Five years ago, the blogosphere united to fight for Social Security and help score the first win against Bush. While we should have used a silver bullet or a stake through the heart or maybe something like this, we're back to 2005, probably even in worse position then we were then. I'm not the only one with déjà vu, check out the new Sam Seder "That's Bullshit" video: A big thanks to everyone who helped block Bush from destroying Social Security in 2005. And apologies that Obama is picking up where Bush left off.

Over the past few weeks I've talked a bit about Social Security, focusing in particular on whether or not Barack Obama believes there is a crisis in the Social Security system. To get a brief idea about why this matters, take a look at the AP's David Espo:

Three years after the collapse of President Bush's plan for private Social Security accounts, Republican presidential contenders are eager to try again. Not so the Democrats, who gravitate toward increasing payroll taxes on upper-income earners to fix the program's finances.

With the notable exception of former Sen. Fred Thompson, a Republican, presidential hopefuls in both parties shy away from suggestions that might offend their own primary voters. As a result, bipartisan commissions to resolve the program's long-term financial problems are in. And longer waits for retirement are most definitely out.

Thompson's proposal, by contrast, includes lower-than-promised benefits for future retirees, as well as new private accounts to make Social Security solvent for 75 years. "If somebody's got a better idea let them put it on the table," he said recently, daring his rivals.

Of course the Social Security program is not truly insolvent -- it will pay full benefits for at least the next 30 to 40 years, and even then it will pay out a greater amount to beneficiaries than it does today (adjusting for inflation) -- and the relatively small long-term defecit that the program does have would not be plugged by taking money out of the system, as Fred Thompson and just about every other Republican presidential candidate suggests.

But the problem with the DC-driven debate in the country today is that these two facts are not taken as gospel. Instead, pundits talk about a "crisis" in the program as a way of drumming up support for an overhaul that will include a partial or complete privatization. As I noted before but I'll repeat again, siphoning off money from the program to create private accounts wouldn't do anything but worsen the long-term deficit in the program, but that's no matter to those on the right -- their hope is not to maintain the program but rather to gut it.

The good thing is that the American people quite overwhelmingly reject both the notion that Social Security is in crisis and that a partial privatization plan should be implemented. But if Democrats begin to grease the wheels towards a "compromise" (potentially including private accounts) by talking about an urgent problem or a crisis facing the program, this could change. So it's terribly important that the Democrats don't embrace Republican talking points in this debate -- both because of the potential of great problems that could result from giving into the Republicans here and, fundamentally, because there is no crisis.

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Barack Obama sounding better on Social Security during the MSNBC presidential debate late last month.

I absolutely agree that Social Security is not in crisis.

Barack Obama sounding a lot worse during an interview with National Journal from Tuesday posted yesterday on the magazine's website.

Q: So, welcome to Senator Barack Obama. Welcome to "National Journal On Air." Let me start right away by asking you about the contrasts that you are drawing between yourself and Hillary Clinton. Her campaign people, the people who support her, say by calling her somebody whose word can't be trusted, by suggesting that she's disingenuous, that that's really a character attack -- that that's the very thing that you said you weren't going to do in this campaign.

Obama: Well, I strongly disagree. Look we are offering our plans for the future on health care, on education, on energy, and the American people have a right to judge how clear and how consistent have the candidates been in their positions. Because if they're not clear and consistent, then it's pretty hard to gage how much they're going to fight on these issues. You know, Senator Clinton says that she's concerned about Social Security but is not willing to say how she would solve the Social Security crisis, then I think voters aren't going to feel real confident that this is a priority for her. And that's the kind of leadership I think that the Democratic Party has to offer in the years to come. [emphasis added]

"Social Security crisis." For those who weren't politically engaged in early 2005, those three words might not be terribly meaningful. But for the folks who fought tooth and nail to ensure that the Social Security program was not dismantled by President Bush and his Republican lackeys on Capitol Hill those three words come off like a dog whistle, because paramount to the conservative effort to kill FDR's great gift to American society was the attempted propagation of the myth that the Social Security system was in crisis -- a myth that has no basis in reality.

Social Security can pay full benefits as promised until 2042 according to this year's Social Security trustees report (or 2052 if you use projections from the Congressional Budget Office). Thereafter it will be able to pay about 75 percent to 80 percent of promised benefits.

Even if benefits were cut to 75 percent of what's promised, that reduced level would still be more than what today's retirees get, [the Center for Economic and Policy Research's Mark] Weisbrot said.

For example, according to CBO estimates, a person born in 1940 would get about $13,300 in their first year of retirement, while someone born in 1990 would get $16,700 -- in today's dollars.

Atrios explains why this stuff matters:

So, anyway, having someone suggest that Social Security is a problem which needs to be dealt with by any serious candidate is like the bat signal for people like me. There is no problem with Social Security. None at all. Whatever broader fiscal time bombs exist have absolutely nothing to do with Social Security. Once you get Fred Hiatt and the gang opining about the need fix that Social Security problem, you've increased the likelihood of something very bad happening.

Listening to Obama this week, it almost makes you think that he wasn't around in early 2005 when progressives had to fight back George W. Bush's efforts to partially privatize Social Security. It certainly leaves the impression that he just doesn't get it on Social Security. I don't know what to say aside from that this is just really disappointing stuff from Obama. Really disappointing.

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While we were all distracted by Alito, Bush crammed his Social Security privatization plan into the budget bill he sent to Congress on Monday:

Read it and gag.

Heads up, people!  This cannot stand.

Time to mobilize!

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