About
Learn More about our progressive online community for the Granite State.

Create an account today (it's free and easy) and get started!
Menu

Make a New Account

Username:

Password:



Forget your username or password?


Search




Advanced Search


The Masthead
Managing Editors


Jennifer Daler

Contributing Writers
elwood
Mike Hoefer
susanthe
William Tucker

ActBlue Hampshire

The Roll, Etc.
Prog Blogs, Orgs & Alumni
Bank Slate
Betsy Devine
birch, finch, beech
Democracy for NH
Live Free or Die
Mike Caulfield
Miscellany Blue
Granite State Progress
Seacoast for Change
Still No Going Back
Susan the Bruce
Tomorrow's Progressives

Politicos & Punditry
The Burt Cohen Show
John Gregg
Krauss
Landrigan
Lawson
Pindell
Primary Monitor
Primary Wire
Scala
Schoenberg
Spiliotes
Welch

Campaigns, Et Alia.
Paul Hodes
Carol Shea-Porter
Ann McLane Kuster
John Lynch
Jennifer Daler

ActBlue Hampshire
NHDP
DCCC
DSCC
DNC

National
Balloon Juice
billmon
Congress Matters
DailyKos
Digby
Hold Fast
Eschaton
FiveThirtyEight
MyDD
The Next Hurrah
Open Left
Senate Guru
Swing State Project
Talking Points Memo

50 State Blog Network
Alabama
Arizona
California
Colorado
Connecticut
Delaware
Florida
Georgia
Idaho
Illinois
Indiana
Iowa
Kentucky
Louisiana
Maine
Maryland
Massachusetts
Michigan
Minnesota
Missouri
Missouri
Montana
Nebraska
Nevada
New Hampshire
New Jersey
New Mexico
New York
New York
North Carolina
North Dakota
Ohio
Ohio
Oklahoma
Oregon
Pennsylvania
Rhode Island
South Dakota
Tennessee
Texas
Texas
Utah
Vermont
Virginia
Washington
West Virginia
Wisconsin

Kelly Ayotte Wants to Steal Money From the Middle Class

by: Kathy Sullivan 2

Tue Aug 17, 2010 at 18:23:46 PM EDT


( - promoted by Dean Barker)

Kelly Ayotte wants to steal my money, and yours as well - unless you are about to retire.

According to the Concord Monitor,

Ayotte said she recognizes the need to reform entitlement programs, including Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. Though she would not change benefits for those about to retire, she said she would consider changing the eligibility age or instituting means testing for those still working.

http://findarticles.com/p/news...

Like many of Kelly's positions, she is a little squishy, in that she does not define "about to retire". But take someone like me. I have been paying into the Social Security system for about 40 years. I am 56, so I probably will keep working for a few more years - especially if Ayotte has her way and raises the eligibility age. So why does Kelly Ayotte want to steal the money I have been paying into the system for decades?  

Kathy Sullivan 2 :: Kelly Ayotte Wants to Steal Money From the Middle Class
This is an out and out assault on the middle class.  The wealthiest Americans, whose tax cuts she wants to protect, won't miss the check each month. It is middle class Americans, who worked hard and quietly built nest eggs in retirement and other funds to go along with their social security savings, who will suffer when Kelly Ayotte steals our social security savings.

Hmmm, savings stolen in an elaborate scheme, that reminds me of something, what is it that I am thinking of? Oh, well, it will come back to me.

But I digress.

The point is, Republicans like Ayotte want to steal our social security money, while at the same time advocating for tax cuts for the wealthiest of Americans. It is out and out class warfare on the middle class.  

I can just see the means testing now. After stopping at the Department of Citizenship, where you have to  prove grandma was not an illegal alien, you go to the Department of Means Testing, to argue over whether you are poor enough to collect your money.  What if you were a hardworking middle class person who did not save a lot of money because you put three or four children through college and grad school, and got hit with medical bills that your health insurance didn't cover? Will you be denied social security because you earned too much over your life?  Or what if you own a house, and just paid off your 30 year mortgage? Will Kelly Ayotte force you to sell your house and spend all the proceeeds on living expenses before you can qualify for getting your money our of social security?

That is the prospect that awaits us if Kelly Ayotte gets her way, because when Republicans talk about means testing for social security, they are talking about limiting it to people who are indigent. So maybe they won't have to raise the age for eligibility - people will have to keep working to pay the bills, because I also suspect that pittance that the Republicans will grudgingly pay out won't cover much.

To the barricades!

Tags: , , (All Tags)
Print Friendly View Send As Email
What if you have a 401(k) (4.00 / 1)
since pensions have gone out of style?  Will Kelly repeal the new finance reform law, which goes a little of the way toward making sure our retirement accounts have something left in them?  I am retiring at the end of the year, and will depend on that money for a little extra above and beyond our social security.  I am not happy with what the Republicans have done to our economy, and I would not trust them with a dollar of my money these days.
Kelly will tell us that financial innovation, a la Ponzi schemes, is essential to make the economy grow, or something, when all it is is a fancy form of stealing.  Wouldn't want to stop financial innovation, would we?

Too bad modern day republicans have forgotten John Winant: (4.00 / 4)
Cincinnati also was the scene of a major national radio address by the commission head in 1936. The year-old Social Security law was under withering attack from Republicans who decried big government spending, and a lawsuit that claimed the program overstepped the government's bounds.

Former Republican Gov. John G. Winant of New Hampshire, who was the first chairman of the Social Security Board, told The Enquirer on the night of his address that "without Social Security, no industrial democracy can live."

The Social Security Act has "protection against unemployment and old age that no private plan can sell us."

Winant's appearance was aimed at the populace and was political - and it appeared to work. The U.S. Supreme Court eventually ruled in favor of the program, and opposition was muted over the decade as the program ramped up

http://news.cincinnati.com/art...

"But, in the unlikely story that is America, there has never been anything false about hope." Si se puede. Yes we can.  


Conservatives think of government as the locus of power, (0.00 / 0)
rather than obligation.  They reject the concept of obligation entirely. Being self-reliant means not owing anybody anything ever.  It's a very juvenile sort of attitude.

[ Parent ]
Totally off-topic blast from the past: (0.00 / 0)
"What is clear is that I am a Sarah Palin Republican," said Stephen.

So, he'd serve for what, one year before quitting?


If I were to guess, (4.00 / 2)
I'd say that, given the keys to power, Ayotte and Co. wouldn't touch the retirement age of those over, say 49, knowing that folks tend to get informed and vote more as they age.

Instead they'll go after Gen X and the Millenials, who are generally speaking paying less attention to retirement.

But whoever is targeted for this theft, let's make sure to point out what it is - theft.

I put my earnings in the system for others.  I expect the same if I am lucky enough to reach retirement age.  I want "social" and "security" from Social Security.

birch, finch, beech


Attached to their insecurities. (0.00 / 0)
Some people get attached to their disabilities.  Make them their familiars and don't want to let go.  Conservatives, it seems, like feeling insecure and being scared.  

[ Parent ]

Connect with BH
     
Blue Hampshire Blog on Facebook
Powered by: SoapBlox