Thursday Reads

Good Morning!! Today is Veterans Day.

The big news of the day is the draft report of the co-chairs President’s Catfood Commission, which is not going over too well even with the other members of the commission. Below are a few more reactions to yesterday’s announcement by Alan Simpson and Erskine Bowles–beyond the ones in Dakinikat’s post yesterday.

BTW, have you ever seen men who looked more dead inside than those two? As you would expect from such soulless men, they didn’t hesitate to advocate cuts to veterans’ benefits along with their attacks on the middle class, the poor, and old people.

So, on to those reactions.

At Huffpo, Dan Froomkin lists “Ten Flash Points In The Fiscal Commission Chairmen’s Proposal”

…taken as a whole, the plan authored by Erskine Bowles and Alan Simpson would have devastating effects on the government and its ability to help the most vulnerable in our society, and it would put the squeeze on the middle class, veterans, the elderly and the sick – all in the name of an abstract goal that ultimately only a bond-trader could love.

For a summary of the attack on veterans, Froomkin links to David Dayen at FDL:

They want to add co-pays to the Veterans’ Administration and TRICARE, as well as pushing individuals covered by TRICARE into an employer policy. They also want to freeze noncombat military pay for three years. And, they want to end schools for families on military bases, instead reintegrating soldier’s kids into the public school system (because that’s so easy for a military family that moves every other year).

The attack on old people and future retirement benefits for everyone:

Deficit Comm. Chairs’ Social Security Cuts Mean Seniors Pay for Wall Street Instead of Their Own Retirement, Says Bob Weiner, Ex-House Aging Committee Chief of Staff

The Deficit Commission “Chairmen’s Mark” proposal today for Social Security cuts, including raising the retirement age and reducing the cost of living, means that “Seniors will be paying for Wall Street instead of their own retirement, will be forced to work longer, and will be squeezed into poverty, despite the fact that the Social Security system has no debt for 30+ years based on what seniors have paid into it,” says former House Aging Committee Chief of Staff Robert Weiner.

“Social Security adds not a dime to the national debt for at least 30 years. What is really happening is cuts advocates are using the Social Security funds literally paid for by seniors to reverse other federal programs that do have deficits or are unpaid, and to pay for the tax breaks for the wealthy,” Weiner continues.

Michael Hiltzik: The deficit commission chairs’ lies about Social Security

Look out — the enemies of Social Security are locked and loaded for a renewed attack on the program.

The new volley comes from the co-chairs of the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform, the so-called deficit commission ginned up by the White House as a sop to conservatives. The co-chairs are the profoundly clownish former Sen. Alan Simpson and Erskine Bowles, a Democrat with his feet firmly implanted on Wall Street….

The co-chairs propose to gut Social Security under the guise of “saving” it, eliminate federal funding for services and programs that heavily benefit the middle- and working classes, and — surprise — steer even more income tax cuts to the wealthy.

The cuts to Social Security are subtle, and for that reason worthy of close scrutiny. The co-chairs’ key proposal is to raise the regular retirement age to as high as 69, and raise the minimum retirement age to 64. This imposes disproportionate harm on lower-income workers, whose working lives tend to be shorter than others’. They also want to reduce relative benefits for better-paid workers, and change the formula for cost-of-living increases to one that looks like it would customarily produce lower COLAs.

Bloomberg summarized a range of reactions: U.S. Debt Proposal Would Cut Social Security, Taxes, Medicare A few quotes:
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