I’m naturally pre-disposed to hold Dwight Eisenhower in high regard. Besides bringing the Thousand Year Reich to an abrupt end, he is also a distant cousin on my maternal grandmother’s side. I like him even better after reading this passage from a letter he wrote to his brother on November 8, 1954:
Now it is true that I believe this country is following a dangerous trend when it permits too great a degree of centralization of governmental functions. I oppose this – some instances the fight is a rather desperate one. But to attain any success it is quite clear that the Federal government cannot avoid or escape responsibilities which the mass of the people firmly believe should be undertaken by it. The political processes of our country are such that if a rule of reason is not applied in this effort, we will lose everything – even to a possible and drastic change in the Constitution. This is what I mean by my constant insistence upon “moderation” in government. Should any political party attempt to abolish social security, unemployment insurance, and eliminate labor laws and farm programs, you would not hear of that party again in our political history. There is a tiny splinter group, of course, that believes you can do these things. Among them are H. L. Hunt (you possibly know his background), a few other Texas oil millionaires, and an occasional politician or business man from other areas. Their number is negligible and they are stupid.
(emphasis added). The numbers, or at least the influence, of people who believe that we can or should eliminate these things is no longer negligible. But their wisdom is the same as it ever was.
Eisenhower’s brand of Republicanism was the sort I was raised with; and the one with which I am most comfortable. And that’s why I look at what’s going on today and have to shake my head.
Newt Gingrich, of all people, looks at Paul Ryan and the House Republican plan to eviscerate Medicare and calls it a bridge too far. Rather than taking Gingrich’s comments as a call to back off, discuss, or reconsider its position on Medicare, the G.O.P. – at least the prominent national voices of the party – views this as an opportunity to double down on the Medicare position and to punish Gingrich for daring to give voice to heretical views.
Friends, in a political environment where Newt Gingrich is regarded as insufficiently conservative, a man such as Eisenhower would be hounded from the ranks as a communist or worse.
For the last 50 years there’s been a formula for Repulicans winning the Presidency – unify fiscal and social conservatives. Without both, no Republican is going to win national office. Eisenhower predated the change in that winning formula. Back when Ike ran, Republicans also got a sizable percentage of the African-American vote. Goldwater ran them off in 1964, and it’s never been the same. Goldwater is way too revered by some Republicans.
When Eisenhower wrote the above, Social Security was this great program that allowed young people to pay for old. The problem is that changes in our population structure (people live longer now, and there are less young people, since people are having less children nowadays) have greatly impacted social security’s viability.
Of course Eisenhower liked Social Security. His generation was part of the beginning of the greatest Ponzai scheme in our nation’s history. He, along with all Americans of his generation, escaped with great returns. It is the last generation of America, the one that will be stuck holding the bag, that we should be concerned about. This is the generation that will have contributed to Social Security for 20-30 years, and won’t see a penny of it returned.
I “ditto” Paul C.’s comments. He is exactly correct.
If taxes had remained at the level they were at during Ike’s tenure, funding Social Security wouldn’t be a problem. We’re not poor. If America were a family, it’d be like we decided to stop putting into the retirement account so Dad could have a Ferrari.
And, really, contributions to Social Security aren’t really the problem. The more regressive payroll taxes are, by and large, enough to fund Social Security if we’d leave that money alone. The problem is that we decided to forgo a good chunk of the more progressive general fund taxes and pay for general fund activities by borrowing from the Social Security funds. Now, for some reason, we have people making fiscal arguments about Social Security based on the notion that it’s somehow a second class creditor of the general fund; we’ll pay back China and Wall Street investors, but not the Social Security Trust Fund?
I won’t use the Limbaugh “ditto” term, but I completely agree with Doug on this one. The statement “won’t see a penny returned” is an exaggerated canard.
I agree with IKE that even today only “splinter groups” really want to cut Social Security, farm subsidies, unemployment insurance and labor laws. And Pauls: all Republican presidents over the past 50 years have overseen budgets that have increased federal spending and none of them cut these programs. Some GOP politicians like to talk about such cuts, but they never seem to get around to it — not that they should. Maybe it is because, as IKE said, they want to keep their jobs. So Pauls, if Republican presidents Nixon, Ford, Reagan, Bush and Bush II increased federal spending what does “fiscal conservative” really mean? A key difference between Bill Clinton and Bush II is that Bush II spent more federal dollars on a host of new and improved programs than did Clinton. Maybe if Al Gore had the chance to continue the liberal spending policies of Clinton we would have had more budget surpluses. Oh well, we will never know because, I guess, “social conservatives” help defeat him. Come to think of it, what are “social conservatives?” Do they want to cut social security, farm subsidies, unemployment insurance and labor laws or do they just want to talk about it? I think if IKE we here today he would say, “who cares? I have a country to run!”
I am not sure how to respond to Barry, other than to acknowledge that Reagan on up (I am too young to remember past that) have increased spending at a rate greater than inflation. To me, that is not part of fiscal conservativism, and I am ashamed of Bush’s domestic spending, including No Child Left Behind, which was a Democratic bill (people always seem to forget that).
However, if we want to be partisan about this subject (as you seem to want to do), I should point out that we had a pretty Republican Congress during the Clinton years, and… according to the Constitution, Congress is responsible for: (1) laying taxes, (2) pay the debts and pay for the common defense, not to mention the small fact that all revenue bills must be started in the House. Coincidentall (or not), the budget fights during the Clinton presidency withe the Republican House were…..wait for it, legendary, yet we avoided them with the past Democratic Congresses that authorized Bush II to spend every dollar he did.
Doug, I note that you use the word “taxes”, not the full “payroll taxes.” In 1950, payroll taxes were 3%. Today, they are 12.4%, and that 12.4% doesn’t even include Medicare. So it is hard to argue that “taxes” are the problem, considering we have increased the amount of “involuntary withholding by a factor 400%. I GUESS we could use regular taxes to support Social Security, but that certainly was not the intent under Eisenhower, and it is impossible to accurately state that Eisenhower would have still liked SS if he had known what it would turn into. Regarding your 2nd paragraph, I agree that it has been bad form to borrow from that fund, not sure why you assume that low taxes is the issue here, rather than increased spending (by both parties). BTW, I guess I should state that I admire Eisenhower quite a bit, and you are lucky to be related to him. The only area where I think he lacked vision is this very subject. His comments about the military complex held amazing foresight.
Ben: unless you happen to know how the whole end of the United States happens, my comment is in no way a canard. There are many possible scenarios where that would occur. The potential “rapture” tomorrow being just one of them. If the end of the world starts this weekend, I won’t see a dime of what I have involuntarily donated to SS.
Paul C. is dead wrong about No Child Left Behind being a Democratic bill. I was first proposed on Jan. 23, 2001 by George W. Bush, somewhat copying a similar initiative in the State of Texas when he was governor there. It was sponsored in the House of Representatives by Republican John Boehner and Democratic George Miller. In the Senate it was sponsored by Judd Gregg, a Republican, and Ted Kennedy, a Democrat. It was passed in both houses by wide margins and was truly a bipartisan bill, though one initiated by Bush the Lesser.
As to his charges that Clinton’s budget success was due to his having a Republican Congress to initiate spending bills, he is partly correct. As to his assertion that Bush’s spending excesses were due to having a Democratic controlled Congress, that’s complete hogwash. While a lot of Democrats may have voted for Bush spending excesses and irresponsible tax cuts, they only controlled the Congress for the last two of Bush’s eight years in office. Six of those spending bills were submitted and passed by Republican Congresses.
If taxes had remained at the level they were at during Ike’s tenure, funding Social Security wouldn’t be a problem.
There is absolutely no evidence of that. I mean, you can believe that, but it is just that, a belief.
Even if you took every single dollar of every American making over $250,000 (a 100% tax rate over 250k) you wouldn’t make our fiscal situation sound. We have a spending problem, not a tax problem.
I don’t think that you are going to get any argument from conservatives that past Republican presidents have spent too much, and that Republican congresses after, say 1998 or so, spent too much.
The 100% tax rate on $250k+ incomes sound bite is lazy and misleading, but it doesn’t surprise me that you would use it.
We have a multifacted problem of poor spending choices, inequitable and insufficient tax rates and a growing income inequality that feeds in to both sides of the spend vs tax equation.
Of course this rationale seems to be much too nuanced for many…
I don’t deny that taxes need to go up. I deny that taxes need to go up on the top bracket. I support tax reform similar to the President’s commission: get rid of the deduction for mortgage interest, make employer provided health insurance a taxable benefit, and CUT rates at the top.
But don’t kid yourself, as Doug is doing, that tax revenue solves any problem. We have a spending problem, mostly in the area of elderly entitlements.
BTW, Doug wants to go back to the Eisenhower tax rates. How about we go back to the Eisenhower era health insurance? Mandate that health insurance only pay for procedures that existed during the Eisenhower administration, and we have no Medicare problem. ;)
Slightly more seriously, everyone, especially the elderly, needs to pay for more of their own health care, it is pretty much that simple.
Don’t confuse the terms “abolish” and “reduce”. No one can abolish those programs, but all (farm subsidies being the biggest one) need to be cut back.
Some of those cuts can just be things like adjusting Social Security to adjust for longer lifetimes. The example I’ve heard is that the age to get benefits was beyond the average male lifetime but less than the average female lifetime. In other words, this was to help put food on the table for Grandma when Grandpa died & could harvest the farm anymore.
Other things could be like focusing money on procedures that will extend life beyond 30 days, but focus on Hospice once death is almost certain. However, I blame my religion more for this issue than the government. Christians shouldn’t fear death as much as most do. We’re doing a poor job of remembering this ourselves and letting others know.
Bob: Your comments are very misleading. However, since you are arguing it, I guess I should clarify my comment about No Child Left Behind. Here are the facts:
In the House, Dems approved NCLB more, as the voting line was:
Dem: 197-10 in favor, GOP: 186-34 in favor.
In the Senate, Dems approved NCLB more, as the voting line was:
Dem: 47-2 in favor, GOP: 43-6 in favor.
I have no idea how this bill was “introduced” by Bush, as it does have to be sponsored by a member of Congress, yes? Nevertheless, I acknowledge that Bush signed it. Of course, I am not sure Bush was aware the power to veto existed in his first term, as he literally signed every bill put in front of him except for maybe two. So yes, if you ask me, the bill was more a “Democrat” bill, than a “Republican” one.
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=No_Child_Left_Behind_Act
Bush and Ted Kennedy worked together on this one. It was not something that just happened to the Bush administration. They were actively involved. Remember that campaign line about “the soft bigotry of low expectations”? This was something that grew out of that.
Oh, I fully agree NCLB was a big deal to Bush, and didn’t mean to imply otherwise. However, if we have to apportion blame among our elected officials (as groups), it would appear based upon the vote counts that the correct order would be Bush > Senate Dems > House Dems > Senate GOP > House GOP.
However, I note that I blame most of our current problems on the same groups in the same order, so I might be biased. (Ha!)