The Washington Post is hysterical:

On the matter of Social Security. Here are some excerpts from today's editorial:

Whatever the deniers say, Social Security needs reform soon (title)

The current focus of the Social Security denialists' ire is President Obama's National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform, which they view as a stalking horse for gutting Social Security.

What does not make sense is preemptively bashing the debt commission. Social Security is not a cause of the current or future debt, but putting it on a sustainable footing is essential to getting the nation's fiscal house in order. Doing so quickly is a condition for making the changes as painless as possible for those who rely on Social Security the most. The debt commission would perform an important service by ignoring the denialists and tackling this topic.

Of interest, in the Los Angeles Times this weekend, their business and economics columnist wrote a column, The myth of the Social Security system's financial shortfall, that looked at the Trustees report and found it to be reassuring.

Dean Baker is (predictably) outraged.

Odd that the Post would care so much about Social Security nearly 30 years in the future while other programs are causing substantial problems for the federal budget today. It's almost as if they want to get at the Social Security money to pay for other things (wars, tax cuts, medical) that are supposed to come out of the general fund.


posted by Quiddity at 8/11/2010 08:07:00 AM