
 |
|
Dec. 3, 2008
Steven Emerson: Yes, the terrorists are winning
Don Terry: Lifetime, no see
Dec. 2, 2008
Melanie Phillips: The Mumbai atrocity is a wake-up call for a frighteningly unprepared world
Stratfor Geopolitical Intelligence Report: Strategic Motivations for the Mumbai Attack
Dec. 1, 2008
Max Freidlander, as told to Jacklyn C. Wadler: India Inkings
Mark Steyn: Whodunit!?
Nov. 28, 2008
Rabbi Ahron Rapps: An evil seed that didn't have to be
Melanie Phillips: Carpe diem --- or can we all relax now?
Nov. 26, 2008
Michael Feldberg: Meet the Orthodox Jew who laid groundwork for scientific development of ordnance that undergirds America's current world leadership
Andrea Simantov:
Shades of life
Nov. 25, 2008
The Jewish Ethicist
by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir : Getting Emotional For Influence
The Kosher Gourmet
by Ethel G. Hofman : Thanksiving feast!
Nov. 24, 2008
Rabbi S. Binyomin Ginsberg: 'I just Became a grandchild!'
Barry Rubin: Don't flatter your enemies, protect your friends
Nov. 21, 2008
Rabbi A. Henach Leibowitz: Money matters?
Caroline B. Glick:
Civilization walks the plank
Nov. 20, 2008
Rabbi Avi Shafran: Bronfman's blindness
The Kosher Gourmet
By Linda Gassenheimer: Portobellos add a hearty flavor to pasta with pesto
Nov, 19, 2008
The Jewish Ethicist
by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir : Spread the wealth? Jewish tradition and income equality
Elliot B. Gertel:
'Mad Men': Tackling prejudices or reinforcing them?
Nov, 18, 2008
Dr. Debby Schwarz Hirschhorn: The End of the Age of Reason
Jonathan Tobin: Does Barack + Bibi = Disaster?
Nov, 17, 2008
Rabbi Yonason Goldson: The End of the Age of Reason
Diana West: Gulling Americans into making terror legit?
Nov, 14, 2008
Rabbi A. Henach Leibowitz: The Power of Spiritual Inertia
Caroline B. Glick: The perils ahead
Nov, 13, 2008
Stratfor Intelligence Briefing: How Bush and Obama together could change the Middle East dynamic
The Kosher Gourmet
by JeanMarie Brownson: Sweet and savory, crispy and meltingly tender bestilla
Nov, 12, 2008
The Jewish Ethicist
by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir : Tyrannical Co-Workers
Michael Doyle: High Court to consider today donated monuments that may have religious messages in public parks
Nov, 11, 2008
Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.: Will Obama stop government officials considering institutionalizing financial jihad?
Jonathan Tobin: They Will Decide Their Own Fate
Nov, 10, 2008
Rabbi Avi Shafran: $8 billion, modern-day Tower of Babel being built?
Barry Rubin: A letter to the president-elect from a Middle East realist
Nov, 7, 2008
Rabbi Francis Nataf: Of Children and Immortality
Caroline B. Glick: Livni's Obama strategy
Nov, 6, 2008
Rabbi Yonason Goldson: How I tricked a classroom of apathetic students into grasping the fallacy of moral relativism
The Kosher Gourmet
By Gina Kim: Tips for making the perfect soup --- includes recipes
Nov, 5, 2008
The Jewish Ethicist
By Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Destitute Debtors
Bruce Weinstein: 'Religulos': Bad title,even worse movie
Nov, 4, 2008
Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.: Treasury Dept. submits to Shariah law
Frida Ghitis: A surprise for Obama in the Middle East
Nov, 3, 2008
Jonathan Rosenblum: Who says Jews are Smart?
Jonathan Tobin:
Was He Wrong About Everything?
March 22, 2007
J-Rhythms with Avraham Rosenblum: JWR's cutting-edge music program showcasing performers -- singers, song writers, musicians, and bands -- who learn and live the Torah lifestyle (OUR NEWEST IGODCAST !)
Oct. 29, 2003
Mortimer B. Zuckerman: Graffiti On History's Walls (MUST-READ!)
|
| |
Jewish World Review
April 14, 2005
/ 5 Nisan, 5765
Triangulate Social Security by offering a choice of plans
By
Dick Morris
| 
|
|
|
|
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
In 1995, the Newt Gingrich-led Republicans accused President Clinton of having no serious intent to balance the budget. They said that, while he was paying lip service to deficit reduction, he was doing nothing about trimming spending and, indeed, was still plotting further tax increases.
Today, the Hillary Clinton-led Democrats are attacking President Bush, saying that he wants to let Social Security die of its own funding shortfall while he builds a privatization lifeboat in which the rich and the upper middle class can escape.
Ten years ago, the truth was that unless and until Clinton proposed his own version of a balanced budget, replete with substantial spending cuts, neither the nation nor the Congress would take seriously his proclamations of support for deficit reduction.
With the White House, most of Clinton's liberal advisers urged that he not produce his own balanced-budget proposal but leave to the Republicans the onus of suggesting the cuts necessary to eliminate the deficit. They said that by embracing cuts on his own he would incur public wrath and lose his standing to fight congressionally imposed reductions.
Today, the conservatives in the Bush White House are telling their president much the same thing: that he should not propose his own series of cuts in Social Security because it will subject him to a massive political vulnerability and give the Democrats fodder with which to attack him. They say that he should simply talk about the problems Social Security faces and bemoan the absence of a Democratic plan for saving it, even as he refuses to proffer his own.
Back then, Clinton defied the conventional wisdom of his party and most of his administration and submitted his proposal for a balanced budget, including a broad package of spending cuts that were to pave the way to the elimination of the deficit. But he avoided most of the heavy lifting in suggesting these cuts by proposing to take 10 years instead of the GOP proposal for seven to bring about his objective. As a result, his cuts did not trigger the damage his advisers had feared.
Once Clinton had proposed a balanced budget, he could no longer be attacked as insincere in wanting a balanced budget and, at a stroke, the Republicans lost their best issue. No longer could they hide their desire to dismantle an array of important programs such as Medicaid, Medicare, federal education funding and environmental enforcement behind the façade of deficit elimination. Clinton had taken away their monopoly on the deficit issue.
Today, Bush has to take away the Democratic mantra that is costing him so dearly in popular support: that Bush wants to wreck Social Security. He needs to counter the effective AARP ad that shows a house being demolished as a metaphor for the destruction of Social Security. By proposing his own package of cuts, Bush can rob the Democrats of their positioning just as Clinton did to the Republicans.
But just as Clinton muted the pain of his cuts by stretching the reduction over 10 years, so Bush can avoid the dire implications of reductions in benefits, raises in taxation or postponement of retirement by using the central ingredient, choice. By offering beneficiaries one of three plans lower benefits or later retirement or higher taxes, he can avoid the pitfalls of a one-size-fits-all approach to the complex and highly individual calculations of what retirement is right for you.
Bush's current approach is to give Congress a menu of cuts. But that is flawed. He must give the beneficiaries themselves a menu of reductions or tax increases from which to choose for their own retirement. By leaving it up to Congress, Bush looks as if he doesn't really want to save the system. By leaving it up to the beneficiaries, he belies that accusation completely.
This approach will turn the debate back to its original focus: privatization of a portion of the Social Security tax revenues. The issue will be no longer destruction of the system but individual choice and options.
(If any reader happens to know anybody who works in the White House, please call this column to their attention.)
Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in in the media and Washington consider "must-reading". Sign up for the daily JWR update. It's free. Just click here.
JWR contributor Dick Morris is author, most recently, of "Because He Could". (ClickHERE to purchase. Sales help fund JWR.) Comment by clicking here.
Dick Morris Archives
© 2005, Dick Morris
| |

Mitch Albom
Michael Barone
Dave Barry
Tony Blankley
Andy Borowitz
David Broder
Stratfor Briefing
Mona Charen
Linda Chavez
Ann Coulter
Greg Crosby
Rod Dreher
Larry Elder
Suzanne Fields
John Fund
Frank J. Gaffney
Lloyd Garver
Jonah Goldberg
Julia Gorin
Jonathan Gurwitz
Paul Greenberg
Victor Davis Hanson
Betsy Hart
David Harsanyi
Nat Hentoff
David Horowitz
Laura Ingraham
Jeff Jacoby
Paul Johnson
Jack Kelly
James Klurfeld
Ed Koch
Ch. Krauthammer
Jonathan Last
Michael Ledeen
John Leo
David Limbaugh
Kathryn Lopez
Rich Lowry
Michelle Malkin
Jackie Mason
The Medicine Men
Dick Morris
Bill O'Reilly
Clarence Page
Kathleen Parker
Dennis Prager
Wesley Pruden
Tom Purcell
Jonathan Rauch
Celia Rivenbark
Robert Robb
Cokie & Steve Roberts
Pat Sajak
Debra J. Saunders
Culture Shlock
Roger Simon
Michael Smerconish
Thomas Sowell
Mark Steyn
John Stossel
Cal Thomas
Jonathan Tobin
Bob Tyrrell
Diana West
Dave Weinbaum
George Will
Walter Williams
Mort Zuckerman

Robert Arial
Chuck Asay
Chip Bok
Dry Bones
Lisa Benson
John Branch
Gary Brookins
John Cole
J. D. Crowe
John Deering
Brian Duffy
Everything's Relative
Mallard Fillmore
Jake Fuller
Bob Gorrel
Joe Heller
David Hitch
Jerry Holber
Steve Kelley
Jeff Koterba
Dick Locher
Chan Lowe
Ranan R. Lurie
Jimmy Margulies
Rick McKee
Michael Ramirez
Jeff Stahler
Danna Summers
John Trever
Gary Varvel
Kirk Walters

How 2
Lori Borgman
The Savvy Consumer
Elder matters
Fixit
Dr. Peter Gott
Marybeth Hicks
GET A JOB! by Marty Nemko
Richard Lederer
Tech Maven
Nutrition Myths
Bruce Williams
How Stuff Works
|