Posted on 08/28/2011 3:46:33 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
OTTUMWA, Iowa - Riding high in the polls, Gov. Rick Perry rode into Iowa on Saturday with tough talk on President Obama, the economy and foreign policy and a declaration that Social Security is not only a Ponzi scheme but a "monstrous lie" for younger people.
"If you're for the status quo in America, I'm not your guy," Perry told an overflow crowd eager to see the presidential candidate at The Vine Coffeehouse, where people repeatedly sang God Bless America - once to try to encourage Perry to come in from shaking hands with people outside.
Asked by a woman in the crowd about Social Security being viewed as an entitlement program, Perry reiterated the suggestion in his anti-Washington book, Fed Up!, that the program amounts to a Ponzi scheme.
"It is a Ponzi scheme for these young people. The idea that they're working and paying into Social Security today, that the current program is going to be there for them, is a lie," Perry said. "It is a monstrous lie on this generation, and we can't do that to them."
Later, in Des Moines, when a reporter asked about the suggestion that his campaign was backing off some positions in the staunch states-rights book, Perry said, "I haven't backed off anything in my book. So read the book again and get it right."
National conversation
He told the Ottumwa crowd that for people who are drawing Social Security or near eligibility "like me," he wasn't proposing a change in the program. But he said there should be a national conversation about potential changes for others, including raising the age of eligibility and establishing a threshold based on a person's means.
(Excerpt) Read more at chron.com ...
If SS is “means tested” then it just becomes a senior citizens welfare program - a money redistribution program for those who didn’t save while at the same time punishing those who did.
You can’t have it both ways.
Perry speaks on S.S. after the 1/2 way mark in this 12 minute audio of Perry at a press conference.
The WHOLE thing is great.
No matter how you look at it, once we’re talking about the elderly, we will be taking care of them one way or another...even if they didn’t provide for themselves when younger. That doesn’t mean they should be enriched and in luxury, but it does mean that if you take social security altogether away, we will be taking care of the elderly in some way or another.
Social security has provided an excuse for the children of the elderly to not step up to the plate and directly take care of - be responsible for - their parents. It is wrong to push that responsibility on to others. There were also direct consequences for not having children. Children that would later take care of you.
We now have big daddy government to push the elderly off on.
Just a few more nails in the coffin of the family unit. And we wonder what happened to the family...
I've got a slogan for him.
Hope and Change.
Hope FOR Change!
Means testing will be a humiliation to the Rooseveltians. It would admit failure just as much as privatization.
Better yet:
VOTE for Change!
AMEN...AMEN...AMEN!!!!
AMEN...AMEN...AMEN!!!!
I am liking this guy more every day.
Boy, three pro-Perry posts before 6 AM Texas time this morning. You’re even working harder to promote St. Rick than the RINOs (Allahpundit and Ed Morrissey) at Hot Air. And, that’s saying something.
Move over Governor Christie.
Perry will get the same reaction as Christie did and as a certain casino mogul did. Watch Perry's poll numbers.
That’ll go over well with all those folks in Florida who are dependent on Social Security.
Oh, the libs are gonna hate that! "Another gaffe", "more anger", "crazy talk", "lies!". I can hear it all now.
He said that any changes won't affect those on SS now or in the near future...so all those Florida retirees are safe.
He's talking about a long term fix for future generations.
Perry was right that outspoken criticism of Social Security can be a headache for a politician. Last Thursday, he was confronted by protesters who said he called the program unconstitutional; he responded, ABC News reported, by putting “a generous piece of popover in his mouth” and saying, “I’ve got a big mouthful.” Outside the restaurant, protesters yelled, “Hands off Social Security and Medicare!”
That same day, Perry’s campaign put forth word that the candidate was essentially repudiating his earlier stance on Social Security. As the Wall Street Journal reported, Perry communications director Ray Sullivan said he hadn’t heard Perry suggest Social Security is unconstitutional and cast “Fed Up” as “a review and critique of 50 years of federal excesses, not in any way as a 2012 campaign blueprint or manifesto.” The book, Sullivan told The Journal, is “a look back, not a path forward.”
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-20095591-503544.html
Man’s on a roll!
Very good point, DB.
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