| Author | Message | ||
     ffof Citizen Username: Ffof Post Number: 3447 Registered: 5-2001  |
cjc- I know, you're missing the point on purpose, right?. I don't think this thread was started so that we could talk about the pros and cons of SS reform. Ronald R could communicate his ideas to the masses in a simplistic, understandable way - like the ideas or not. Now, some might say that Bush is also simplistic (or a simpleton  ), but he is no communicator. End of story. | ||
| notehead Supporter Username: Notehead Post Number: 2142 Registered: 5-2001  |
The guy has been talking (or mumbling, or dissembling, or whatever you want to call it) about this subject for months. Any dolt should at least be able to recite by rote a few clear sentences on the subject after so much repetition. It is amazing that the POTUS either can not or will not do so. | ||
| Innisowen Citizen Username: Innisowen Post Number: 637 Registered: 3-2004 |
Hmmm. The Bush citation in the first posting above reminds me, in word form, of the "look and feel" of the bar scene in the first Star Wars movie back in the 70's. Bush is not stupid, by any means. So he is not going to get caught saying something that people can follow. If he did that, we could catch him on it. Far better for Bush to mouth nonsense than be heard to say something that people can understand, analyze, and provide rebuttals for. What kind of rebuttal, in god's sweet name, could one possibly offer to the howling Bushian mish-mash cited in the first posting in this thread? | ||
| Innisowen Citizen Username: Innisowen Post Number: 643 Registered: 3-2004 |
Ad Bush's verbatim above, I reflect on the words of a former teacher of mine: "Det som er dunkelt tenkt, er dunkelt sagt." Or in the words of Rivarol: "ce qui n'est pas clair n'est pas francais." | ||
| Mark Fuhrman Citizen Username: Mfpark Post Number: 1417 Registered: 9-2001  |
Tell that to Sartre. | ||
| Bob K Supporter Username: Bobk Post Number: 7917 Registered: 5-2001 |
Maybe Bush was uncomfortable talking about benefit cuts? I don't remember him talking about this in the past. | ||
| dave23 Citizen Username: Dave23 Post Number: 198 Registered: 5-2001 |
It would have been a lot less painful for him to tell the truth: "It doesn't." | ||
| notehead Supporter Username: Notehead Post Number: 2145 Registered: 5-2001 |
You've got to wonder what people who were actually present in Tampa when W gave that response said to one another afterward. Surely, some of them said, "My God, why is that guy in charge?" But just as surely others said, "You hear that? Of course that guy is in charge!" | ||
| cjc Citizen Username: Cjc Post Number: 3272 Registered: 8-2003 |
ffof -- I'm not missing the point here. The thread title is "Bush on Social Security." The entry point was Bush's quote. Was it as good as it needed to be? Not entirely. Some think it's stupid. Some attach hidden motives to his lack of clarity. GREAT! Wonderful thread. If that's all that's here, it's rather empty and hardly stimulating intellectually, nor does it even try to move the ball on the debate. But if that blows your dress up -- have at it. Or is it over because you've said "end of story"?? | ||
| ffof Citizen Username: Ffof Post Number: 3449 Registered: 5-2001 |
cjc- you aren't very much fun, are you. | ||
| Innisowen Citizen Username: Innisowen Post Number: 645 Registered: 3-2004 |
Hmmm-- I thought that the point of this thread has been to make fun of Bush's mangled syntax and poor use of language. Some may make just pure fun of it and some impute motives for his lack of clarity. A public figure is a legitimate subject of scrutiny, especially when the figure speaks at a public function and speaks gobble-de-gook. And you can't read the citation that started this thread without laughing out loud. I would have loved to hear it "live." Whether we are well served by a president who "seems" incapable of stringing two logical sentences together is another question, and I will pass over that one. As I said in a posting above, "Det som er dunkelt tenkt, er dunkelt sagt." | ||
| themp Supporter Username: Themp Post Number: 1570 Registered: 12-2001 |
Interesting analysis by Jonathan Chait: Meanwhile, in the New York Times, David Brooks writes a “A Requiem for Reform,” in which he blames GOP miscalculation, Democratic partisanship, and the selfishness of the voters for killing privatization. (A departure from his usual sunny populism, wouldn’t you say?) Actually, if reform dies, it wasn’t selfishness that killed privatization. It was precisely the opposite. The irony of Brooks’ complaint, which we’re sure to see repeated elsewhere, is that selfishness has always been at the core of Bush’s economic agenda. He passed tax cuts by dismissing Democratic worries that it would burden future generations with debt. Remember him waving dollar bills and promising, “it’s your money”? He organized lobbies representing the affluent to push for the tax cuts that would benefit them disproportionately. Karl Rove’s re-election strategy was built on appealing to the narrow self-interest of a series of groups. Farmers got lavish crop payments. The steel, shrimp, textile and lumber industry got tariffs. HMOs and pharmaceuticals got lavish subsidies. Etc. Unsurprisingly, Bush approached Social Security privatization in the same spirit. The strategy was to divide up the electorate and appeal to each segment in very self-interested terms. They would neutralize seniors with the assurance that their benefits wouldn’t be touched. The young would be lured in with promises of amassing great fortunes in private accounts. Blacks would be peeled off from the Democratic coalition with bogus claims that Social Security harms them disproportionately. And Wall Street and other businesses, who smelled large profits down the road, would pony up tens of millions of dollars to fund the whole campaign. But it hasn’t worked. And the main reason is that the public is not quite as selfish as the conservatives thought. The privatizers’ weakest assumption turned out to be their belief that the elderly would support privatization if they knew they wouldn’t be affected. For weeks, as polls have shown rising hostility to privatization, GOP pollsters and strategists have conceded that they need to do more to reassure seniors on this point. Bush has obligingly harped on it at every stop. Yet senior citizens overwhelmingly oppose Bush’s approach. And it’s not because they think their benefits will be cut – polls show they overwhelmingly they buy his reassurances. I find this pretty heartwarming. Who wouldn’t? I’ll tell you who: an economic libertarian who sees concepts like social insurance or collective interest as fundamentally alien. Which is to say, the sentiment that has driven privatization from the very beginning. As usual, this sentiment was voiced in its most naked way by GOP strategist, business lobbyist and Rove confidante Grover Norquist. Last year, speaking to a Mexican newspaper, Norquist chortled over the demise of the World War II generation: "This is an age cohort that voted for a draft before the war started, and allowed the draft to continue for 25 years after the war was over. Their idea of the legitimate role of the state is radically different than anything previous generations knew, or subsequent generations." Before that generation, whenever you put a draft in, there were draft riots. After that generation, there were draft riots. This generation? No problem. Why not? Of course the government moves people around like pawns on a chessboard. One side spits off labor law, one side spits off Social Security. We will all work until we're 65 and have the same pension. You know, some Bismark, German thing, okay? Very un-American." Brooks writes today about how privatization opponents used “familiar scare tactics designed to frighten the elderly,” using one of the most hackneyed clichés favored by critics of Social Security. Here’s what I’d like to see them explain: What’s wrong with being frightened about a future in which your children and grandchildren live in an every-man-for-himself society? | ||
| ina Citizen Username: Ina Post Number: 184 Registered: 6-2001 |
Notehead, yours is the point I was trying to make. W. and his handlers seem to not feel any obligation to even *appear* competent. W can babble incoherently at a public forum and there's just us lonesome souls picking it apart. Innisowen, I take it you think W is crafty? Because I can't imagine anyone with a triple digit IQ saying the kind of claptrap he does. | ||
| Tom Reingold Supporter Username: Noglider Post Number: 5865 Registered: 1-2003  |
But ina, he really is smart. He appeals to people's emotions, and they go along with whatever ride he takes them on, as a result. I'm not kidding. | ||
| Innisowen Citizen Username: Innisowen Post Number: 646 Registered: 3-2004 |
Ina: I believe he is crafty. And crafty can be devious. And I believe he has more guile than people give him credit for. And he is surrounded by people who have plenty of guile and plenty of gall. That's what scares me about this regime. | ||
| cjc Citizen Username: Cjc Post Number: 3274 Registered: 8-2003 |
The selfishness at root here is a retirement system that takes more and more from the children of retirees and gives those kids less and less when they retire. Those who call Social Security an 'insurance' vehicle are misleading you when premiums aren't adjusted for risk and benefit levels have no relation to the premiums paid. Selfishness is raising taxes/premiums even more on people paying the most to pay for a lack of planning (and ability to plan thanks to the federal government) for others. And selfishness is refusing to honestly address the problem that is Social Security, especially for those politicians with 3-digit IQs who are heavily invested in the market and oppose this because it threatens their political power and ability to spend the money they've confiscated in the name of "social security" but apply to other programs and pork. It was the premise behind Gore's lockbox, but we can't have it now because Bush will get the credit. We can't invest those monies into the market unless the govt does it and keeps that revenue at their disposal. Democrats are so empty on this issue. | ||
| Innisowen Citizen Username: Innisowen Post Number: 647 Registered: 3-2004 |
And blah-blah-blah... Puerile, petulant, pusillanimous crisis creation... Save us, god please, from the well-intentioned. | ||
| The Libertarian Citizen Username: Local_1_crew Post Number: 602 Registered: 3-2004  |
another in the seemingly endless supply of posts by innisowen that adds nothing to the conversation | ||
| The Libertarian Citizen Username: Local_1_crew Post Number: 603 Registered: 3-2004 |
when gore called it a lockbox it was brilliant. when a republican calls it privatization, he is a sneaky manipulator. i dont like bush but his plan is almost the same as gores. | ||
| Innisowen Citizen Username: Innisowen Post Number: 648 Registered: 3-2004 |
And the Libertarian scores one again for the Cromwellians... |
