Social Security
From Zanecorpwiki
I think we all found un-deserved familiarity a bit offensive. I'm not talking about artificial familiarity like forms of address... that certainly offends some, but I don't much care what you call so long as it's not an insulting. I'm all for casting aside class distinctions.
However, I do resent when others assume they're familiar with my views. Specifically, I hate "call to action" emails that start off telling me how horrified I should be when, in fact, I support the thing they're assuming I'm against.
This has happened with both general political groups as well as issue specific groups. Even when there's close alignment, it's never complete. Even when I do agree, I find it offensive that they assume I agree.
But the political calls to action are the worst. I've got 4-6 emails today about how I need to sign petitions to stop Obama from giving any ground on social security and/or Medicaid and/or Medicare. Now there are certainly many changes to these programs that I would oppose, but they all need to spend less money in the long term. How you do that is certainly very tricky and I might not like the cuts being proposed, but the emails don't talk about specific problems, just with a general willingness to deal.
I WANT politicians to talk about these programs. As it is, they're all going to cost me more money than I ever see any benefit and it's already pretty much guaranteed I'll be subsidizing my parent's generation. I'm fine with some social transfers and I'm not totally opposed to subsidizing care and even lifestyle for the elderly, but it's something we should absolutely be looking at. I find it quite offensive that "the Left" expects me to provide unlimited subsidy without debate.
Personally, I'd like to expand the safety net, but I also believe that dismantling Social Security and Medicare as they exist today is a pre-requisite to that expansion. The way Medicare pays doctors is at the heart of unsustainable health care increases in this country and every rational analysis I've seen indicates that you could dramatically cut Medicare (esp. if you talk about cuts over a decade) and it would provide IMPROVED services. The only people that benefit from the current structure are administrators and insurance companies. Restructuring, and ultimately cutting these programs (vis-a-vie current projected levels of spending) should be a non-partisan issue.
I actually don't mind taxes. I wouldn't mind paying a higher rate even. But I do resent the SS and Medi* taxes in particular. It's clearly a scam since I know I'll never collect on the "contributions". To liberal politicians, I want to say: stay rational. Fix these programs. Protect the social safety net, but sometimes that means you have to cut out snarls and make repairs.
