From the White House transcript: Obama DID include Chained CPI in negotiations.

[woo me with science]

84. Expose Third Way bullshit. That's my priority. :)

That's rich. A *special* chained CPI just for the elderly. And it's especially magical because it doesn't even exist. It is hypothetical, whereas the President's proposal, which involves a chained CPI that slashes benefits viciously over time, is real.

I see the talking points are moving toward some particularly slick bullshit like Durbin was proposing: that putting a chained CPI in place for no reason whatsoever is just hunky dory, as long as we maybe, *perhaps,* exempt Social Security from its reach...for now.

What a slick first move that would be. What the Republicans and the Third Way desperately hope people won't realize is that the chained CPI affects many, many programs, and many, many groups of vulnerable people...not just the elderly on Social Security. It is used across the government to calculate benefits and outlays for all sort of desperately needed social programs.

Fuck the disabled. Fuck veterans. Fuck federal retirees. Fuck who knows who else. The chained CPI is a regressive tax hike, and it is malignant, right-wing steaming bullshit. It harms people and loots them, which is what the right-wing, whether they are Republicans or Third Way Democrats, specializes in doing.

And none of it is necessary. It is corporate looting of the people's money, pure and simple.

I am beginning to wonder if the goal for this particular Shock Doctrine episode is twofold, and despicable: to implement the chained CPI across the board, but to find a way to spare Social Security in some way...so that the Third Way can not only fuck over millions of us and get this camel's nose under the tent, but simultaneously and outrageously claim to have been our savior by "saving" Social Security.


We are witnessing a remarkably well-planned and sinister assault here. The corporatists are very, very good at what they do...