Please repeat after me: war is peace, freedom is slavery, ignorance is strength, Bush wants to save social security.
“Bush: Save Social Security” was the post State of the Union headline in the Feb 4th Bellingham Herald. This headline no doubt produced a state of confusion in many who read it. In what sense does President Bush want to ‘save social security’? Perhaps only in the sense of that officer in Vietnam who said: “We had to destroy the village in order save it.”
So why is the major media working so hard for Mr. Bush? It’s a good question, and maybe the question. Democrats have been doing a good job of holding their elected officials accountable, but it’s time to start working on the press. The battle to save social security has in many ways already been won in Washington, D.C. but if we do nothing it may be lost in newsrooms around the country. Here’s another key question: When the President tells a lie is it the duty of the press to repeat the lie verbatim? Or is it the duty of the press to call the President out for lying? When we fail to answer this question correctly we go to war on false pretenses, gut key social programs, and bankrupt the nation.
In 1946 George Orwell published his famous essay “Politics and the English Language” in which he wrote: “A man may take to drink because he feels himself to be a failure, and then fail all the more completely because he drinks. It is rather the same thing that is happening to the English language. It becomes ugly and inaccurate because our thoughts are foolish, but the slovenliness of our language makes it easier for us to have foolish thoughts.” The times being what they are we cannot afford foolish thoughts or a slovenly media which fails to hold the powerful accountable to the truth.
Diverting money from the social security trust fund into private accounts will not save and strengthen social security, it will only weaken and defund it. According to the Center for Economic and Policy Research nearly 2/3rds of elderly households get more than half their income from social security and nearly half of the elderly would fall below the poverty line without it. Additionally, more than 6 million workers receive disability benefits through the Social Security trust fund, as do 1.6 million children. These people have been effectively disappeared from the national debate. As Senator Patty Murray states: “While some are trying to enrich Wall Street or push an ideology or force market experiments on senior citizens, our priority in this discussion should be ensuring that we're doing right by those who rely on Social Security – from current workers to retirees, the disabled and widows.” To help save Social Security please visit www.thereisnocrisis.com
// posted by Nate Johnson @
2:34 PM 
