in case you were wondering, george w. bush is a liar. i agree that social security needs to be reworked, but in my opinion (which matters precious little in dc) we should divert at least a third of our defense spending to non-military aspects of our budget. that said, perhaps republikkkan voters remember w saying that he would not cut social security benefits when he was campaigning. now, he says that he will be doing so, but only for those taxpayers who can afford it. he reassured the old folks and the aging folks by saying anyone born before 1950 would see no difference in their benefits whatsoever.
i'm all for those who can afford it tightening their belts a little to help everyone who can't; hell, what kind of semi-anarchist/quasi-communist/moderately anti-capitalist would i be if i weren't. however, it is still the middle class who will end up paying for the bulk of this anyway. since every retiree currently receives the same amount of benefits (give or take a little) from social security, the middle class (who outnumber the rich) will end up giving up more than the rich, even though the rich can afford it more. this whole line of bullshit was tailor made to avoid raising the limit on what payroll levels can be taxed. (not that i really know a lot about tax law, but my mom is an accountant, so here's a rough idea as i understand it. payroll taxes must be paid by businesses up to a certain level of payroll, let's say up to $100,000 per employee taxable income. if an employee were paid more than $100,000, no payroll taxes would need to be paid on the amount over $100,000. trust me, this is primarily a tax sheltering mechanism for the well to do, not a small business owner protection.)
instead of making the wealthy take a little hurt, he's swinging at the little guy and the middle guy again. i don't much want to go to prison, so i'll continue trying to tell people about it instead of doing anything about the root problem, but if anyone were to make a few deletions from the rolls of the republikkkan party, i would not be too upset. i might throw you a party. hell, if i ever try to hold political office, i'll declare a holiday for you. someone, some nutjob with a gun (i'll temporarily lift my usually anti gun stance), please?
skullfuck bush.