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The Wall Street Journal reports on how Obama is shying away from any real fixes to Social Security and Medicare in his deficit reduction plan.
The decision to exclude Social Security, and discussions inside the White House about what to propose on Medicare, come as Mr. Obama and his top aides are trying to keep attention on his plan to create jobs, the top concern in voter surveys...[Democrats] argue that by proposing controversial changes to entitlement programs, Mr. Obama could undercut Democratic arguments against the GOP on these points in 2012.
This comes a week after Obama said this in his jobs speech:
Millions of Americans rely on Medicare in their retirement. And millions more will do so in the future. They pay for this benefit during their working years. They earn it. But with an aging population and rising health care costs, we are spending too fast to sustain the program. And if we don’t gradually reform the system while protecting current beneficiaries, it won’t be there when future retirees need it. We have to reform Medicare to strengthen it.
It sounds like he may not be proposing much of anything on entitlements after all. Anything, that is, that will truly make a serious dent in the deficit.
The Democrats are fundamentally unable to do anything about entitlements. The Journal article quotes former OH governor Ted Strickland as saying, "Discussion of raising the age for Medicare eligibility would be very disturbing to me." [The idea] "should be taken off the table."
His quote sums it all up. Even though people are living longer - a lot longer - than when the eligibility age was established, the program as designed is sacrosanct.
And without taking on these sacrosanct entitlements, the deficit simply cannot mathematically be addressed.
Obama's cynicism is no longer benefitting him. He is growing so irrelevant that, in the words of his former spokesman Bill Burton, "it’s going to be impossible for the president to win" without a strong grassroots turnout.
His jobs speech did nothing to improve his political standing, because at heart, Americans knew his plan didn't really have anything to do with creating real jobs in the private sector. It was hard all along imagining him giving a deficit reduction speech that would convince Americans that he's serious about the deficit if he tip-toes around entitlements.
He is giving Republicans so many pieces of ammunition that he will wish he never gave his speeches. One does wonder why he has chosen to do this instead of just passing on addressing the deficit - as he has done all year. Short of a big, surprise course correction that involves serious reforms to the biggest drivers of our debt, he would do better just to leave the deficit debate to Congress.
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