It’s not that Obama won’t fire him that infuriates me. It’s that he appointed him in the first place:
If Social Security is “a cow with 310 million tits”then what’s the proper metaphor for veteran’s benefits? We don’t know. But Alan Simpson seems to think they’re too expensive. Or too overused. Or something. Anyway, it’s bad.
“The irony (is) that the veterans who saved this country are now, in a way, not helping us to save the country in this fiscal mess,” said Alan Simpson, co-chair of the White House’s fiscal commission, according to the Associated Press.
Simpson was referring specifically to the disability benefits the Department of Veterans Affairs dispenses to Vietnam veterans exposed to Agent Orange.
According to AP, Simpson declined to comment on whether this issue would be examined by the commission. But as TPM has reported, some members of the commission have sought to prioritize cuts to service members and veteran benefits over other defense spending cuts.
The President and his administrators and apologists remind me of Forest Gump’s girlfriend in that movie, who kept going back to the exciting abusive men (Wall Street, the Generals, Rahm Emmanuel, Robert Rubin, etc) while poor devoted Forest is standing by to do anything in the world for her, making up every excuse in the world for her behavior.
I never saw then end of the movie, it was too sad. What happened to her finally?
Well, she eventually got clean, had a baby, went home to Forrest, she had AIDS, he married her and then she died. The end! (Plus, the kid was his.)
Obama not only appointed Simpson, but every single one of his appointees to the Cat Food Commission was a deficit hawk and most had spoken publicly about making changes to SocSec which would actually be cuts. The Repubs, of course, used their appointments to further load the commssion with deficit hawks (on social spending only) and anti-social safety net programs such as SocSec and Medicare.
Among the appointees by the Dems, there are, what, a couple of strong SocSec supporters? One?
Obama created the commission and stacked it with those who would vote as he wanted.
He wants and has wanted to make cuts to SocSec benefits, and he did tell us that during the primary and general election…sometimes, of course, only to the elites at this private fundraisers.
BTW, Brian Williams is clearly an elite — I believe Obama spoke truth to him about his objectives. Debt and deficit cuts, which for Obama means cuts to SocSec, Medicare, and Medicaid. Also, he told a primary fundraiser, to education. (Or, better yet, destroy teachers’ unions so they’re easy prey for “cheap labor” proponents.)
Last night, when Obama talked about the importance of jobs, he was speaking to us rubes. I did not hear him say anything about using the power of government to proactively provide work (and some income) for people, but I may have missed that.
However, I must emphasize that what he says to the rubes, potential voters, is not necessarily what he intends to actually do or wants to do. I think he has pretty strong track record to support that by now. It’s there to be seen, except for the Kool-Aid drinkers and MCM stenographers (until the MCM turns on him totally)….