social security

The other day a friend in southeast Wisconsin sent me a reply to a letter he had written to his congressman about Social Security. His congressman is Paul Ryan.

Dear MoveOn,

When I was in elementary school in Brooklyn I was one of the only ones in my neighborhood who used to take the subway-- most of which was elevated-- in to "The City." Parents worried "The City" would turn you into… whatever they feared most. But they would warn the neighborhood kids that they went on the subway, they might be killed by the third rail. Wikipedia defines the third rail as "a method of providing electric power to a railway train, through a semi-continuous rigid conductor placed alongside or between the rails of a railway track.

Jason Thigpen is running for Congress in eastern North Carolina (the Outer Banks, most of the coastal plain, from the outskirts of New Bern, down the 17 to Jacksonville and on past Camp Lejeune into Wilmington. The district has been trending Republican in recent years but Democrats have a 12% voter registration edge and Jason is just the kind of guy who can appeal across the partisan divide without abandoning his progressive values. He penned this guest post.

Keith Ellison (D-MN) is widely viewed as an up-and-coming progressive leader able to articulate progressive ideas and values to ordinary voters. He may not be invited to many events sponsored by lobbyists on K Street or Wall Street, but Democrats all over the country have been inviting him to speak to local grassroots activists.

Shimshon Bichler and Jonathan Nitzan wrote another excellent academic paper, Can Capitalists Afford Recovery?:

The new 31st congressional district, which runs south of L.A. from Upland and Rancho Cucamonga out to San Bernardino, Colton, Loma Linda and Redlands, was carved out of Democratic-leaning areas that were once represented by Jerry Lewis, David Dreier and Joe Baca, 3 conservatives who are no longer in Congress. It's the bluest district anywhere in America with a Republican congressman. And that congressman, Gary Miller, isn't just a standard, garden variety Republican; he's a far right ideologue and has been for his entire sordid career.

You probably saw the anti-union, food stamp-cutting governor of Ohio, John Kasich, publicly bitching the other day that his political party is engaged in a merciless war against the poor. “I’m concerned," said Kasich, "about the fact there seems to be a war on the poor. That, if you’re poor, somehow you’re shiftless and lazy.” He may well have had Republican House budget chairman and class warrior Paul Ryan in mind.

Many progressives fear that conservative Democrats are working with Boehner, McConnell and the Republicans to undermine the inviolability of Social Security-- the Third Rail aspect-- by including Chained CPI in a so-called "Grand Bargain" which would see the GOP give a tiny bit on taxes-- raising taxes on the rich slightly which could be easily lowered as soon as they regain power-- in return for forever decoupling Social Security from the Third Rail.

I've been wondering if all the strum und drang over the typically glitchy launch of the Obamacare website isn't just a shiny object moment to distract attention from what the conservatives among our ruling elites have in mind for us.