People are rightly abuzz about the report today in the New York Times that the White House is using the Social Security Administration itself to begin a major public relations offensive in favor of partially phasing out Social Security and replacing it with private accounts.
We have a packet of documents here from the SSA Communications office, which we’ll be sharing with you. But one of the action points, if that’s the lingo these folks use, is this one from a February 2004 message memo “on the Long-Term Challenges Facing Social Security.”
Under the heading that says “reform” is a “presidential priority” one of the items reads: “Modernization must include individually controlled, voluntary personal retirement accounts to augment Social Security.”
Sounds like the word’s really gone down that they have to support the president’s phase-out plan.
And why is it exactly that President Bush’s phase-out agenda is incorporated as part of the official talking points for SSA?
We’ve just posted the document to the TPM Document Collection and you can read it by clicking here.
