The stage is being set to loot Social Security...

[Neecy]

Think Bush is a lame duck? They know a Democrat will be elected in the fall and they're desperate to finish off raiding the Treasury before he leaves.

NEW YORK, Jan 10 (Reuters) - Moody's Investors Service said on Thursday the United States' "triple-A" government bond rating could come under pressure in the very long-term if the Medicare and Social Security programs are not reformed.

"These two programs are the largest threats to the long-term financial health of the United States and to the government's Aaa rating," Moody's analyst Steven Hess said in the agency's annual report on the United States.

The report is not a rating action.

Hess also said that risks from the U.S. subprime mortgage crisis are not affecting the nation's credit rating.

http://www.reuters.com/article/bondsNews/idUSN1017237120080110

Strange, isn't it, how Moody's isn't asking for the massive spending in the industrial/security complex to be reduced - no, they now want to tap into *our* savings to pay for it.

Don't think Bush won't seize on this phony threat to try to bully the Congress into putting our money into the stock market.

[antigop]

1. And surprise, surprise! Hillary's "American Dream Accounts" to the rescue!

http://www.dlc.org/ndol_ci.cfm?contentid=253996&kaid=137&subid=900111

Remarks of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton at the 2006 DLC National Conversation

That is why the American Dream Initiative proposes American Dream accounts, which require every employer to open retirement accounts for its workers, and make those pensions portable when workers change jobs.

Gotta keep that stock market propped up somehow, don't we?

[midnight]

6. Wall Street needs to be bailed out! The rest of us are on our

own.

[antigop]

9. Yep! Exactly! n/t

[papau]

21. If Americans save that is a rescue of Wall Street and evil? interesting - btw the

most likely investment for American Dream monies is a bank account.

[antigop]

22. HA! Papau --- you should know better. We've seen this before.

Companies put in 401(k)'s -- they pull the plug on defined benefit pensions.

Wall Street wants "American Dream Accounts" -- so the plug can be pulled on Social Security.

Same song. Different verse.

[papau]

36. the pull the plug on defined benefit with replacement by 401k is indeed a problem - but

the simple concept of saving is what is being discussed - the Social Security System always assumed savings would be there in addition to Social Security.

[antigop]

38. Nope. -- the American Dream Accounts are what we get so they can pull the plug on Social Security

Hillary is the DLC candidate. The DLC has pushed for privatization of Social Security and Medicare.

It's the same scam that the corporations pulled.
1) Give employees a 401(k) along with their defined benefit plan.
2) Make them think they will have both.
3) Pull the plug on the db plan (which was actually the plan all along).

Same thing with Social Security:
1) Give them American Dream accounts.
2) Make them think they will have Social Security AND the Dream accounts.
3) Pull the plug on Social Security (which was actually the plan all along).

Same song. Different verse.

<edit to add> Fool me once...

[papau]

43. corps need no special reason beyond no unions to pull plug on defined benefit - I see increased

savings as a good.

[antigop]

44. And I see it as scam redux and another way to prop up the stock market

Look at the contributions HRC is taking from Wall Street.

Wall Street wants privatization and HRC's Dream Accounts are the way to get there.

[antigop]

46. It also explains HRC's lack of plan for Social Sec-- she wants a "bipartisan commission"

Gee, I wonder what the Republicans on that commission are going to recommend?

Fool me once....

[tabasco]

26. Thanks for the info. She really is a tool for Rupert Murdoch.

American Dream Initiative.

Even has the bizarro-land name attached.

"Put your retirement in the stock market, folks! What could possibly go wrong??"

H. Clinton will never be standing in a soup line so she doesn't give a shit.

[angstlessk]

2. an INVESTMENT service wants boosh to INVEST social security

in the private market..I am shocked! SHOCKED! I tell ya! No conflict of interest in THAT report.

[blondeatlast]

3. Spread the word and watch the candidates on this issue. Excellent find. K&R. nt

[sellitman]

4. Hands off MY money.

Which candidate will protect our savings?

[Angela Shelley]

17. NONE OF THEM will protect YOUR savings.

If you have savings, then you have to protect them yourself.

The country has no savings.

[me b zola]

27. We have $$ invested in old-age insurance

Quibble over the terminology if you must, but we have paid into it and the corporatists need to keep their mitts off of that stack of cash.

[tavalon]

5. They bettter hurry

Looting hase to be offshored by next fall.

[bemildred]

7. That's not what it is.

The federal government has a fiscal liability to pay all us old farts back for all the money we paid into the Social Security system over our working lives, and these weasels want to avoid paying what is owed. In order to justify that, they have to make certain assumptions and project the state of the system out about 40 years or so, so that they can argue that someday the SSI system might be "insolvent". This is wrong on it's premise, the SSI system is not a business enterprise, intended to turn a profit; it cannot be "insolvent" unless the Congress refuses to appropriate funds and enact taxes to meet it's obligations. This is just one more attempt to screw the Boomers out of the protections and benefits that the generation before them took for granted.

[antigop]

10. deleted --wrong place n/t

[antigop]

13. It provides them cover for what they have wanted to do for a long time--destroy the New Deal n/t

[bemildred]

15. Well, yeah, and there is all those "savings accounts" that can shore up equities for a while.

And other things.

[antigop]

19. And all those defined benefit pensions that have been frozen/eliminated

and replaced with 401(k)'s.

[slipslidingaway]

14. "The federal government has a fiscal liability to pay all us...

old farts back..."

:toast:

[bemildred]

16. Aw shucks. nt

[Angela Shelley]

20. Fiscal liability is a dream

[bemildred]

23. You mean it's not realistic?

Maybe so, but you'd have to know the future to be sure.

[Angela Shelley]

24. "IF" there was such thing as "fiscal liability"

then there would be no troops in Iraq, because the population of the US would have started a revolution by now.

The majority of the US households are living on credit, showing no "fiscal responsibility" to themselves or their families.

Why should the government be expected to manage the cash differently?

[bemildred]

25. Yeah, you want to be realistic.

I do not disagree, but I still like to deconstruct these "social security is going to go bankrupt" arguments.

I've been expecting a good round of hyper-inflation one of these days to wipe all this unpleasant debt out and get a "clean start" for a now round of economic Ponzi schemes.
:hi:

[Naturyl]

8. Why not military spending?

They never mention that...

[slipslidingaway]

11. K&R, they have already used Two Trillion of the SS Trust Fund

for war and tax cuts. Medicare is the larger problem, a single-payer system would help with future expenses.

"...Strange, isn't it, how Moody's isn't asking for the massive spending in the industrial/security complex to be reduced - no, they now want to tap into *our* savings to pay for it..."

[info being]

12. Wouldn't want any unreasonable expectations

We should just accept it. It is hard for government to do anything that benefits the citizens. We shouldn't expect that at all.

[Bandit]

18. They have already "looted" Social Security

They have been using SS funds for quite some time now for other purposes than SS. That is why Gore came up with his "lock box" for SS funds. Everybody made hjuge fun of him for that one but SS funds keep getting looted and no one is suggesting anything be doen about it. The IOUs that are sitting in the SS fund box will never ever ever be repaid. Just as the US Debt will Never ever ever be paid...

[Javaman]

35. I was thinking just the same thing, this is nothing new...

moron* has filled up SS with so many IOU's that the next ruling species will have to pay it off.

[slipslidingaway]

40. The Dem leaders should have brought this to the attention of

the American people everytime a vote for funding the war came to the floor.

[dkofos]

28. They are right. SS needs to be reformed. Remove the CAP.

[bemildred]

29. LOL. Yep. and make it progressive, real progressive, at the high end. nt

[dkofos]

30. I don't think that would be necessary.

[bemildred]

32. But it would be fun. nt

[lurky]

31. Moody's? They gave AAA ratings to those sub-prime derivatives, right?

Has anybody investigated (like, ahem, Congress) any of the obvious corruption and conflict-of-interest they displayed in that whole disaster. I mean, Moody's singlehandedly enabled the current economic disaster by doing that, and now they are trying to strong-arm the government into destroying Social Security. Who's running the show there, and what is motivating them, aside from naked greed? Maybe they need to be looked into.

[melm00se]

33. What moody's is saying

is that in the long term, the $$$ layed out for SS and Medicare benefits will outstrip supply, so much so the US federal government and the US economy will struggle to service the debt that has and will be incurred raising the possibility of default.

to offset this risk, the US Government will have to pay an increased interest rate to attract investors to their debt instruments (like bonds).

All the finger pointing aside, the numbers look bleak - the US population is aging and entering the qualifying age range is accelerating and unless something substantive is done, what Moody's is concerned about will come to roost.

[sarcasmo]

34. Is there any way to opt out or take a buy out from Social Security?

I feel my wife in her current state of health will never see a dime from Social Security.

[WinkyDink]

42. It's for the entire population, including orphans and widows. So the answer is "no".

[dysfunctional press]

37. loot what? the i.o.u.'s from congress?

:shrug:

[in_cog_ni_to]

39. The Military Industrial Complex is the largest threat to the long-term financial health of the USA

AND REPUKES in power.

[Rosemary2205]

41. To late.

Even Big Dog kept quiet while SS money was used to compensate for the budget. There was no surplus. It was all that SS money.

[treestar]

45. What nerve he has

And the billions for an unnecessary war don't count?

[earth mom]

47. While everyone is focusing on the (s)election, those f*ckers are robbing us blind.

LIVID doesn't even begin to describe how furious I am right now!!!!

:grr: :grr: :grr: