"There's only one solution to this.... sunset Social Securirty and Medicare. Voluntarily eliminate your own entitlement, and continue to bear the existing Social Security and Medicare tax burden to clean up the remaining unfunded liabilities."

She lays it out better than most.

The problem:



The solution:



I agree with this lady, but I don't know how to make it happen.

The second video is more important; watch it if you don't have the time or patience for both.

Sacrifice, yes. Also, people need to be open to life and therefore have more children. That's the real issue, but it violates PC and the prevailing dogma so we can't talk about it.

_________________
THE TIMES are nightfall, look, their light grows less;
The times are winter, watch, a world undone:
They waste, they wither worse; they as they run
Or bring more or more blazon man’s distress.
And I not help. Nor word now of success:
All is from wreck, here, there, to rescue one—
Work which to see scarce so much as begun
Makes welcome death, does dear forgetfulness.
Or what is else? There is your world within.
There rid the dragons, root out there the sin.
Your will is law in that small commonweal…
G.M. Hopkins.

I think only the Democrats can be capable of doing entitlement reform.

Yes, you heard me.

Simply because the retirees in that case (and the soon-to-be retirees) will have nowhere to go.

The Swedish socialists did this in 1996, cutting social security that is. The system was collapsing and the economy was pushed down. We had just gotten out of a financial crisis where our country nearly had gone bankrupt, and now the recovery was slow because of the pension problem (among other factors). So they just announced quietly (no debate, no big press conferences) one day that social security was to be changed and now, if you wanted a pension that you could live on and not just survive on, you better gamble your money in the stock market. The state would help you by providing you a list of around 600 government-approved mutual funds, but other than that, you were on your own. Some of these funds were low-risk of course (investing in government bonds for instance), so it didn't have to be a gamble. But if you wanted the same pension you would have gotten in the old system, you had to take on some risk for sure.

So how did people react? They were outraged, in particular those close to retirement. But where would they go? The Socialist party is the most left it goes (yes, there is a communist party, but they're not credible and have never had any power). The right-winged parties had supported this reform for decades, so they weren't an alternative. And in Sweden, where our MPs aren't elected directly (you vote for party, not person), there was nothing the party grassroots could do about it.

Guess what? Pensions are higher today than they used to be. People still complain of course, in particular when the stock market falls, but overall it's better. Somehow, the private sector can give you a better return and a higher pension than the government bureaucrats can. Who would have thought?

The democrats would have to take the initiative to reforming entitlements, I'm afraid, and the Republicans would have to just passively support whatever they did and promise not to exploit their reform in the following election campaign. There would be no alternative to the left.

This is also why entitlement reform most likely won't happen until it's way too late.

That's interesting. Thanks for sharing.

I tend to think you're right, that the D's will actually have to summon up some courage on this one; especially if the Republicans don't take the Senate or the Presidency in 2012.

_________________
THE TIMES are nightfall, look, their light grows less;
The times are winter, watch, a world undone:
They waste, they wither worse; they as they run
Or bring more or more blazon man’s distress.
And I not help. Nor word now of success:
All is from wreck, here, there, to rescue one—
Work which to see scarce so much as begun
Makes welcome death, does dear forgetfulness.
Or what is else? There is your world within.
There rid the dragons, root out there the sin.
Your will is law in that small commonweal…
G.M. Hopkins.

I think a lot of democrats will "see the light", but only once Obama is gone. He is such a charismatic and, for them, strong leader that I doubt anyone would dare to "rebel" against him.

It's actually happened. It took a Republican congress combined with a Democrat in the White House to pass the welfare reform in the 90's. The Republican party has been in disarray since 2008 and didn't have the strength to win both houses in 2010. If they had real progress might have been made. Of course that would also mean Obama would have dramatically increased his chances of getting re-elected. You decide whether that would be better then what we have now.

_________________
Judith Martinez
"It is true poverty for a child to die so that we may live as we wish."