Quote:
Originally Posted by QuikSand
I'm still unsure what to think about the "fixing Social Security is easy" line, for me the most memorable of the night from either candidate.
On one hand, I want to be a responsible citizen, to press for a real response, and to pin both guys down on a criminally under-reported issue that I actually care a lot about.
On the other hand, if I'm rooting for my candidate and want him to win the election, the pragmatist in me realizes that you simply can't say anything at all about SS without making people go batty. Raising taxes, reducing benefits, indexing, age limit increases, cutoff points -- the whole damned thing is high voltage stuff. So, I guess the McCain response, while far from being "straight talk," was probably ideal for what he wants -- to not turn off the voters by saying something objectionable.
For me, that sort of thinking becomes a really tough issue. I don't want to "settle" for the practical, safe, triangulated answer. But I'm smart enough to realize that anyone who speaks candidly enough to satisfy me (I'm a big boy, I can take my medicine if you explain to me why I need to) is going to alienate twenty other voters with the exact same candor. People like me don't get to determine elections - it's the other twenty people who do.
Kinda sucks. Easier to pick sides and just make fun of the other guy than it is to actually feel invested in some of the issues, and to constantly be frustrated that there's really nothing that happens on the campaign trail that bears directly on some of the issues that we know are lying in wait for the winner.
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The annoying thing about it is that of all of our entitlements, Social Security is the easiest to fix. You raise the payout age by about 5 years and it's not only solvent but profitable in the long term. However, you do immediately cause AARP to put you on your crap list and vote out every single one of you.
If you're really sneaky about it, you say that you won't touch it in the next 5 years, then phase it in with some yearly increments, say, increasing the age 1 year every other year the next 10 years after that, moving the age to 70.
Oh, and once again, the idea that most horrified me about Bush in 2000- privatizing social security- yeah, I think we're all glad that didn't come to pass at this moment.
SI