And the President isn't going to apologize for it, nor will he repudiate the zombie lies that Mr Simpson continues to spew.
A quick look at the other Presidential appointments to his commission shows that the President was not interested in appointing people who have made any kind of deep commitment to saving the social safety net without hurting the American People it was created to protect.
Alice Rivlin's own deficit reduction proposal (in concert with Pete Domenici) includes a national sales tax, payroll tax holiday, lower corporate and top individual tax rates, spending freezes, and a more generously implemented version of Paul Ryan's Medicare phase-out.
David Cote, leader of defense contractor Honeywell is an avid union buster. Unionized Honeywell workers at a uranium plant in Illinois, along the Ohio River, are being locked out in stalled contract negotiations because they dared to report the improper storage of radioactive mud in the open air behind the plant (where it was leaking into the River). In retaliation, workers are being told to give up their pension, give up retiree healthcare, and increase their healthcare contributions to $8000/year. Meanwhile, the poorly trained scabs have been responsible for one massive explosion, one release of corrosive gas, and damage to one valve that released trace amounts of an incredibly deadly gas. Oh, and Mr Cote apparently focused on "freezing military pay, [and] making military people pay for their health care" while on the commission.
Ann Fudge is the quintessential Corporate American. She sits on the boards of General Electric, Unilever and Novartis. Her positions in corporate America have focused mostly on corporate propaganda. First she was at General Mills during its years of conglomeration. Then on to Kraft, making her way through a number of corner offices. And finally to Young and Rubicam, a marketing firm whose subsidiaries include Burson Marsteller, famed for defending the image of corporate criminals and military dictatorships.
Erskine Bowles is a zombie lie aficionado, paid hundreds of thousands of dollars by Wall Street bailout recipient Morgan Stanley every year. I'm going to guess that the folks who write Mr Bowles' paychecks were quite happy that his commission said nothing about taxing the speculation and finance that wrecked our economy, causing the deficit to increase.
Leaving us with Andy Stern. Was he supposed to be the one true sign of what the President really wanted from his Commission? Because given the slow, grinding setbacks that our unions' leadership have accepted these last few decades, I have a hard time imagining Mr Stern was in a position to win many converts to the case for not destroying the social safety net.
Alan Simpson's sole unique attribute among the President's appointees to his own Commission is that Mr Simpson won't shut up about how hard he wants to stick it to the serfs. The rest just know how to shut the hell up.