Grab your tin foil hats, folks. The Lexington Herald Leader is waxing eloquent about Social Security again.
The headline offered some hope: Social Security reality check. Could the left be coming around on actually discussing entitlement reform like adults? But, alas, it wasn't so. The editorial uses way too many words to suggest again that raising taxes for the 18th time will somehow do a more thorough job of repairing the system this time.
It's noteworthy that the last four paragraphs of their editorial could have almost been written by someone serious about the problem. Judge for yourself:
---------------------------------
There isn't a perfect plan, but it is time to craft a workable one so we can move on to other problems.
Medicare is in much more dire straits, and the deficit is spinning out of control. Social Security, for all the bombast these past many months, is an easy fix compared to those.
Of course, we could just flip the channel and ignore Social Security, Medicare and the deficit.
It worked for the Romans. The rulers offered free shows at the Coliseum, and a grateful public, eager to be entertained, filled the seats. It kept everyone distracted -- until the empire collapsed.
----------------------------------
But their proposal included eliminating the cap on earnings subject to the Social Security tax. This enormous income tax increase would hit businesses who employ the dreaded high income earners very hard. And even the far left knows what that means. Those taxes are passed along to consumers, hitting the lowest earners the hardest.
Still can't imagine how the Democrats on Capitol Hill would respond to real media scrutiny about their hard line against allowing taxpayer choice and ownership rights of Social Security.
It is shameful how their rhetoric staggers perilously close to the factual only to meander back into the dark recesses of the obstructionist's cave. They seem to understand that Social Security is one of the easier problems to handle and must properly be dispensed with so more pressing trials may be confronted. Tax increases, most of us know, won't get us past step one. And the only snake-oil solution is the do-nothing approach Democrats cling so fearfully to. But they are right to be afraid. If personal accounts pass, voters will face inescapable evidence that partisan Democrats are a gangrene appendage on the body politic.