I haven’t bothered to check, but it isn’t a stretch to claim that the Washington Post has written more negative stories about Rick Perry in the past two weeks than the paper wrote during the entire 2008 Obama campaign. Obama is still handled with kid gloves by his adoring press. Steven Levingston of the Washington Post claims that Rick Perry’s campaign is in damage control mode over his 2010 book Fed Up! This is news to me. What is so controversial about the book? Perry says that Social Security is a failure. Apparently Levingston is unaware of that fact. Here’s the damning passage that Levingston cites from Perry’s book:
“This unsustainable fiscal insanity is the true legacy of Social Security and the New Deal. Deceptive accounting has hoodwinked the American public into thinking that Social Security is a retirement system and financially sound, when clearly it is not….Now if you say Social Security is a failure, as I have just done, you will inherit the wind of political scorn. Seniors will think you want to cut the benefits they have paid for…We are told that no politician has the courage to raise these issues, even if avoiding them puts us on the fast track to financial ruin. But by remaining quiet, politicians are really saying they think the American people won’t understand it if we share the grim details of our financial future…Is that how we should respect our fellow citizens? By underestimating their intelligence, their desire to retire with greater stability or their commitment to the next generation?”
Huh? Maybe this is controversial to someone who’s uninformed, but there’s nothing wrong with that passage. Social Security is an accounting Ponzi scheme that hoodwinked the American people. The program is a failure. It’s going bankrupt. Liberals like to pride themselves on how smart they are, but they’re stuck on stupid when it comes to entitlements. Social Security hasn’t reduced senior poverty and it’s going bankrupt. If this is success, what does failure look like?
Is this a problem for Perry? I’m not sure. Americans’ willful ignorance about entitlements is a threat to the Republic. Sadly, progressives are too invested in the idea of fairness that they haven’t bothered to realize their programs don’t work.
