UPDATE BELOW: McCain dodges privatization question on CNN ...
Chuck Todd set the stage this morning on the Today Show, discussing the big move to Obama among seniors:
If we see that shift of seniors stay with Obama, that's the difference between this being a state-by-state battle for those 270 electoral votes, and some sort of electoral landslide. If seniors move, that's Florida, that's Ohio, that's Indiana, that's all of those remaining toss-up states.
Over the past month, Obama has given seniors plenty of reasons to be confident in his leadership, and is likely reminding many of them of the steady confidence exuded by FDR.
Meanwhile, the stock market crash is a vivid reminder of McCain's dangerous position in support of privatizing Social Security:
I'm totally in favor of personal savings accounts .... I campaigned in support of President Bush's proposal and I campaigned with him, and I did town hall meetings with him.
The big argument in support of the corporate-sponsored Bush/McCain privatization plan was that future retirees would get a greater rate of return on the stock market than with the guaranteed government securities in which the Trust Funds are currently invested, which were up 5.25% in 2007.
Stocks are now down 40% since October 2007.
As Obama has pointed out when the market crash began in September:
"If my opponent had his way, the millions of Floridians who rely on it would’ve had their Social Security tied up in the stock market this week. Millions would’ve watched as the market tumbled and their nest egg disappeared before their eyes," he said. "I know Senator McCain is talking about a ‘casino culture’ on Wall Street – but the fact is, he’s the one who wants to gamble with your life savings and that is not going to happen when I’m president. When I’m President, we’re not going to gamble with Social Security."
Not only do seniors have reason to be concerned about McCain's support for privatization, they also have seen him relentlessly promote "Joe the Plumber," who had to say about Social Security last week on national television:
Social Security is a joke.... Social Security, never believed in it, don't like it. I hate that it's forced on me.
Three days after that denunciation of Social Security, John McCain continued to embrace Joe, making clear:
Joe the Plumber is now speaking for me
John McCain might not be quite as direct as Joe the Plumber in his opposition to Social Security, but he is a consistent supporter of the privatization scheme the right has cooked up to undermine the basic foundations of Socials Security:
I favor strongly retirement savings accounts, personal savings accounts, whatever you want to call them.
Democrats have a different record:
Democrats created Social Security after the Republicans led us into the Great Depression.
Democrats saved Social Security from the Bush/McCain privatization scheme before the modern Republican recession.
And Democrats join with all Americans in giving thanks today that Social Security is not invested in the volatile stock market, but instead, in secure, guaranteed accounts backed by the full faith and credit of the United States Government and earning a steady rate of return.
Democrats also remember history: after the stock market crash in 1929, it took a quarter of a century for the market to recover all its losses. And while the cheerleaders for privatization like to claim stocks always go up in the long term, if you put your retirement in the stock market in April 1998 -- more than 10 years ago -- you've lost money as of today.
But ... but ... but ... John McCain said in the first debate:
A lot of us saw this train wreck coming.
So he and his supply-side supporters must have warned folks that the economy and the stock market were in danger? Right?
We’re in a long sustained period of economic growth.
- John McCain, March 2007
[W]ho does [McCain] turn to for advice? His answer is reassuring. His foremost economic guru is former Texas Sen. Phil Gramm (who would almost certainly be Treasury Secretary in a McCain administration). He’s also friendly with the godfather of supply-side economics, Arthur Laffer.
- Wall Street Journal, November 2005
I've never seen the U.S. stock market so well positioned as it is now.
- Arthur Laffer, Supply-Side Economist, January 19, 2007 (Dow still at 12,565)
If we can get through this period, I think we’ll see a quick recovery.
- Phil Gramm, July 9, 2008 (Dow still at 11,147)
The Dow is now a 8,519, down from its high last October of 14,164.
A lot of people saw the train wreck coming ... but none of those people was named John McCain, Phil Gramm or Art Laffer.
UPDATE: There was just a segment on CNN's Situation Room in which Wolf Blitzer recapped his conversation earlier today with McCain about privatization. Blitzer noted that McCain "really didn't want to answer" the question about whether the Bush/McCain plan to privatize 10% of funds in Social Security accounts was a bad idea. Interesting, Ed Rollins had no hesitation in saying it was obviously a bad idea in retrospect (he said something to the effect of, "thank God that didn't happen" -- I'll update with an exact quote when the transcript is available).
Here's the transcript of the relevant portion of the Blitzer/McCain interview:
BLITZER: Let's talk a little bit about your support -- and correct me if I'm wrong -- you did support President Bush's plan to overhaul Social Security and allow Social Security recipients to use about 10 percent of their Social Security savings in the stock market. That collapsed, obviously. It didn't go forward.
Knowing what we know now about the volatility of the stock market, is that still a good idea?
MCCAIN: The reason why the talks collapsed is because the Democrats insisted on agreeing to tax increases before we sat down. So let's understand history.
BLITZER: What about Social Security investments ...
MCCAIN: That's what they wanted to do. And all this other stuff was worth negotiating. And I will protect as president of the United States the Social Security benefits of retirees and future retirees. I will protect those benefits, and I'll do whatever's necessary to protect those benefits, and I've said that time over time.
Every even-numbered year, Democrats run out, scare the senior citizens, say they're going to raise your taxes, they're going to destroy Social Security. Same old stuff. I've seen it for more years than I can count.
I'm not scaring any senior. I'm going to preserve their -- protect their Social Security benefits, despite what ads may be run. And the senior citizens, as well as all citizens in this country ...
BLITZER: And the notion of using 10 percent in the stock market?
MCCAIN: ... They know about how I'm going to fix Social Security. And I'm going to make their Social Security the best I can, and we'll preserve the benefits that they have, and I'll protect Social Security.
BLITZER: And the 10 percent?
MCCAIN: And I'll protect Social Security, and I'll sit down at the table with the Democrats. And by the way, we can keep -- you know, this is -- I'll give you -- I'm telling ...
BLITZER: This is an important issue.
MCCAIN: ... I'm going to protect Social Security, and that's what I've done my entire career. And I will do what Ronald Reagan and Tip O'Neill did, and that is save Social Security and make Americans aware that, unfortunately, present-day retirees have -- working Americans today are not going to receive the same benefits as present-day retirees unless we fix it. And I think I can convince the American people that we'll sit down together.
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Cross-posted at Tall Tales
Excerpts from Yeah, Right: "This Economy Is Strong" and Other Tall Tales (pages 23, 60, 73)
Online Sources: McCain; WSJ; Gramm; Laffer
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