In fairness, I thought I should modify this post with information provided to me by Sen. Sander's office, that five or ten Democrats are expected to co-sponsor once the bill has been introduced. Still it's hardly the number one would expect given public sentiment and the draconian nature of attacks on Social Security.
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Well, Sen. Bernie Sanders has proposed a bill that would protect Americans' Social Security benefits for the next seventy-five years...and absolutely no one is co-sponsoring it.
That's right, one of the most popular public programs of all times has only a single champion today.
Why, you might ask, is that?
Bernie's plan is simple: all Americans with incomes over $250,000. should make contributions to Social Security on that higher income, the same as they and everyone else does on income below that amount.
I don't know about you, but around my house that sounds eminently reasonable.
Contrary to what Republicans would have us all believe, Social Security is not insolvent. It is in danger of nothing so much as the sinister Right's scheme to divert our public investment into private pockets.
The reason other Senators won't touch this bill with a ten foot poll, even though most Americans would say, "Hell, yes!" if the question were put to them, is simply because, under the current campaign financing system, money makes policy; and saving Social Security will not serve the monied-class agenda of the Right.
"Money makes policy." In fact, let's be perfectly honest and chuck that dated sentiment, "E pluribus unum" and replace it with "Money makes policy." "Out of many, one" couldn't be much farther from the truth. Citizens United simply sealed the deal.
Cruelly selfish positions such as those espoused by the current crop of Tea Party Republicans used to be carefully avoided as "politically incorrect" so long as an immigrant working class still had the ear of its government. In our new post-democracy, politicians have only to please stateless corporations, the uber-rich and their bizarre puppets on the far right in order to ensure the kind of media investment necessary to bring home the bacon.
Up is down and down is up if they say so; and no matter how many independent economists debunk Reaganomics, if it fits the meme of the power class, we're stuck with it.
The resounding moral cowardice of Congress when presented with almost any opportunity to ease pain and fear among our most vulnerable populations truly makes me sick.
I'm growing doubtful of our ability to survive these difficult times as a nation even vaguely resembling the fortress of ethical compassion that we once were. |
