More “good news” for Bob Ney’s campaign. That and other news of the day in today’s Daily Muck.
Cunningham briber company, MZM, had a contract to help analyze Saddam’s ‘nuclear program’.
Colorado House candidate, Rick O’Donnell, was forced to reveal today he wrote an essay eleven years ago calling for Social Security to be abolished and replaced with a “mandatory, private savings scheme.” Today, he says, he’s better informed. Now he says he wants to phase it out and replace it with prviate accounts.
The Rocky Mountain News is playing this like he’s changing his position. But what’s the change?
Someone ask this bozo what’s the difference between his position then and his position now.
O’Donnell also says President Bush “bungled” Social Security phase-out last year by advocating the phase-out plan O’Donnell says he himself supports.
Who is this guy? I’m not sure I’ve ever seen a would-be pol who isn’t even capable of successfully executing a flip-flop.
Sen. Craig (R-ID) applauds the Bush administration for rounding up those dingbats in the warehouse outside Miami as key win in the War on Terror …
In times of crisis, the Bush administration is relentless in the hunt for those who would harm our nation. Every day thousands of dedicated public servants stand on guard to protect us — whether it’s our privacy or our security, whether it’s in Iraq or in the back alleys of our nation’s inner cities — and we owe each of them our thanks.
Nice to see Sen. Craig’s got his head screwed on straight.
Sen. Inhofe (R-OK) keeps gunning in the Global War against Global Warming TV specials.
President Bush is out saying that his tax cuts are responsible for the deficit this year being lower than his economists predicted earlier this year and slightly lower than the actual deficit last year. But is someone going to mention that the tax cuts are the prime reason we have record deficits to begin with? President Bush came into office with surpluses. He ran up the deficits, structural deficits created by his tax cuts. Or have we forgotten that?
Late Update: There’s a good editorial making this point in The New Republic a few weeks back. Unfortunately, it’s behind their subscription wall. But I’ll give you this snippet: “Halving a deficit you inherited would be something to brag about. Halving a deficit you created, not so much. You don’t see Bush’s former chief domestic policy adviser Claude Allen boasting that he has returned half the merchandise he filched from Target.” And as the editors point out, this would be the case if the claim of reducing the deficit were true, which it turns out not to be. Oh well. News editor dorks who got taken in can seek absolution where?
Don’t believe Social Security phase-out is coming down the pike again next year?
This from a press release just out from from Finance Committee ranking member, Sen. Max Baucus …
U.S. Senator Max Baucus (D-Mont.), Ranking Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, today blasted the Presidentâs renewal of a plan to privatize Social Security and slash benefits for millions of Americans. The Mid-Session Budget Review released by the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) today included a proposal that would spend $721 billion â nearly $10 billion more than originally planned in the Presidentâs original Fiscal Year 2007 budget â to turn Social Security into a system of private accounts with lower guaranteed benefits to Americans. The Presidentâs proposal to privatize Social Security includes significant cuts in guaranteed benefits for the vast majority of Social Security recipients through the indexing of initial benefits to prices, rather than wages.
This is only one of several behind the scenes initiatives over the last few weeks aimed at laying the groundwork for phasing out Social Security next year. Is Social Security phase-out a good issue for Democrats in the mid-term elections? Yep, absolutely. But the president and his allies on the Hill really are getting ready to do phase out the program next year.
Don’t pretend you weren’t told in advance.
The press is ignoring it. And a lot of Dems across the country are too.
And as long as they do, candidates around the country can refuse to say where they stand on the issue until after election day. Tom Kean, Jr. in New Jersey is just one example.
But there’s actually something you can do. Right now. Find out where the candidates in your state and district stand on the issue. Are they in favor of preserving Social Security or will they vote for phasing it out and replacing it with private accounts? Simple question. And you can get an answer.