I got a letter from Joe Lieberman today. Unfortunately, he's one of my senators, and he replied to my letter that I wrote to him about 6 weeks ago. From this letter, Joe is definitely off the SS reservation. A few quotes:
"Social Security is a promise that cannot be broken and a commitment that cannot be compromised" (he then proceeds to compromise). . ."However the 'entitlement gap' the country is facing is a dire problem that cannot be ignored... In order to address this, we must expand our conventional political dialogue so we can put ourselves in a position of fiscal strength to grapple with the growing crisis of Social Security."
He goes on to plug for Senate Bill 1915--the Honest Government Accounting Act, and then addresses some of the plans introduced by the Presidential committee, saying he's against "the cuts in guaranteed Social Security benefits proposed by President Bush's Commission. . . "
"It appears that the President will propose reforms . . .that include a form of privitization, which I am concerned is not a sound approach." (This sounds like some very careful parsing to me, which makes him--Lieberman--sound like he is opposed to privitization, without actually ruling it out) "I am committed to safeguarding the Social Security safety net for seniors. The system needs to be reformed and I am open to proposed solutions. But on its face, the Presidents vision for fixing Social Security appears to cost too much, and could jeopardize Social Security for participants by funneling safety net investments into sometimes unreliable markets." Then he says he voted for the lockbox. Sorry this is so long, but what do you think? Does he sound as wishy-washy to you as he does to me?