Social Insecurity: Hardball Asked a Good Question

Hat tip to Pete Peterson and Paul Krugman who appeared on Tuesday’s edition Hardball and did terrific jobs of addressing the issues over Chris Matthews’ annoying interruptions. Speaking of annoying, Chris made the mistake of also including Brian Wesbury whose misrepresentations included:

first is that we already have a $10 trillion unfunded liability in Social Security. That debt‘s already out there…The budget deficit is somewhere in the $300 billions right now…Using personal accounts in Social Security does not take away helping people that truly need help…In fact, Paul Krugman wrote in 1996, 1997, in “The Boston Review” that this is a ponzi scheme.

Dr. Krugman corrected Wesbury’s last misrepresentation there. But let’s give Chris credit for asking Wesbury this:

MATTHEWS: Why—why is that—why do you know that to be a sound idea? And let me ask you this. If I‘m working at a factory and I‘m 42 years old and there‘s an accident in the factory, and I get hurt badly and I can‘t work again…

WESBURY: Right.

MATTHEWS: … who‘s—now the government pays that money because it‘s a Social Security insurance program.

WESBURY: Right.

MATTHEWS: Who‘s going to pay that money if I haven‘t paid in enough

in the new

WESBURY: Well…

MATTHEWS: Who‘s going to—I‘m—I‘ve invested all my money in the stock market.

WESBURY: Right.

MATTHEWS: I just got hurt. I can‘t work. Well, what, am I stuck then?

Wesbury kept dodging this as if it were merely a hypothetical question. But at the end of the day, all he said was the government would always take of these type of people. Yes – by having a social insurance program, which is the program that Wesbury is advocating getting rid of. Yes, the GOP is pushing Social Insecurity.