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Graham: Reduce benefits for wealthy seniors
Charleston City Paper ^ | 2011-01-02 | Greg Hambrick

Posted on 01/02/2011 10:24:47 AM PST by rabscuttle385

Seniors should be older before the receive Social Security and wealthy Americans should receive less benefits across the board, says Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C.

He made the argument in an interview on Sunday's Meet the Press, but it's a position Graham has advocated for on the stump in South Carolina, including a 2009 stop at The Citadel with Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz.

"What I'm going to do is challenge this country to make some hard decisions," Graham said at the time, telling the crowd of cadets, Tea Partiers, and Graham supporters that they shouldn't give Congress a pass on the tough stuff.

(Excerpt) Read more at charlestoncitypaper.com ...


TOPICS: Breaking News; Crime/Corruption; Government; News/Current Events; US: South Carolina
KEYWORDS: 0pansification; 0pansy; 0ponzi; 112th; doasisaynotasido; fascism; greeniguana; lindseygraham; linseedgrahamnesty; mcbama; mccaintruthfile; mclame; mclamesbff; mclameslapdog; mclamespoodle; mcqueeg; medicare; metrosexual; rino; socialinsecurity; socialism; socialist; socialsecurity; southcarolina; spain4just75000day; wagyabeef4only100lb
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To: SgtHooper

You realize that reducing Congressional salaries would solve nothing, right?


181 posted on 01/02/2011 1:20:08 PM PST by danieltl
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To: drbuzzard
They pulled off a major overhaul of welfare back in the 90s under a Democratic president. That proves you are utterly wrong.

Tell me which welfare program Clinton & congress "killed" and I'll happily admit I was off base.

Otherwise I'll assume you're just blowing smoke.

182 posted on 01/02/2011 1:20:37 PM PST by skeeter
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To: rabscuttle385

Cut Legislative pay to the average Social Security benefit, and then put Legislators on Social Security Retirement.


183 posted on 01/02/2011 1:21:01 PM PST by Concho (-)
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To: rcofdayton

>The wealthy pay the most into the social security system. They get the least percentage of wages out of the system and now the liberals want to take all of it away. If they accomplish that then the time to start shooting has arrived. Remember Social Security was supposed to be insurance but has become part welfare. We need to defeat this POS.

That fact that you bought into the lies about it being insurance is the problem. It never was, and never will be insurance. It is a transfer payment from future generations to current ones. That is how it has always been and it is the very nature of the system. It is a ponzi scheme. Those never work in the long term and someone is always left holding the bag. The only thing which can be changed is how screwed you leave the ones holding the bag.


184 posted on 01/02/2011 1:21:11 PM PST by drbuzzard (different league)
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To: B Knotts
"It has been known for some time that this is necessary, but Democrats have resisted it, because they fear a reduction in political support for the program if it is not universal"

I'm astounded at the number of Freepers that don't understand this. Or the fact that without cuts to SS and Medicare we are left with only an increase in economy stifling tax increases and a prayer.

185 posted on 01/02/2011 1:22:42 PM PST by Mariner (USS Tarawa, VQ3, USS Benjamin Stoddert, NAVCAMS WestPac, 7th Fleet, Navcommsta Puget Sound)
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To: Mariner

I agree with you too, Mariner. We’ve got to take some steps to reduce spending. Cut benefits for those who can afford it, then work to cut the tax. Or do it the other way around. But do something now.


186 posted on 01/02/2011 1:23:40 PM PST by sand lake bar
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To: drbuzzard
You are correct. Many of the FReepers in this thread have it exactly backwards. A universal retirement program is explicitly socialist; a welfare program is merely an artifact of the welfare state.

It has always been the left who has opposed means testing, because they want a universal (e.g., socialist) system.

187 posted on 01/02/2011 1:24:19 PM PST by B Knotts (Just another Tenther)
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To: skeeter

>Tell me which welfare program Clinton & congress “killed” and I’ll happily admit I was off base.

>Otherwise I’ll assume you’re just blowing smoke

They didn’t kill it, but they drastically changed the way in which benefits were given out, and they cut welfare rolls drastically.

If you are trying to claim that the 90s welfare reform didn’t actually do anything, then you are either delusional or disingenuous.

I don’t expect to see much in the way of government programs killed, but cut back is a hell of a lot better than letting them go on full steam.

Heck, at least as a welfare program, it has some chance of reform and being pared back.


188 posted on 01/02/2011 1:24:58 PM PST by drbuzzard (different league)
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To: Mariner

I don’t understand it. For all the tea party rhetoric around here, it seems that many just don’t want to face economic reality and truly reform government and its budget.

Less payments means a smaller system and thus, a smaller government. I thought that’s what we were in favor of here.


189 posted on 01/02/2011 1:26:05 PM PST by B Knotts (Just another Tenther)
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To: B Knotts
There is no option. Either these programs are means-tested, or the whole pyramid scheme will soon come crashing down.

You are asking them to cut benefits without a complete plan to make SS viable, which is not going to be accepted. People who paid in will not accpt cuts to pay for people who have not paid in.

Means testing should be tied to a plan to cut benefits for those who have not apid in or reduce all benefits equally. You are promoting socialism and wealth distribution on a pure level. Why continue to save and work if you will get nothing while those who spend and are foolish with their income continue to receive benefits? Means test is stupid and will have unintended consequences, soon everyone will go Gault.

Lets start by prosecuting and or seizing the assets of the politicians responsible for this Ponzi scheme. Take away Congress's pay, pensions and graft and then go after their assets they received while in Congress. Make it a seizure of ill gotten gains from their continuing Ponzi fraud. Why not, it works for Drug seizures? Sure it would be hard to prove who did what, but that doesn't stop the govt from taking peoples stuff and making them go to court and prove their innocence in seizure cases now does it? On the other hand we can quit giving welfare to Illegals, SSI to those that did not pay in should be cut immediately, and other expansive programs should be cut to the bone. The party is over, we have run out of other people's money. Let those who ran this scheme pay for it not the innocent victims who were forced to pay into it.

190 posted on 01/02/2011 1:26:54 PM PST by rolling_stone ( *this makes Watergate look like a kiddie pool*)
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To: B Knotts

>I don’t understand it. For all the tea party rhetoric around here, it seems that many just don’t want to face economic reality and truly reform government and its budget.

Even the Tea Parties don’t always get it. I can still remember signs from the Tea Party rallies to the effect of “I don’t want your socialized medicine, and keep your hands off my medicare!”

The fact that someone could make such a sign is just pathetic.


191 posted on 01/02/2011 1:28:30 PM PST by drbuzzard (different league)
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To: B Knotts

Can someone explain to me why there is a Muslim crescent moon in the header of his Senatorial page. Check it out on his page.


192 posted on 01/02/2011 1:28:30 PM PST by Parmy
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To: B Knotts
I don't see anyone here supporting the system as it is.

What I do see are many who are fed up with constantly being the ones asked to give while other subgroups are allowed to continue right on taking without so much as a suggestion they do with less for a change.

For example, wasn't Lindsey advocating amnesty not long ago? Where was his concern about the costs of that little program?

193 posted on 01/02/2011 1:29:19 PM PST by skeeter
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To: rolling_stone

>Lets start by prosecuting and or seizing the assets of the politicians responsible for this Ponzi scheme.

I hate to break it to you, but FDR died a very long time ago.


194 posted on 01/02/2011 1:29:58 PM PST by drbuzzard (different league)
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To: anyone

I remember my father, a natural-born Conservative, bemoaning way,way back in the olden days, that SS would be the nation’s ruination. He was very wise.

To those who think “everybody should get everything they got coming” - where, oh where do you propose the money should come from?


195 posted on 01/02/2011 1:30:08 PM PST by gloryblaze (No tag yet)
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To: rabscuttle385

The best idea...

Make necessity the mother or American invention again.

Stop all welfare payments, free school breakfast, lunch, and dinners, all medicaid/medicare for able bodied persons, all coverages for illegal indigents, etc., etc. etc.

Poverty is not a luxery. Either work or create work.

Leave the seniors alone.


196 posted on 01/02/2011 1:32:21 PM PST by EBH ( Whether you eat your bread or see it vanish into a looter's stomach, is an absolute.)
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To: rolling_stone
You are promoting socialism and wealth distribution on a pure level.

You have it exactly backwards. In trying to preserve a bankrupt universal government-run retirement program, you are promoting explicit socialism

In addition, you are promoting bigger government.

The remedies you suggest, while they might sound nice, do not add up to numbers significant enough to make the programs solvent.

In addition to means-testing these programs, we need to privatize retirement for future retirees.

197 posted on 01/02/2011 1:32:49 PM PST by B Knotts (Just another Tenther)
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To: Parmy

That’s from the South Carolina flag.


198 posted on 01/02/2011 1:33:41 PM PST by B Knotts (Just another Tenther)
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To: gloryblaze
To those who think “everybody should get everything they got coming” - where, oh where do you propose the money should come from?

China, I reckon.

Honestly, I don't think they're even thinking that far.

199 posted on 01/02/2011 1:35:13 PM PST by B Knotts (Just another Tenther)
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To: B Knotts
Why stop with SS? How about we means test those who wish to take advantage of their 401ks and IRA?

I mean, whats the difference?

Its coming, folks.

200 posted on 01/02/2011 1:35:41 PM PST by skeeter
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