Rep. Mike Castle of

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Rep. Mike Castle of <$NoAd$> Delaware answers some phase-out questions from Human Events Online

As a leader of moderate Republicans, do you agree with President Bush’s assessment that a payroll tax increase should be ruled out to help pay for Social Security reform?

REP. MIKE CASTLE (R.-DEL.): First of all, I don’t rule in or out anything at this point. My own judgment is that this is an extremely complex problem, and I’m not 100% sure, or I’m not sure at all, that we should have any privatization in this area.

Do you favor personal retirement accounts?

CASTLE: I do not know the answer to that either. I’ve never embraced them one way or another, and I want to totally understand that. I think there’s some merit to it and there’s some problems with it.

Do you think other moderates share your views?

CASTLE: I don’t know. We haven’t had a lot of extensive discussions about it. Now, I will tell you that [Arizona Rep.] Jim Kolbe (R.) is one of the advocates for it and he’s a moderate. So the answer’s not 100% of the moderates oppose it, so it’s hard for me to judge. I think you ask the right question, though. It’s more likely in the moderate camp that you’ll find people may have opposition to this.

Doesn’t sound like Rep. Castle is sure of much of anything when it comes to Social Security. For the moment, though, we’re sure he’s in the Conscience Caucus.

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