Some Senate Republicans seem

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Some Senate Republicans seem intent on conducting an intelligence test on their Democratic colleagues. Only they mean to eschew the normal square pegs and round hole approach and instead use a new gambit in the Social Security debate.

Says the AP’s David Espo: “Senate Republican leaders are considering whether to seek Democratic support for Social Security legislation without the personal accounts sought by President Bush, aiming to restore them later, officials said Thursday.”

So given that privatization now seems dead in the water, these senate Republicans want to enlist Democratic support for enacting what will no doubt be highly popular benefit cuts and tax increases because this will smooth the way for them to partially phase out Social Security with private accounts, as part of a two step gambit.

And to structure the experiment so as to get a clear read on whether we’re talking about mere substandard intelligence or some more profound sort of incapacitation they’re telling the reporter from the Associated Press that this is their plan.

Setting aside this foolery, why would any Democrats agree to do anything on Social Security before getting agreement from Republicans — embodied, where appropriate, in legislation — that phase-out is off the table for good and that the Treasury notes in the Social Security Trust Fund will be repaid in full.

The Democrats’ priority here is to protect Social Security. And the most pressing dangers to Social Security are not deficits in the 2040s but the present threat of privatization and President Bush’s effort to renege on the promise that money loaned out of Social Security payroll tax funds will be paid back.

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