<-- (Image: JR / t r u t h o u t; Adapted: Eddy Pula, SqueakyMarmot)

The Economic Illiterates Step Up the Attack on Social Security and Medicare
Monday 8 August 2011
by: Dean Baker, Truthout | Op-Ed

Rather than being a left-right split, this is a top-bottom split. There is a bipartisan consensus among the elites that these programs should be cut. The guiding philosophy of this drive is that public money that goes to programs for middle income and poor people is money that could be in the pockets of the wealthy.

…….

The remarkable part of this story is that elites are effectively using their incompetence in managing the economy as the core of their argument for cutting these social programs. After all, no one was talking about cutting these programs until the deficit exploded, and the reason the deficit exploded was that the collapse of the housing bubble wrecked the economy.

If these elites had a clue about the economy, they never would have allowed the bubble to grow to such dangerous levels. The economy would not have collapsed, the deficit would be manageable and no one would be discussing cuts to Social Security and the other programs.

In other lines of work, incompetence on the job gets you fired. In policymaking in Washington, incompetence means more responsibility and power.

(Read On)