by publicly thanking them and organizing thank-you events in their districts.

MoveOn members overwhelmingly oppose cutting Social Security benefits, but it's never easy to go up against a president we all worked so hard to elect. So please chip in today so we'll know we have the resources to go big:

Yes. I'll chip in 5 dollars to help convince President Obama not to support Social Security benefit cuts.
- - https://civ.moveon.org/donatec4/obamacuts.html?id=65431-15400088-azVnslx&t=2

Thanks so much for your help.

–Anna, Manny, Angie, Matt, and the rest of the team

Sources:

1. "Obama Budget Said to Include Earlier Debt Reduction Offer," Bloomberg, April 4, 2014
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=288722&id=65431-15400088-azVnslx&t=4

2. "Paul Ryan's Budget, Simplified: Save the Rich, Spare the Old, Forget the Poor," The Atlantic, March 12, 2013
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=288723&id=65431-15400088-azVnslx&t=5

3. "AARP to Congress and the President: Don't Cut Social Security," AARP, December 18, 2012
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=285712&id=65431-15400088-azVnslx&t=6

Want to support our work? MoveOn Civic Action is entirely funded by our 7 million members—no corporate contributions, no big checks from CEOs. And our tiny staff ensures that small contributions go a long way. Chip in here.

“Given the questionable intellectual foundations of the Boskin Commission's findings, the commission's high standing in Washington requires explanation. Both Democrats and Republicans have been keen to see its recommendations adopted, because they provide a potentially uncontroversial way to achieve deficit reduction. Raising taxes is unpopular, and little discretionary government spending is left to be cut. Restating the CPI as a measure of cost-of-living inflation offers an easy way to lower Social Security payments through reduced COLAs and raise tax revenues through reduced exemptions. The hope is that the CPI can be presented as an apolitical and boring technical issue that voters won't notice.

“Revising the CPI would get the Republicans off the hook of deficit reduction, while simultaneously advancing the interests of business. This, however, would occur at the expense of working Americans and the elderly. Revising the CPI would get the Democrats off the same hook, but at the cost of another shameful desertion of the constituencies they claim to represent.”


- - - - - - - - - - - - http://www.theatlantic.com/past/docs/issues/97apr/econhist.htm

Addendum:

Multiple replies seem to re-enforce the corporate media inspired misconception that the rule requiring 60 votes to shut off debate automatically means that 41 votes can veto any bill without having to pay the price of actually filibustering, but simply by issuing a threat, which the corporate media then sugarcoats by reporting (not that the GOP is filibustering, not even that the GOP once again is holding the nation hostage by once again threatening to filibuster) but that the Democrats "don't have the votes". Consequently, the GOP gets their way without having to pay the political price.

Contrary to these replies, this post is NOT about shutting off debate (which, since Reid passed up the opportunity to change that rule at the start of this Congress)....what it IS about is about whether Democrats have the will to force the GOP to actually filibuster, and pay the price, if they are going to obstruct.

While some are saying "that ship has already sailed", that is precisely what the GOP, and the corporate media, would have us believe. Because that belief gives them a free pass to block legislation without being portrayed as the obstructionists they are.

What "already sailed" is the opportunity to eliminate the rule requiring 60 vote to SHUT OFF debate.

Over time, the GOP has perpetuated the misconception, now misrepresented as "fact" by corporate media ( and accepted as such by many on this board), that that means that 41 votes can veto any bill they want just by convincing Reid that they have the votes to prevent the 59 others from cutting off their filibuster - - - even when they never do actually filibuster.

As has been demonstrated this week, the act of actually filibustering has consequences. It can require energy and co-ordination. It can result in exposing fractures within your own party. It can result in the loss of political capital.

Yes, Reid passed up the opportunity to rid the Senate of the 60 vote requirement to shut off debate.

And he did so on the basis of promises, or implied promises, that the GOP has broken.

They now want to continue to have the benefits of filibustering (the benefits being the ability to block legislation), without paying the consequences inherent in actually having to get up and filibuster.

Yes, Reid does not have the power to SHUT OFF debate without 60 votes.

But he does have the power to force the obstructionists to actually have to stand up and keep talking until the backlash sends them into retirement, if they are to succeed in their obstructionism.

Dear MoveOn member,

Last year, President Obama offered Republicans a heartbreaking deal that would have slashed Social Security benefits by $112 billion over a decade.1 MoveOn members overwhelmingly opposed it. And together with allies, we won.

Now, here's the state of play. Over the weekend, faced with Republican obstructionism, the president once again—and more clearly than ever—offered to put our social safety net on the negotiating table.2

We have a plan to launch an ambitious push, with allies inside and outside of Congress, to oppose any benefit cuts to Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid.

Can you chip in $5 to fund our emergency campaign to save the social safety net?

Yes, I can contribute 5 dollars.

This isn't the first time there's been talk of a "grand bargain," and it won't be the last.

We've won this fight before, and we can do it again. Obama's latest offer to consider cuts just happened over the weekend. There's still time to work with allies inside and outside of Congress.

We know this kind of campaign works. For several years now, progressives inside and outside of Congress have united behind a simple message: No cuts to Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid benefits. Again and again, it's worked.

But to keep winning, we have to keep our laser focus. We can't afford to wait for a last-minute "grand bargain" to take us by surprise. We need to go big now.

MoveOn member, can we count on you?

Yes, I can contribute 5 dollars to help save the social safety net.

If we do this, here's what we're thinking:

We'll make sure middle-class champions know we have their backs. Lawmakers fighting to preserve Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid need to know we have their backs, so we'll publicly thank them and run ads in support of their leadership.
We'll speak truth to power. Specifically, we'll inform constituents of every member of Congress—including Democrats—how their representatives voted on slashing our social safety net.
We'll change the national debate. We'll be ready to run powerful TV ads featuring a MoveOn member who would be directly impacted by benefit cuts, and have organizers helping folks start and deliver petitions on MoveOn.org's petition site, SignOn.org, opposing any cuts to the social safety net.
We'll join with coalition partners in building big protests. This will include direct action at congressional offices and other community actions to oppose the Washington austerity agenda.
We'll flood Congress and the White House. We'll light up the phone lines, bury offices in stacks of petitions, and flood senators with faxes showing significant opposition to any deal that cuts Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid benefits.

Now's the time to dig deep. Our plan costs $250,000 just to get started—and we'll need more to keep it going for the coming weeks. Can you chip in?

Yes, I'll chip in 5 dollars

Thanks for all you do.

–Ilya, Elena, Mark, Manny, and the rest of the team
Sources:

1. "AARP to Congress and the President: Don't Cut Social Security," AARP, December 18, 2012
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=287801&id=63753-10220574-I58B6cx&t=6

2. "Obama Renews Offer to Cut Social Safety Net in Big Budget Deal," CNBC, March 3, 2013
http://www.cnbc.com/id/100515721

Want to support our work? MoveOn Civic Action is entirely funded by our 7 million members—no corporate contributions, no big checks from CEOs. And our tiny staff ensures that small contributions go a long way.

Privatizing Roads, Bridges, Schools and Energy Grids? Corporatism Pervades SOTU

While the President pledged to reel in corporations, his grand plans for the U.S. proposed just the opposite.

by Laura Gottesdiener, AlterNet

. . .

. . . on the issue of income inequality, the President’s rhetoric was right across the board--that is, until he actually began unfurling his Grand Plans. That’s when the President’s typical double-speak kicked in. He promised to curtail corporate profits, but his vision for a new, “high-tech” America seemed to entail turning everything from our highways to our public schools into corporate-owned, public-private partnerships.


. . . Obama’s proposed public-private partnerships went far beyond public school classrooms. They also include the country’s most essential infrastructure: roads, bridges, rails and even energy grid.


. . . Couched as a way to save taxpayers’ money, the President actually just dangled a considerable carrot in front of corporations: construction grants and partial ownership of nearly all of the United States’ infrastructure.Public private partnerships are essentially a stepping stone to full privatization of our roads, bridges, railways, power grids and--yes--even our public schools.

The implications of this proposal are so scary that they even startled a Fox News reporter who commented, “It’s unnerving to hear the suggestion that the best way to guard against corporate excess is by crafting ever-closer public/private partnerships.”

As a concept, public-private partnerships can be considered a metaphor for any type of privatization: they sound smart in a capitalist society, but they’re never what they’re cracked up to be.

As a trio of smart economics professors, including one at Yale University, writes in a paper on using these partnerships to revamp U.S. infrastructure, “Public-private partnerships are often touted as a “best-of-both-worlds” alternative to public provision and privatization. But in practice, they have been dogged by contract design problems, waste, and unrealistic expectations. Governments sometimes opt for a public-private partnership, for example, because they mistakenly believe that it offers a way to finance infrastructure without adding to the public debt. In other cases, contract renegotiations have resulted in excessive costs for taxpayers or losses for private firms.”

. . .

http://www.alternet.org/news-amp-politics/privatizing-roads-bridges-schools-and-energy-grids-corporatism-pervades-sotu?paging=off

For history tells us that while these truths may be self-evident, they’ve never been self-executing. That while freedom is a gift from God, it must be secured by his people here on earth.

14th amendment:
"Section 4:The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bonuses for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned. But neither the United States nor any state shall assume or pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or any claim for the loss or emancipation of any slave; but all such debts, obligations and claims shall be held illegal and void."