Peace activists and progressives are the only people that I've heard connect war spending in Afghanistan and Pakistan with our financial security at home -- until now, that is. Yesterday House Minority Leader John Boehner made the connection explicit, telling reporters and editors for the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review that we need to cut Social Security benefits to pay for the AfPak military effort. As the Tribune-Review staff reported:
Ensuring there's enough money to pay for the war will require reforming the country's entitlement system, Boehner said. He said he'd favor increasing the Social Security retirement age to 70 for people who have at least 20 years until retirement, tying cost-of-living increases to the consumer price index rather than wage inflation and limiting payments to those who need them.
All that money you paid into Social Security so you could get its benefits? That income you were counting on for rent and food in your old age? According to John Boehner, the government needs it for drone missiles and nation-building, most of it to be spent in a nation with "at most 50 to 100 Al Qaeda" members still in it.
Mind you, this isn't "gotcha" reporting from an unfriendly outlet. The Tribune-Review is a conservative newspaper, and this account provides a favorable outlet for Boehner to present his case to voters without anything as inconvenient or messy as, say, fact-checking.
Where, oh where to begin? In the first place, this comment serves as a further rebuke to the slanted "deficit cutting" media exercise conducted this weekend by the AmericaSpeaks organization (and redirected back to reality somewhat by its participants). Participants in that event were told they needed to find cuts among other government programs and Social Security entitlements (misleadingly packaged in with the rest of Federal spending, rather than appearing as a separate and historically self-funded program). Defense spending figures were kept artificially low by excluding our current wars and withdrawal from Afghanistan was not included in the list of deficit-cutting reductions for defense in the event's "options workbook."
To further tilt the exercise, participants were only given the option of cutting military spending across-the-board by various percentages (up to a maximum of 15%), with the consequences described in ways like this: "... (T)hese cuts would mean an even more reduced U.S. leadership role around the world ... lower benefits and less training for the troops and less effective weapons and other equipment with which to fight." ) Peace in AfPak as a deficit reduction move wasn't an option.
Yet here we have John Boehner, the Man Who Would Be Speaker, laying out the connection in black and white: We have to cut Social Security to pay for the war.
What about the specific changes Boehner is proposing? Deficit hawks keep saying that raising the eligibility age is not a "benefit cut," but of course it is. (It's a good bet that everybody making that argument has a desk job.) He misstates the way annual inflation adjustments are made, but his intent appears to be a slower rate of annual increase (and possibly a lower initial calculation of benefits earned -- it's not clear).
As for "limiting payments for those who need them," who decides who needs them and when? Means tests are a slippery slope, and penalties originally targeted for the well-to-do can quickly become painful for the middle class. (Ask any working couple that's had to pay the Alternative Minimum Tax). Middle-class families who have been budgeting for a retirement based on savings, pensions, and Social Security could find their plans ruined by this kind of test -- especially since savings have been battered and companies are cutting pensions.
This video shows that Boehner had other things to say about Social Security, too. "We're all living a lot longer," says Boehner, so "eventually getting the retirement age to seventy is a step that needs to be taken." But we're not living that much longer than we were in 1983, when Congress stabilized the program financially. He also says, "We need to look at the American people and explain to them that we're broke, and that if you have substantial non-Social Security income ... why are we paying you?" Um ... because you paid in to the program? The only alternative is to apply a payroll tax to wealthier people for benefits they'll never collect, which amounts to a very un-Republican-like tax on the rich, or allowing people to opt out of the program (which really would ruin it financially).
As for "we're broke," how many times does it have to be said that Social Security is not "broke." It's fully healthy for many more years, after which it's 75 percent healthy. How many governments -- or household budgets, for that matter -- are that un-- broke today?
Boehner is asked, "Where would you start, you personally, on entitlement reform?" He answers: "I think Social Security would be the most logical place to start." Be afraid, Americans. Be very afraid.
And as for those war comments: Conspiracy theorists may conclude that John Boehner is a closet peacenik, a Code Pink mole who wants to undermine public support for the war in Afghanistan. Why else would he confront the American people with an either/or choice between a popular social program and a war that so far has escaped intense public debate? Does he really think this is a "shock doctrine" moment he can use to gut Social Security? If that's an example of his political calculation, then the Democrats may have less to fear in November than they think.
The reality is that Republicans have been trying to gut Social Security for a long time, and Boehner's comments offer further proof of what they'll do if they get back into power. If Obama and the Democrats don't present themselves as a sharp contrast to the GOP on this issue -- something they've failed to do so far -- then even Boehner's poor judgement may not save them.
Richard (RJ) Eskow, a consultant and writer (and former insurance/finance executive), is a Senior Fellow with the Campaign for America's Future. This post was produced as part of the Curbing Wall Street project. Richard also blogs at A Night Light.
He can be reached at "rjeskow@ourfuture.org."
Website: Eskow and Associates