Deinonychus antirrhopus

Drum, and Al Franken, have a fondness for calling others liars - despite the fact that their own standards for truth are lower.

In an earlier post on this he called this "worse than anything Maureen Dowd had done" (or something to that effect).

What are you gonna do?

Ron, I guess the only standard they have is whether or not the argument fools themselves.

of course there should be additional savings to social security. they are called ira's, 401k's and in the "olden days" - saving accounts. common sense tells us this - but social security is the floor, the base, the safety net which people who have worked their whole lives may depend upon to keep a roof over their heads and food on the table.

Quite an irrelevant comment, Laurie. Despite a lot of scare-mongering, no one is proposing anything to the contrary.

Drum, Franken, etc, are wrong, Hume is right.

Here's the problem with Drum's analysis:

Social Security is not #2, it is much closer to #1

If Social Security were self-supporting, there would be no issue to discuss in the first place. It clearly isn't. It's a de facto income-tax/welfare/Ponzi system.

Had FDR done the responsible thing and linked Social Security benefits to actuarial tables, it would actually fulfill its intended function at its intended cost, and it wouldn't kick in until age 75: in other words, it would be the social safety net it was supposed to be. Instead, it's a ticking demographic time bomb of a Ponzi retirement scheme.

If Hume should be fired over this stupid controversy then Franken should be shot for all his lies and propaganda.

Just when you think the left has perfected the art of hypocrisy, they somehow manage to do better.

PS : How long before they claim Hume is gay and having sex with Gannon? That seems to be their strategy for moving stories into the mainstream these days.

"Note that Hume said that FDR felt that Social Security should incorporate a voluntary component that sounds similar to what President Bush is proposing in Model 2."

"Sounds similar?" Not quite. The only similarity between what Bush proposed and what FDR proposed is embodied in the words "voluntary" and "retirement." Beyond that, there are distinct differences. FDR's "voluntary contributory annuities" are quite unlike a "private investment account" in the sense that phrase is used by Bush, and in the sense that phrase is commonly used in the discussion about Bush's plan.

FDR was clearly not talking about investment in the private sector, as the Bush plan encourages, and as implied by the phrase "private investment accounts." FDR's proposal of "voluntary contributory annuities" was for insurance-type annuities, to be issued and guaranteed by the government. Income from this program "would go into the trust fund along with the payroll taxes collected under the mandatory program." This is clearly explained here.

The phrase "private investment accounts" implies money is put in the hands of Wall St. Indeed, that's what the Bush plan encourages. FDR's phrase "voluntary contributory annuities" was referring to money that would be placed in the hands of the government. Hume pretends this distinction is meaningless. If the distinction is meaningless, then so is Bush's plan.

FDR was talking about allowing workers to voluntarily send extra money to the government, to add to the mandatory retirement fund, and to support a guaranteed benefit. Bush is talking about taking money that currently goes to the government and sending it to Wall Street instead. To treat these two proposals as equivalent is a fraud. I think it takes incredible contortions to imagine that perpetrating this fraud wasn't Hume's exact intention.

If FDR's "voluntary contributory annuities" are fairly described as a "private investment account," then SS as we know it is a "private investment account," since the only difference between FDR's "compulsory contributory annuities" (SS as we know it) and his "voluntary contributory annuities" is embodied in the words "compulsory" and "voluntary."

Hume might just as well have run a report saying "We already have private investment accounts; the system is called SS; Bush says 'Never mind'"

"Now of course, that is hard to say with certainty because FDR never got around to proposing the voluntary component so we don't know exactly what he would have proposed."

"Hard to say with certainty" only if you ignore readily available resources such as the article I cited, which shows that FDR was quite clear and explicit with regard to what he meant when he said "voluntary contributory annuity."

jukeboxgrad, you're quite the busy beaver tonight!

Still not able to extend a cogent argument even with all those paragraphs, but I suspect you're easily earning your Post Dollars $$$ this fine evening!

And yeah, your dense prose and and pendantic repetition probably through me off. I'm sure you have a point, somewhere.

jukeboxgrad, you're quite the busy beaver tonight!

Still not able to extend a cogent argument even with all those paragraphs, but I suspect you're easily earning your Post Dollars $$$ this fine evening!

And yeah, your dense prose and and pendantic repetition probably threw me off. I'm sure you have a point, somewhere.

Gah! The dreaded double post in an attempt to fix a grammatical error.

Sorry 'bout that ya'll.

Still was shorter than his, Brent. Even doubled.

Silly wasn't it. Hume said "similar" and since it wasn't absolutely identical ( which oddly enough, is not a synonym for "similar" ), jukebox thinks he has a point. LOL.

"Sounds similar?" Not quite. The only similarity between what Bush proposed and what FDR proposed is embodied in the words "voluntary" and "retirement." Beyond that, there are distinct differences. FDR's "voluntary contributory annuities" are quite unlike a "private investment account" in the sense that phrase is used by Bush, and in the sense that phrase is commonly used in the discussion about Bush's plan.

Actually Bush's proposals are in some ways quite similar. There is a voluntary and mandantory annuity (ulitmately any gains the individual realizes with private accounts is used to pruchase a...wait for it...annuity). Bush's proposals for reducing future benefits will return the system, in theory, to actuarial balance for the 75 year period (not sure beyond). So in that limited sense it sounds alot like FDR.

Now FDR's annuity plan is administered by the government. Much like Bush's private accounts. Under FDR's proposal the rate of return would vary depending on what was necessary to assure actuarial balance. Bush's plan has the rate of return determined by which type of investment strategy the individual selects and how the economy is doing. So both have elements of risk.

Like the FDR plan Bush's proposed private accounts (again using Model 2) from the CSSS report would be administered by the SSA.

"Hard to say with certainty" only if you ignore readily available resources such as the article I cited, which shows that FDR was quite clear and explicit with regard to what he meant when he said "voluntary contributory annuity."

Actually no. It was a rough outline of what the voluntary contributory annuities would look like. There are far less details than what Bush is proposing.

Frankly, I just don't see the huge horrendous differences here that justifies calling for Brit Hume's head or the indignation you and your cronies on the Left are all up in arms about. If you want ot complain about the risk inherent in Bush's model and that it is greater than the risk in FDR's model fine. Would FDR support Bush's Model 2? Probably not, but then again FDR lived at the time of the stock market crash and the Great Depression.

"Hume said 'similar'"

Really? With regard to FDR? Not here. Hume said "FDR himself planned to include private investment accounts in the Social Security program when he proposed it." Hume didn't even bother using a weasel-word like "similar."

"since it wasn't absolutely identical"

Saying that FDR's "voluntary contributory annuities" and Bush's "private investment accounts" are not "absolutely identical" is like saying that black and white aren't "absolutely identical." True, they're not.

If you claim that the Bush and FDR proposals are similar enough to be treated as interchangeable (because that's what Hume did), you need to explain why Bush's plan shouldn't be considered interchangeable with the SS system we already have.

Steve said "ulitmately any gains the individual realizes with private accounts is used to pruchase a...wait for it...annuity"

You're grasping at straws. Nice job overlooking crucial distinctions and managing to find a trivial similarity. Oh yes, you forgot to mention that they both have something to do with "retirement." And "money."

By the way, in Bush's plan the private sector investments (which are a partial replacement to SS) are converted, at retirement, into a private sector annuity. In FDR's plan, it's a government annuity all along, and it's a supplement to SS, not a replacement of it. If these distinctions mean nothing to you, you need to explain why you think Bush's plan is any different than SS as we know it.

"Bush's proposals for reducing future benefits will return the system, in theory, to actuarial balance for the 75 year period (not sure beyond). So in that limited sense it sounds alot like FDR."

This irrelevant and questionable remark about "actuarial balance" has nothing to do with establishing that FDR's "voluntary contributory annuities" are the equivalent of Bush's "private investment accounts," which is what you're trying to prove.

"Now FDR's annuity plan is administered by the government. Much like Bush's private accounts."

FDR's government annuity is a fixed-return vehicle which has nothing to do with the private sector. Bush's "private accounts" allow investing in equities, which are a variable-return vehicle. If you think this qualifies for "much like," then you must think that Bush's plan is "much like" what we already have.

"Under FDR's proposal the rate of return would vary depending on what was necessary to assure actuarial balance."

Nice job just making stuff up, but your financial illiteracy is overwhelming. An annuity, by definition, is a fixed-return vehicle. The idea of a contractual, fixed return (which rules out an investment in equities) is inherent in the word itself. (The modern hybrid innovation of a so-called "variable annuity" is sort of an oxymoron; anyway, it's not what FDR was talking about because they hadn't even been invented yet.)

So your assertion that FDR was proposing a variable rate of return is nonsense.

"Bush's plan has the rate of return determined by which type of investment strategy the individual selects and how the economy is doing. So both have elements of risk."

It's nice to see that you have no understanding of the difference between a fixed-return instrument and a variable-return instrument. I'd love to have a chance to sell you some securities. Stocks, bonds, what's the diff, they're "much like" each other.

"Like the FDR plan Bush's proposed private accounts (again using Model 2) from the CSSS report would be administered by the SSA."

Nice job in persisting to obscure the key distinction between a fixed-return instrument where money is held by the government, as compared with a variable-return instrument where the money is held somewhere in the private sector. The idea that both programs are "administered" by the government doesn't negate this fundamental distinction.

"Actually no. It was a rough outline of what the voluntary contributory annuities would look like."

Right. A "rough outline" that said income from the program "would go into the trust fund along with the payroll taxes collected under the mandatory program." You haven't explained why that sentence isn't enough to tell you that FDR's proposal and Bush's proposal are fundamentally different.

"Frankly, I just don't see the huge horrendous differences here"

I guess you're right. Private sector, public sector; variable-return, fixed-return. It's all the same, right? Apples and oranges are both fruit, right? Black and white are both colors (sort of), right?

"that justifies calling for Brit Hume's head"

I see your point. Why make a big deal about a network anchor deliberately rewriting history in order to promote government propaganda? If Armstrong Williams and Jeff Gannon are tools of the government, why not Brit Hume?

"If you want ot complain about the risk inherent in Bush's model and that it is greater than the risk in FDR's model fine."

Ahh, maybe you do have some inkling there's a fundamental difference between "fixed-return"and "variable-return." Careful, if you keep heading in this direction you might actually end up in touch with reality.

"Would FDR support Bush's Model 2? Probably not, but then again FDR lived at the time of the stock market crash and the Great Depression."

Nice job pointing out a very good reason to understand that Hume's deception was deliberate, and not just carelessness. The idea that FDR favored "private investment accounts" would have raised red flags, if someone had been interested in reporting truth, as compared with pursuing a political agenda.

And had FDR been president on 9/11 2001 those Muslim Americans would have been in concentration camps. And the carpet bombing campaign would have begun.

Saith Jukeboxgrad, "Private sector, public sector; variable-return, fixed-return." Life must be so simple with a thought process like that.

1. Social Security cash surpluses are invested in special-issue Treasury securities, but to say the public sector is "fixed return," given that Congress has the power to change or kill the program at any time. Try telling any of the folks who were suddenly advised that their retirement age for full benefits had changed, or that part of their benefit was taxable, that their return was fixed.

2. There is, simple-brain assertions notwithstanding, nothing inherently contradictory between the concepts of private sector and fixed return. If you chose to assign your private-account contributions to buying Treasuries, corporate bonds, preferred stocks, or annuities, then bingo: fixed return.

Why you would want to do that is a different question...

"Congress has the power to change or kill the program at any time."

Nice job bending over backwards to miss the point. It's not a question of suggesting there's ever a way to eliminate risk entirely. Of course not. There's no such thing as a sure thing. We could wake up tomorrow and find out the prez'nit is a miserable cokehead and Fort Knox has disappeared up his nose. Sort of like how we found out that Bush's pal Ken Lay didn't mind shafting his shareholders. Shocked, we were. The world is full of surprises.

But that's not the point. The point is whether or not it's reasonable to treat the Bush and FDR proposals as interchangeable (because that's what Hume did). FDR spoke of "annuities" which are, by definition, a promise of a fixed-return. That's fundamentally different than the private-sector equity investments encouraged by Bush's plan. Hopefully I've now made this simple enough that even you can understand.

By the way, SS has an excellent record so far. There's a reason why T-bills are considered the world's safest investment.

"There is ... nothing inherently contradictory between the concepts of private sector and fixed return"

I'm well-aware of that. That's why I mentioned each distinction (the distinction of fixed vs. variable, as well as the distinction of public vs. private). The point is that Hume's fraudulent comparison pretended both those distinctions are meaningless. If all those distinctions are meaningless, then Bush's plan doesn't differ in any meaningful way from SS as we know it.

As someone who apparently opposes "simple-brain assertions," it's a mystery why you would apparently not be concerned about that.

Speaking of "simple-brain assertions," maybe you're also not concerned about Bush himself telling people that higher returns from Wall Street (compared with T-bills) are a sure thing: "a personal account, obviously, under strict guidelines of investment, will yield a better rate of return over -- than the money -- the person's money is earning in the Social Security trust" (link). There is no equivocation in that assurance, and I didn't take it out of context. Any stockbroker who similarly omitted the essential disclaimer ("past performance is no guarantee of future results") would face serious legal and professional sanctions.

I guess the only standard they have is whether or not the argument fools themselves.
And what amazes me is, they appear to have succeeded here.

I did finally, after a massive amount of effort, get one of the most enlightened commenters at Drum's to realize that the arguments that the left use against the Iraq War are pure, unalloyed, conservative arguments. Used by liberals as if they thought them up.

I think he was stunned, haven't seen him there since.

steve -- FDR's plan was a fully-funded, defined benefit plan. Therefore, the compulsory annuities he describes are NOT the same thing as modern-day Social Security. See my commentary here. For these and other reasons, Franken and MediaMatters are just plain wrong.

On the flip side, Bush's privatization plan is a defined contribution plan that puts the risk on the individual. FDR wanted society to take that risk instead of the individual. Therefore, Hume was dead wrong.

All in all, the point of confusion is that FDR wanted a pre-funded system but with defined benefits, a set of options that he himself took off the table when they switched SS to a pay-as-you-go system in 1939.

Moving back from a pay-as-you-go system to a fully funded system would be prohibitively costly. We went a small bit of the way there with the 1983 Trust Fund (although not in a way that is meaningful to general fund revenues). And Bush is proposing that we pursue private accounts which would again increase the pre-funded component (or, more accurately, extend pre-funding farther into the future). But few have proposed we go all the way (Sam Johnson is an exception), and no one has suggested that we go all the way with the risk absorbed by the government, which is, to repeat, FDR's original vision.

Victor said: "the compulsory annuities [FDR] describes are NOT the same thing as modern-day Social Security ... For these and other reasons, Franken and MediaMatters are just plain wrong."

I disagree, in particular with regard to your claim that FDR envisioned a "fully funded" plan. A detailed and relatively low-noise discussion on this point appears here.

"See my commentary here."

I'd like to, but your "link" isn't a link.

"FDR wanted a pre-funded system but with defined benefits, a set of options that he himself took off the table when they switched SS to a pay-as-you-go system in 1939."

You're treating the terms "prefunded" and "fully funded" as if they're interchangable. They're not. As far as "pay-as-you-go," that's also a fundamentally misleading oversimplification. See the thread I cited.

"no one has suggested that we go all the way with the risk absorbed by the government, which is, to repeat, FDR's original vision."

Our current system does indeed have "the risk absorbed by the government," so this is another way in which some of your statements are misleading.

The point is to emulate the tactics of the right wing and to make shrill calls for the heads of people on the other side of an issue. Hume said something stupid about Social Security and FDR (I don't think he knows enough to be willfully misleading). Hume says something idiotic almost every day and is an ideal target for the tactic. This gets the right wing incensed and causes them to make hypocritical statements about the level of public discourse that they helped to put in the crapper in the first place. It does not matter if what Hume said is true or defensible any more than it matters when the right wing jumps on someone. I often wondered why the left did not adopt this tactic sooner. It makes for more fun all around.

Well, Dennis, I firmly believe Hume's statement was a willful distortion, and of course Bill Bennett, for one, seems to have heard it the way Hume meant his listeners to hear it, when he stated quite plainly that FDR wanted to replace social security with private accounts. (Which was much like "Gannon" repeating Rush's "quote" of Harry Reid about soup lines as if Reid had said it.)

But you're right, it's pretty hilarious to hear all the wailing on the right over a single left-wing "propagandist", given their near-monopoly of the category.

Nice job just making stuff up, but your financial illiteracy is overwhelming.

I don't think so, read your own link.

juke -- http://www.deadparrots.net/archives/media/0502screwed_by_our_forefathers_who_were_screwed_by_their_forefathers.html

I did flip to the other discussion, but I cannot find anything specific in your interpretation of the 1935 Social Security Act to justify your position. Indeed, I can barely find the actual law, speech text, or other primary source evidence referenced at all.

What we do know is that FDR wanted a defined benefit system with a reserve account into which your payroll taxes would be deposited. This reserve account would pay for all future outgoes, and individuals would have death-benefits and a guaranteed internal rate of return for their money. As far as I can tell, it was supposed to be "self-sustaining" meaning that current employees putting money aside for their own future returement as opposed to funding current retirees. Effectively, this reserve account was going to accumulate large sums of money. Benefits wouldn't be given out until 1943, however, IIRC -- a feature that led to political disgruntlement and the 1935 system's demise.

This system was changed in 1939 when we went to a pay-as-you-go, defined benefit system. The language and discussion from 1939 onward reflects the language we would associate with today's Social Security. You can find all of this described in detail on the SSA's website, in the links I provide in my blog post, and in the Congressional Record pages that they have so generously posted. I also have independent supporting testimony that is not linked to from my blog, including a basic overview in Rosen's popular "Public Finance" book, among many others.

I have found no evidence in support of MediaMatter's assertion that the 1935 Old-Age Reserve Account system in support of the compulsory contribution annuities was equivalent to our current system in any significant way other than the philosophy of the defined-benefit schema, which, I hope we can both agree, is not a sufficient similarity to declare equivalence.

The proper antecedent of our current system is the 1939 reform, as best I can tell. I feel that the burden of equivalence between the 1939 reform and the original 1935 law is on people such as yourself.

You're treating the terms "prefunded" and "fully funded" as if they're interchangable. They're not. As far as "pay-as-you-go," that's also a fundamentally misleading oversimplification. See the thread I cited.

I fail to find the relevancy of this criticism to any of my previous points. I was trying to distinguish the financial accounting of a pay-as-you-go system vis a vis a system of pre-funded benefits with adjustments to ensure actual benefits being as limited as is actuarially possible.

The 1935 Act resulted in a massively large reserve account sitting around; the 1939 law reversed that accumulation procedure and did NOT establish such a system. That distinction is not trivial, IMO, with respect to Social Security's financing (although it may be trivial with respect to the general fund, which is a different question and depends on the assets in that reserve account)

Our current system does indeed have "the risk absorbed by the government," so this is another way in which some of your statements are misleading.

No kidding. Please look at the context. You quoted the second part of a sentence, the first part of which explicitly refers to Social Security PROPOSALS. Further, the entire paragraph talks about attempts to move to a fully-funded system. I can find no rational reading of my previous statement that would lead a reader to conclude that the sentence fragment you quote refers to the current system. No Social Security PROPOSALS have suggests a significant pre-funding mechanism that keeps the risk burden on the government.

Actually, this isn't technically true. Paul Ryan has proposed such a plan. However, I would imagine that we could both agree that it is not particualarly practicable, and I have trouble thinking of it as a "plan" so much as a "hope".

"I don't think so, read your own link."

You made a statement to the effect that FDR's VCA proposal was for variable-return annuities. There's nothing to support that specious assertion in any link I provided, or anywhere else, for that matter.

Okay Jukeboxgrad, I can see rational discourse with you is not possible. Good bye (no I'm not banning him, just ignoring him).

"I can see rational discourse with you is not possible"

Translation: "I'm annoyed that you actually expect me to use facts to back up my specious assertions."

"I did flip to the other discussion, but I cannot find anything specific..."

It's very long. Maybe you need to look more closely. That other thread very much focuses on exactly the questions you raise in your blog post. Therefore, I hesitate to recapitulate it here.

In a nutshell, the problem is that it is one thing to have a reserve account, and it something else to be "fully funded." I think you cannot show that FDR or anyone else envisioned the latter.

"I was trying to distinguish the financial accounting of a pay-as-you-go system vis a vis a system of pre-funded benefits with adjustments to ensure actual benefits being as limited as is actuarially possible."

This issue you raise is discussed in excruciating detail in the other thread. I would invite you read that thread thoroughly and post there, if the subject interests you.

"I can see rational discourse with you is not possible"

Translation: "I'm annoyed that you actually expect me to use facts to back up my specious assertions."

No, I expect you to read your own links. That and your taking Victor's quote out of context tells me you just aren't serious, but looking to score points.

Steve, nothing about this silly set of accusations against Hume was ever serious.

"No, I expect you to read your own links."

Nice to see that you still can't be bothered to be specific. That's because you know there's nothing in my link to support the assertion you made.

"your taking Victor's quote out of context"

Victor is a big boy and I'm sure he can take care of himself. Anyway, I suggested to Victor where to look to understand why I quoted him the way I quoted him. I don't think you're in a position to pass judgment on the way I responded to Victor if you're not familiar with the other thread I referenced.

"Steve, nothing about this silly set of accusations against Hume was ever serious."

Turn up the volume in the echo chamber. It's important not to let any inconvenient facts seep in.

Why should I be bothered to be specific with somebody like you who isn't willing to discuss this forthrightly?

Juke -- In a nutshell, the problem is that it is one thing to have a reserve account, and it something else to be "fully funded." I think you cannot show that FDR or anyone else envisioned the latter.

Consider: this.

"The President, for his part, took the liberty of making the program even more self-supporting than either the committee staff or Secretary Perkins wanted. When he heard that the plan written by Brown depended on general revenue subsidies to keep the program solvent in the future, he objected on the grounds that he could not mandate future government expenditures. At the very last minute, he ordered the staff to rework the tax rates, so that the program would never need to depend on general revenues."

By 1980, the size of the reserve account was going to be 8 times the entire amount of money in circulation in 1936. It would be generating enough interest to offset any foreseable shortfall in revenues (although the actuaries did mistakenly calculate the number of beneficiaries be around in 1980, so I'm not sure if an unfunded liability might have eventually arisen.)."

I don't know how you are defining terms, but let me here and now define a system to be fully-funded if the expected unfunded actuarial liability is zero. The aforementioned statement is one of many that indicate FDR envisioned a "fully-funded" system under that definition.

Today's system is not fully funded because the Trust Fund becomes exhausted after 2042, requiring an external revenue source to make up "promised" benefits.

To the extent that Bush wants to establish private accounts for people, he wants to set aside a portion of Social Security that will be fully-funded (by definition since they will be defined-contribution) (and FWIW, they will be pre-funded). Further, he wants to re-establish death benefits. Both of these actions seem consistent with FDR's original vision, but not the current system.

To be clear, Hume is wrong, IMO. But Media Matter's assertion of an equivalence between current benefits and FDR's compulsory annuities is equally wrong.

"Why should I be bothered to be specific with somebody like you who isn't willing to discuss this forthrightly?"

In a typical maneuver, you neglect to indicate what I've done that isn't "forthright." Unless you mean "isn't willing to accept everything I say at face value even though I neglect to offer proof."

"I don't know how you are defining terms"

That's only because you haven't read the thread I invited you to read.

In my opinion, "fully prefunded" means that SS has enough of a positive balance in its trust fund to ensure that all future obligations for current and past workers could be met, even if no one in the future ever paid another dime into the system.

"a system [is] fully-funded if the expected unfunded actuarial liability is zero."

That's a bit cryptic. I think we're using equivalent definitions, but I'm not sure.

In my opinion, you've provided information to show that FDR envisioned a system that was more prefunded than what we have. But this is different from claiming that FDR envisioned a system that was "fully" prefunded.

I'll say only one more time that there is another place for this discussion, where a great deal of groundwork has already been laid, which is pointless to recapitulate here.

I'm not going to join the MediaMatters discussion on basic principle. I avoid venues where terms like "liar", etc., are thrown around without much forethought or accuracy.

Regarding definitions ... put another way, if there is zero unfunded actuarial liability (what I call fully-funded) then you never expect to need funds from an outside source to cover promised benefits. The 1935 system fit that definition as best I can tell.

Technically, the 1983 SS reform fit that definition for a 75-year time period (through 2058) after which Social Security was designed to require net transfers from the General Fund. Obviously the system as it stands today does not meet that standard.

Your idea of "fully pre-funded" is a bit different, and more restrictive. I believe that I have carefully skirted whether or not the 1935 system fully fits this description. In a mechanical sense, no defined-benefit system will be perfectly run, so it is virtually impossible for a defined-benefit system to be *exactly* fully-pre-funded.

However, the *intent* of the 1935 bill sure sounds to me like they were going to be as close to this as possible. See the Vernon Miles quote on my blog.

The key difference between your definition and a fully-funded system is that you can be "fully-funded" by including future cash-flows (and also weighing these against future benefits); your "fully-pre-funded" definition would most generally be more restrictive than this, since fully-pre-funding would never allow for raising taxes to "catch up". In other words, the actuaries could only be wrong in one direction: benefits had better be lower than predicted.

Being "fully-funded" is an actuarial standard that solid pension plans in the private sector are judged against. It is a standard that FDR wanted for Social Security, and it was a standard that carried a lot of political weight in the day to help get Social Security passed. However, t is not a standard that can be used to describe the present system (which began in 1939).

This fact, coupled with the facts that the 1935 system guaranteed an internal-rate-of-return equal to or in excess of Treasuries and it provided death benefits are ample evidence to suggest that the 1935 system was different than the 1939 system and, by extension, different than today's.

I therefore stand by my assertion that MediaMatter's assertion is factually incorrect. The system FDR described in 1935 was fundamentally different than the system we have today above and beyond the simple "degree" to which it was "pre-funded".

Look Jukebox it is really simple. Not all annuities have a fixed rate of return. Some are set up to adjust the rate of return to inflation, other investments, etc. In the case of FDR, there was a condition about maintaining actuarial balance and revising rates to meet said goal. Now maybe it was rate of return or the premium, but whatever it seems to me that would alter the return one gets on one's money that is put into the voluntary program. Even SS doesn't have a fixed rate of return in the sense that it is a constant like the speed of light.

Steve -- you have a source for that? Somehow I had missed that. Not saying you are wrong, just that I am not *that* familiar with the 1935 system which was notably different from the one we have today (which is kind of my point, I guess)

http://www.ssa.gov/history/reports/1939no2.html

Here's a nice summary of the changes in 1939 that reinforce this point.

"The revision of the benefit formula reflects the change in the emphasis of the program. The original provisions offered primarily a plan for systematic savings for old age. The amendments, on the other hand, are designed to provide a minimum subsistence income for the retired worker and his dependents or for certain of his survivors, relating the amount of the benefit to his family responsibilities and, roughly, to the level of his former earnings as well as to the extent of his participation in the system. The primary monthly benefit, payable to a qualified worker at 65 or after, is based on his average monthly wage (as defined subsequently) according to the following formula: (1) a basic amount of 40 percent of the first $50 of the average monthly wage, plus 10 percent of the amount by which that average exceeds $50 and does not exceed $250 and (2) 1 percent of the amount calculated under (1) multiplied by the number of years in which the worker has received $200 or more in wages from covered employment."

Notice how all of those changes make the system into what it is today, rather than the reverse.

Sure victor, it is the link Jukeboxgrad gave us.

Link

This part in particulare caught my attention,

1. The plan should be self-supporting, and premiums and benefits should be kept in actuarial balance by any necessary revision of the rates which periodic examinations of the experience would indicate.

Now maybe I am reading it wrong or something, but this seems to suggest that the something somewhere has to give to maintain actuarial balance. Maybe there is something else that indicates the above general comment was later changed.

What I want to know is why Jukebox can't find a flippin' dictionary and see what the word "recapitulate" actually means.

Kyle's contribution was to say "What I want to know is why Jukebox can't find a flippin' dictionary and see what the word 'recapitulate' actually means."

"To repeat in concise form." Commonly shortened to "recap." That's what my dictionary says. Maybe yours says something different, since it's a "flippin'" dictionary. And what was your point, exactly?

Walter, if for whatever reason you don't want to post at MMFA, I still see no reason why you can't read what's there. Then you'll see in advance what my detailed answers are to many of the questions you raise here. Also I think you'll find a number of illuminating and carefully researched posts from a variety of thoughtful people, on exactly a subject that seems to be of great interest to you (not just SS generally but the early history with regard to the question of prefunding).

Steve, thanks for being specific. Now I think I see what you're trying to say. I think I missed it before because it doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me.

I think you're pointing out, correctly, that even a nominally fixed-return instrument such as FDR's VCA (or indeed even SS itself) could, in the real world, run up against circumstances where for one reason or another the actual return might vary somewhat. But so what? I think all you're saying is we live in an imperfect world. I think your assertion is sort of like saying I could live in a cardboard shack, or I could live in a castle, and they both might burn down someday, therefore a cardboard shack is "similar" to a castle. Yes, it's similar. They are both abodes. They are both three-dimensionsal objects. "Similar" is a slippery term.

This all goes back to claiming, as you did, that FDR's VCA is "similar to what President Bush is proposing." Recall you need to make this claim in order to justify Hume and condemn Franken. However in my opinion your use of the word "similar" is sufficiently loose as to be intellectually dishonest. As I've pointed out elsewhere, the only fundamental similarities are embodied in the words "retirement" and "voluntary."

I also think it's disingenuous for you to say it's "hard to say with certainty because FDR never got around to proposing the voluntary component so we don't know exactly what he would have proposed." As I've detailed elsewhere, FDR gave us more than enough information to understand that his VCA is fundamentally different from Bush's "private investment accounts."

By the way, the vagueness sword cuts both ways. If you claim we don't know what FDR meant, you need to explain why people like Hume are comfortable emphatically proclaiming that "FDR contemplated the eventual inclusion of private investment accounts in Social Security."

By the way, your statement "not all annuities have a fixed rate of return" could be misleading. The modern oxymoronic variation of a "variable annuity" wasn't invented, or at least didn't come into common use, until the 1950s. The idea of a fixed return is embodied in the very meaning of the word annuity.

Jukebox, you are really only showing your dishonesty here, not Hume's.

Steve -- ah, Witte's testimony. It's not clear to me exactly how that principle became codified into law. The Social Security Board was responsible for maintaining solvency, but I haven't found that provision in the actual bill. here. I think he was referring to the fact that Congress could come back and change it, although I do not know for sure.

As a point of trivia, the current design of Social Security actually DOES have a "stabilizer" provision, however. Desscribed here. Reform opponents don't really want to make that little bit known, however. It is also notable that the CBO and SSA scenarios, because they focus on first-year benefits, won't necessarily show the effects of the stabilizer provision in the outyears, thereby understating the gain to reform.

It is also notable that FDR's VCA proposal would have private contributions invested in bonds earning no less than 3% -- exactly like Bush's individual account proposal, although my best-guess at this time is that the benefit-design was supposed to be more of a defined-benefit than a defined-contribution idea.

........

Juke -- In this comment thread, I have given you quotes from the 1939 Social Security actuaries in their definitive statement regarding the changes made in 1939 compared to 1935. I have given you a direct reference to the pre-eminent undergraduate Public Finance textbook. On my blog post, I quoted Vernon Miles, an actual member of the Social Security board back in 1936. You would think he would know something about this.

I linked you to a historian's paper on FDR's actions and the design of Social Security, in this thread. From my blog, you can follow links to the SSA history page, the text of the 1935 Bill, the text of the 1939 amendments, and a plethora of Congressional testimony. There are multiple citations in each of these that confirm my position that the original design of Social Security was to be (a) fully-funded, and (b) can be fairly modelled as closer to a savings plan than anything we have today. I have pointed out that the 1935 design paid death benefits and provided a guaranteed rate of return on your money -- that it would not be subject to downward revision as is our current Social Security design (which, in fact, not only is subject to this, but GUARANTEES ever-decreasing internal-rates of return).

That is the bulk of evidence on my side. On yours, you keep referencing the MMA discussion forum. Walter has a couple of sources on there that seem to be consistent with my position. There is the Center for Budget Policies and Priorities link which again doesn't refute my position. I'm not going to go digging through there.

If there is some key piece of evidence that I am missing to suggest that the 1935 design was more similar to today's than I have characterized, I am still willing to listen. But I am not willing to spend any more time typing away here adding unnecessary additional intellectual weight behind my position when you haven't even suggested on reason why the actuaries from the late 30s were incorrect, or why Miles was wrong, or why the eradication of the Reserve Fund was meaningless, why the transformation to the current AIME earnings calculation and progressive PIA benefit scheme also done in the 1939 reform is trivial, and why, despite all of these things, it is fair to state that the current system is like the original 1935 structure.

I also think it's disingenuous for you to say it's "hard to say with certainty because FDR never got around to proposing the voluntary component so we don't know exactly what he would have proposed." As I've detailed elsewhere, FDR gave us more than enough information to understand that his VCA is fundamentally different from Bush's "private investment accounts."

I didn't say that Bush's plan and FDR's plans were exactly the same or very, very similar. I said they were similar. Saying this is like saying black and white is misleading in that they are more similar than simply being two different types of "personal accounts" broadly defined.

Was Hume's statement misleading, yeah so what. I don't think it was highly misleading, any more than what is typical for the MSM. Brad DeLong notes it, Victor notes it, and so have others. If you are going to demand the resignation of all these journalists get your butt in gear dude, you've got lots of heads to hack off.

As for the variable rate of return, premium, whatever and an imperfect world, doesn't that apply to Bush's plan too? You seem to want to have your cake here and eat it too. Yeah, we live in an uncertain world and there is nothing that says the VCA would have to have a constant rate of return. There is some risk there. This we seem to agree. I think we also agree that Bush's plan has more risk, and that risk is primarily on the individual. Still I don't see the big beef here. Should Hume have said what he did? No. Should he resign? I don't think so, just as I don't think Kevin Drum should resign from the Washington Monthly.

Victor said "It is also notable that FDR's VCA proposal would have private contributions invested in bonds earning no less than 3%"

Could you let us know where you got that?

"exactly like Bush's individual account proposal"

Bush's proposal allows and encourages investment in equities. In fact, this is a major feature, perhaps the most salient feature. So where do you get "exactly like?"

"my best-guess at this time is that the benefit-design was supposed to be more of a defined-benefit than a defined-contribution idea."

I'm perplexed as to why any guessing is required, unless you claim SS as we know it is the latter. Because it's clear that FDR's VCA was simply an extension to SS as we know it.

"That is the bulk of evidence on my side. On yours, you keep referencing the MMA discussion forum. Walter has a couple of sources on there that seem to be consistent with my position."

You're not addressing the arguments I've raised on the other forum.

Steve said "I don't think it was highly misleading, any more than what is typical for the MSM. Brad DeLong notes it, Victor notes it, and so have others."

This looks like a double-standard to me. When righty bloggers find something in MSM they think is misleading, they make a big fuss, but only if the bloggers' political agenda is served. For some reason Hume gets a free pass.

As far as "so have others," I'm having a hard time finding more than one or two righty bloggers who are willing to acknowledge that Hume's statement was even slightly misleading.

"As for the variable rate of return, premium, whatever and an imperfect world, doesn't that apply to Bush's plan too?"

It doesn't just "apply to Bush's plan too." It applies much, much more to Bush's plan. Trouble is, Hume's remark tends to obscure and deny this essential fact.

"I think we also agree that Bush's plan has more risk, and that risk is primarily on the individual. Still I don't see the big beef here."

The big beef is with looking the other way as the press turns into a propaganda arm of the government. This Hume incident is not in a vacuum. It's in the context of Armstrong Williams, Jeff Gannon et al. Yet your reaction is to thow up your hands and say "so what." Note also that Ken Mehlman recently repeated Hume's lie, practically verbatim, so it's not an innocent error, or an isolated incident. It seems to be a classic Rovian talking point, shamelessly distorted and deceptive. Obviously the same deception has also been propagated by Bill Bennett and the WSJ.

The big beef also is in hiding the issue of risk. You acknowledge Bush's plan has more risk. Bush himself is inclined to hide this fact (see my post of 2/18, 6:05 am). It appears Hume et al are colluding with him. After all, most of us perceive FDR and his SS as inclined to protect us from risk; Hume is helping Bush coopt FDR's reputation.

Robin said "Jukebox, you are really only showing your dishonesty here, not Hume's."

Nice job throwing mud without an iota of substance. Who said you could play with the grown-ups?

This looks like a double-standard to me. When righty bloggers find something in MSM they think is misleading, they make a big fuss, but only if the bloggers' political agenda is served. For some reason Hume gets a free pass.

Brad DeLong is not a righty blogger. He hasn't gotten a free pass the Lefties have gotten on his case. The problem is they are trying to turn it into an Eason Jordan thing, which is ridiculous.

As far as "so have others," I'm having a hard time finding more than one or two righty bloggers who are willing to acknowledge that Hume's statement was even slightly misleading.

Well Victor has, and note I'm saying it isn't highly misleading like Dan Rather or Eason Jordan (both of which seem to have some elements of a cover-up). So there, Victor says Hume is wrong, and thus misleading. I think Hume is as misleading as Kevin Drum. So there, you have your two "Righties" if you want to count Victor and I as "Righties".

It doesn't just "apply to Bush's plan too." It applies much, much more to Bush's plan. Trouble is, Hume's remark tends to obscure and deny this essential fact.

Yes, that is a frustrating thing about television and even print news (much less in the latter). They tend to over-simplify things. One television they have to make things into news bytes, fit into a 5 or 10 minute segment, and so forth. Lots of information is lost.

The big beef is with looking the other way as the press turns into a propaganda arm of the government. This Hume incident is not in a vacuum. It's in the context of Armstrong Williams, Jeff Gannon et al. Yet your reaction is to thow up your hands and say "so what.

And were you just as outraged at Dan Rather? Do you still think the information is "fake but true" like Al Franken? You talk a good game, but this is just a minor incident of selective quotations. It isn't faking evidence nor is it claiming U.S. troops are murderers and then trying to hush it up.

Regarding Gannon, I don't see a big deal there either. The guy had day passes and asked softball questions? So what. You telling me you want the White House Press Secretary prohibiting journalists passed on political ideology and/or sexual orientation (hint: a yes answer puts you pretty much in the bigot catagory).

Note also that Ken Mehlman recently repeated Hume's lie, practically verbatim, so it's not an innocent error, or an isolated incident.

Yes, and Drum is guilty of the same thing. Have you started e-mailing him and his superiors at Washington Monthly? He is a fairly influential blogger who gets paid to do it. Look at the claims he repeats about OASDI and blacks. Check out the link in the post.

Victor said "It is also notable that FDR's VCA proposal would have private contributions invested in bonds earning no less than 3%"

Could you let us know where you got that?

Uh, that's in the law itself, it's also explained very clearly in the second to last paragraph of the 1936 benefits pamphlet I linked to in my blogpost.

Some forms of Bush's plans have actually mandated a rather sizeable investment in bonds, making the parallels eerily similar.

One distinction, of course, is that the 1935 act essentially ALSO guaranteed an overall rate of return to the individual VCA certificat holder via their death benefit provision (3.5% of accumulated wages).

"my best-guess at this time is that the benefit-design was supposed to be more of a defined-benefit than a defined-contribution idea."

I'm perplexed as to why any guessing is required, unless you claim SS as we know it is the latter.

Guessing is required because a fully-funded system design like that proposed in 1935 will require constant monitoring. It is clear that the Social Security board was given some power on this dimension, but I don't know how much. This is what Steve has pointed out.

Because it's clear that FDR's VCA was simply an extension to SS as we know it.

OK, now this is absolutely false. Notice the huge bulk of testimony indicating that the 1935 COMPULSORY accounts weren't the same as current law. The Voluntary ones are even less so; they didn't have the employer match (which today's social security has), they had death benefits (which today's doesn't have), they had guaranteed rates of return (which today's doesn't have), they didn't have survivor benefits (which today's social security has), these were virtually fully-funded, they were voluntary tack-ons or for those who otherwise couldn't buy into Social Security, etc. In fact, I can think of almost no characteristic that is reasonably similar between the two. Both paid benefits, I guess.

Notice how quickly FDR let his fellow Democrats shoot down the VCA's, so if the VCA's were "just like modern day Social Security", FDR must not have cared that much about our current scheme.

You're not addressing the arguments I've raised on the other forum.

To be blunt, I found no worthy arguments in the other forum that Miles, etc., hadn't addressed over here. Perhaps I missed them. However, I can't help fail to notice that you have ignored virtually every single argument that I've made in THIS forum, and refuse to even give me a time-date stamp place to look in the other forum.

Read the explanation from Myers in the early 1950s. Read the statement from Miles. Read the 1939 actuarial opinion. Read any modern-day textbook discussing Social Security. They all say the same thing, shockingly enough. I have done almost no original thinking on this dimension; I have simply regurgitated what is commonly understood in all places outside of Media Matters.

Steve said "Brad DeLong is not a righty blogger."

Exactly. I'm well-aware of that. That's my point. Anyone (blogger or not) who expects to be seen as more than a partisan hack realizes a responsibility to condemn corruption and falsehood whereever it appears. For example, many righty bloggers had the integrity to speak up in disapproval regarding the Armstrong Williams fiasco. In comparison, the rush to defend and justify Hume is striking.

"He hasn't gotten a free pass the Lefties have gotten on his case."

Please refer to my previous paragraph.

"The problem is they are trying to turn it into an Eason Jordan thing, which is ridiculous."

Interesting standards you have. Jordan spoke in a private forum, made a mistake, backtracked, and lost his job anyway. Hume speaks before a national audience, says something that is at best "misleading" (as you admit), and is at worst a blatant example of lying through his teeth in order to promote administration propaganda, and he takes no responsibility and admits no error. And a bunch of righty bloggers stand up and applaud. Along with Bill Bennett, Ken Mehlman and the WSJ. Nice.

"They tend to over-simplify things. One television they have to make things into news bytes, fit into a 5 or 10 minute segment, and so forth. Lots of information is lost."

Too bad that lame excuse doesn't apply to the print/web version of Hume's remarks. Likewise for Bill Bennett, WSJ, and a variety of other folks parroting Hume's nonsense.

"It isn't faking evidence nor is it claiming U.S. troops are murderers and then trying to hush it up."

Sorry, but this isn't the place to get sidetracked into a debate about Rather and/or Eason. You got your pound of flesh from those guys. Powerline got to be Blog of the Year out of it. Too bad Hume isn't expected to even post a clarification.

"this is just a minor incident of selective quotations"

Hmm, we're talking about the centerpiece of Bush's domestic agenda. We're talking about historic legislation involving trillions of dollars, to have effect not just over decades but over lifetimes. We're talking about a subject that people find confusing and highly emotional. And you think what appears to be an intentional distortion of history for the purpose of manipulation of mass public opinion by a news anchor is a "minor incident." I realize you think Eason insulting our troops in a small private gathering is a much greater threat to our future as a democracy.

"The guy had day passes and asked softball questions? So what. You telling me you want the White House Press Secretary prohibiting journalists passed on political ideology and/or sexual orientation"

Nice job trying to pretend the story is about his softball questions or his sexual orientation. You wish. It's not.

If it had been discovered that a prostitute (regardless of gender or sexual orientation) using a phony name to masquerade as a journalist had been granted daily passes to get into the Clinton White House for a couple of years, we would have seen Ken Starr spending millions to investigate. Somehow we know all about a stain on a blue dress, but we're not supposed to be curious about whether Gannon used sexual blackmail to jump in line ahead of thousands of real journalists who would like a chance to ask the president a question during a nationally televised live press conference.

By the way, the issue with Gannon isn't particularly about anything he did. It's what the White House did. It takes a lot of gullibility to think that this character ended up there for a couple of years without a little help from people in high places.

"Yes, and Drum is guilty of the same thing."

It's not a good sign for the quality of your argument when the best you can do is try to shift attention to an alleged misdeed by someone on the other side. Anyway, last time I checked, Drum wasn't head of the Democratic party, or a news anchor with a live audience of millions.

Victor said "Some forms of Bush's plans have actually mandated a rather sizeable investment in bonds, making the parallels eerily similar."

If the Bush plan was 100% bonds, and if it was in addition to SS instead of a (partial) replacement, then I would be more willing to call Hume an honest man. But those are big ifs.

"I found no worthy arguments in the other forum that Miles, etc., hadn't addressed over here."

You've mentioned Miles several times in this thread, but I couldn't find links to him in this thread or on your blog. Maybe I didn't look in the right place. A pointer would be helpful.

"you have ignored virtually every single argument that I've made in THIS forum, and refuse to even give me a time-date stamp place to look in the other forum."

I'll say again that I think responses to your arguments appear in the other forum. I hate to sacrifice more innocent electrons by pasting lots of stuff here. There are numerous aspects of the issue, and numerous posts, so it didn't occur to me to try to tell you which posts to look at.

By the way, when you say "refuse," I think it sort of conveys the impression you asked me for that ("time-date stamp"), and I summarily turned you down. Not exactly what happened, unless I missed something somewhere.

"Read the statement from Miles."

This in particular is something I'm having trouble finding.

jukebox, there just isn't anyway that you can make your case despite your willingness to expend thousands of bytes on it. And yet, despite pumping out the bytes, you chose to ignore all the counterarguments presented to you. It is false to claim that "at worst" Hume was lying. At worst, Hume was stretching a point.

You really need to get a grip as this issue is a completely meaningless one. Your attempt to toss Guckert in shows an obsession.

If jukebox has truly deluded himself into believing that Hume's statement was a lie, I'm looking forward to how jukeboxgrad rates this.

I'm not defending Hume, I'm just saying I don't see the magnitude here that you are suggesting.

Interesting standards you have. Jordan spoke in a private forum, made a mistake, backtracked, and lost his job anyway.

Private forum? With a blogger and public officials, and video tape. Nice reach there, but no prize. Also, you are ignoring the content for Jordan, but not here. Nice standard you have.

Hmm, we're talking about the centerpiece of Bush's domestic agenda. We're talking about historic legislation involving trillions of dollars, to have effect not just over decades but over lifetimes.

Irrelevant. Hume is not part of the Bush Administration, he is not a spokesmen for the administartion or for Bush's push to privatize Social Security. Further, Hume is one voice of many, and surely not the last.

We're talking about a subject that people find confusing and highly emotional. And you think what appears to be an intentional distortion of history for the purpose of manipulation of mass public opinion by a news anchor is a "minor incident." I realize you think Eason insulting our troops in a small private gathering is a much greater threat to our future as a democracy.

Are you through being hysterical?

If it had been discovered that a prostitute (regardless of gender or sexual orientation) using a phony name to masquerade as a journalist had been granted daily passes to get into the Clinton White House for a couple of years, we would have seen Ken Starr spending millions to investigate.

LOL, man you liberals crack me up. A righty says something referencing Clinton and it is "Clenis! Clenis!"

Somehow we know all about a stain on a blue dress, but we're not supposed to be curious about whether Gannon used sexual blackmail to jump in line ahead of thousands of real journalists who would like a chance to ask the president a question during a nationally televised live press conference.

Well the first involved perjury, the latter sounds like a sordid fantasy. Is it yours or someone else's?

By the way, the issue with Gannon isn't particularly about anything he did. It's what the White House did. It takes a lot of gullibility to think that this character ended up there for a couple of years without a little help from people in high places.

What happen to the sexual blackmail? Seriously, is this the extent of the evidence you have for this?

It's not a good sign for the quality of your argument when the best you can do is try to shift attention to an alleged misdeed by someone on the other side. Anyway, last time I checked, Drum wasn't head of the Democratic party, or a news anchor with a live audience of millions.

Oh. Okay, so misleading statements are just fine if one isn't a news anchor. Gotcha. Thanks for the green light to post misleading information. I'm sure you are going to come back and say, "It is a matter of degree, Hume reaches millions and Drum only reaches tens of thousands." Of course, how many people read Drum's op-ed piece in the Christian Science Monitor or the one in the L.A. Times?

Also, it isn't shifting focus, but noting that

1. This is routine, on both sides.
2. The hypocrisy.

Drum, Franken, et. al. have done this themselves, how come they don't resign? Because they are propagandists trying to destroy the fabric of our democracy.

Are you shaking your head at that last one? Well jukebox that is precisely how you sound, hysterical.

"Your attempt to toss Guckert in shows an obsession."

Good point. Guilty as charged. I'm obsessed with an obligation to try to make sure my kids inherit a democracy, and I'm obsessed with the idea that one of the main things a tyrant does is corrupt the press. I also know enough about history to realize that the road to hell is paved not primarily with cataclysmic events, but rather with a series of relatively small corruptions that people like you and Steve are inclined to characterize as "minor incidents." If you don't understand what's at stake, that's your problem.

"If jukebox has truly deluded himself into believing that Hume's statement was a lie, I'm looking forward to how jukeboxgrad rates this."

There are obviously numerous assumptions behind the calculator, and I doubt that any two people would agree completely about exactly which assumptions make sense and which don't. Anyway, it's too bad you can't see the difference between partisan rhetoric coming from a major news anchor, who explicitly claims to be "fair and balanced," as compared with partisan rhetoric coming directly from a political party, which by definition is expected to be partisan.

If you're looking for partisan rhetoric that's highly distorted and misleading, you can consider Bush himself telling people that higher returns from Wall Street (compared with T-bills) are a sure thing: "a personal account, obviously, under strict guidelines of investment, will yield a better rate of return over -- than the money -- the person's money is earning in the Social Security trust" (link). There is no equivocation in that assurance, and I didn't take it out of context. Any stockbroker who similarly omitted the essential disclaimer ("past performance is no guarantee of future results") would face serious legal and professional sanctions.

"I'm not defending Hume, I'm just saying I don't see the magnitude here that you are suggesting."

I'm not defending Eason, I'm just saying I don't see the magnitude here that you are suggesting. Note that one is out of work, and the other hasn't even posted a clarification. On the contrary, he'll probably end up with a presidential medal.

"Private forum? With a blogger and public officials, and video tape. Nice reach there, but no prize."

I'm not saying he was alone in a room. "Private forum" in the sense that it was a relatively small, invited audience. In contrast with millions of people watching a cable news program.

"Also, you are ignoring the content for Jordan, but not here. Nice standard you have."

I made it clear I don't approve of the content, regarding Jordan. So I'm perplexed how that equates to "ignoring."

"Hume is not part of the Bush Administration, he is not a spokesmen for the administartion or for Bush's push to privatize Social Security."

Then it's odd how he happened to misquote and distort FDR in exactly the same manner as Ken Mehlman, practically verbatim.

"Further, Hume is one voice of many, and surely not the last."

Exactly. One voice of many that includes Bill Bennett, the WSJ and Mehlman himself. How peculiar that a supposedly objective press happens to misquote FDR in exactly the same manner as the Party itself. Many voices, yes, all repeating the same propaganda. Some "minor incident."

"A righty says something referencing Clinton and it is 'Clenis! Clenis!'"

And your point is what? Are you claiming that a hooker hanging around the Clinton White House for a couple of years is something you would have considered a non-story?

"Well the first involved perjury, the latter sounds like a sordid fantasy."

I think you'd like to dismiss it as a fantasy, but his work life as a hooker is well-documented, and his daily presence in the White House for a couple of years is also well-documented. And there's also reason to believe his two lives were conducted simultaneously. So the only fantasy is your wish that this will be swept under the rug as another "minor incident."

Anyway, since perjury is a big deal for you, I'm surprised to notice you're not screaming bloody murder in connection with Gonzales lying about how he helped Dubya avoid jury duty.

"Seriously, is this the extent of the evidence you have for this?"

I realize you think pseudononymous hookers wander in and out of the White House all day long, and there's nothing noteworthy about this, even when they get called on by the president on live national TV. Move along folks, nothing to see here. Repeat after me: there's no story here, there's no story here. It's nothing but a third-rate burglary.

"Okay, so misleading statements are just fine if one isn't a news anchor."

Nice job exaggerating and putting words in my mouth.

"Of course, how many people read Drum's op-ed piece in the Christian Science Monitor or the one in the L.A. Times?"

A whole lot fewer than watch Fox.

"it isn't shifting focus, but noting that 1. This is routine, on both sides. 2. The hypocrisy."

I notice you're the master of fine distinctions and splitting hairs when it comes to claiming that Hume didn't lie, but was only "misleading." But the fine distinctions go away and the broad brush comes out when it comes time to imply that Drum and Hume have equal clout. Nice.

Anyway, it's nice to see you implicitly acknowledge that Hume is just as partisan as Drum et al. At least the latter don't wrap themselves in a phony slogan of "fair and balanced."

"Drum, Franken, et. al. have done this themselves, how come they don't resign?"

Everyone makes mistakes. Honorable people make an effort to correct their mistakes. By the way, unlike Hume, Drum and Franken (like you, to your credit) both provide a forum where people can respond to them.

Please refer me to a thread in either of those places (Drum or Franken) where you've spoken up to report an important error and you think the host avoided being held accountable.

So above we see that jukeboxgrad has no integrity at all since he would not call the blatant lies of the Democrats' dishonest "calculator".

Another troll exposed.

I'm not defending Eason, I'm just saying I don't see the magnitude here that you are suggesting. Note that one is out of work, and the other hasn't even posted a clarification. On the contrary, he'll probably end up with a presidential medal.

Well one should be careful about their accusations of murder, and Eason Jordan has done similar despicable acts before.

I'm not saying he was alone in a room. "Private forum" in the sense that it was a relatively small, invited audience. In contrast with millions of people watching a cable news program.

And millions are just as aware of Eason Jordan's "slip up" thanks to that one blogger.

I think you'd like to dismiss it as a fantasy, but his work life as a hooker is well-documented, and his daily presence in the White House for a couple of years is also well-documented. And there's also reason to believe his two lives were conducted simultaneously. So the only fantasy is your wish that this will be swept under the rug as another "minor incident."

Soooo...in other words you ain't got shit? Have I got that right, nothing other than your own made up fantasies.

And your point is what? Are you claiming that a hooker hanging around the Clinton White House for a couple of years is something you would have considered a non-story?

Well I don't know, would chuckling over it mean that I considered something other than a non-story? Hanging around the areas the press can hang around, I wouldn't have really cared. Now maybe if the (former) hooker was involved with highly classified documents there might be cause for concern. Was Gannon/Guckert handling highly classified material in your fantasies?

Anyway, since perjury is a big deal for you, I'm surprised to notice you're not screaming bloody murder in connection with Gonzales lying about how he helped Dubya avoid jury duty.

I post very little on stuff outside of my areas of interest: economics, mathematics/statistics, intelligent design/evolution and the overlap of these areas with politics. Given your tendency to fantasy, I'm not going to assume what you have written is the best summary of the situation though.

I realize you think pseudononymous hookers wander in and out of the White House all day long, and there's nothing noteworthy about this, even when they get called on by the president on live national TV. Move along folks, nothing to see here. Repeat after me: there's no story here, there's no story here. It's nothing but a third-rate burglary.

Like I said, you Lefties are looking for your Rather/Jordan story and are working hard, but these two just don't get me riled up. Keep going with the sordid fantasies though, they might make a good porn short story you can sell to Penthouse Letters or something.

Nice job exaggerating and putting words in my mouth.

I'm not exaggerating, I'm merely taking your comments to their logical conclusion. Since I don't have an audience of millions I'm free to mislead my little heart out. It ins't my fault you are getting caught in your own hypocrisy.

notice you're the master of fine distinctions and splitting hairs when it comes to claiming that Hume didn't lie, but was only "misleading." But the fine distinctions go away and the broad brush comes out when it comes time to imply that Drum and Hume have equal clout. Nice.

What was whiney Jukebox saying about putting words in his mouth? I didn't say that Drum and Hume have equal clout, but Drum is a big blogger (hell he gets paid to do it) and he gets op-eds in important newspapers read by millions. He may not be Brit Hume in terms of audience, but he sure as hell isn't some no-name blogger such as myself.

Everyone makes mistakes. Honorable people make an effort to correct their mistakes. By the way, unlike Hume, Drum and Franken (like you, to your credit) both provide a forum where people can respond to them.

Yes, and Drum rarely if evers acknowledges a mistake. Victor has noted many of Kevin's ahhh...loose interpretations of the data. Yet he is considered to be a main source of information Democrats and liberals can use. Who gives a shit if the information is faulty.

Here are some of Victor's posts where Drum made some misleading comments.

Mr. Drum's Mental Noodle

Drum in the L.A. Times

Open Letter to Drum: Error Notification

Here are some of mine.

Kevin Drum's Economic Theories

Follow that one with this one,

Gasoline Refineries in California

Funny how these things tend to contradict Kevin, yet I know of no correction, retraction, new pot on Kevin's part.

Misleading Chart

Oil, Gasoline, and Prices...Oh My

Have fun reading Jukebox. Oh yes, Kevin does get trackbacks so he has to be at least aware of some of these.

And, BTW, Drum makes so many mistakes that I, for most practical purposes, have simply decided it is no longer worth the effort to try to correct him. I do believe that Kevin Drum tries hard, but he is so blinded by ideology that he can't help it. Just a theory.

...

I excerpted two paragraphs Vincent Miles' statement on my blog, and linked you to this location: http://www.ssa.gov/history/miles.html . However, I did not label the quote as coming from him, so I can understand how it could be missed.

"jukeboxgrad has no integrity at all since he would not call the blatant lies of the Democrats' dishonest 'calculator'."

Hmm, let's see. Bush says stocks are a sure thing, and you can't be bothered to condemn that, even though it hardly takes a PhD in finance to understand how dangerously false that statement is. But you think I should decipher several dense screenfuls of javascript and actuarial formulas in order to be able to make a fair assessment of the link you cited. No thanks.

By the way, there's nothing "blatant" about an alleged lie that requires that much technical analysis to demonstrate (blatant: "so obvious or conspicuous as to be impossible to hide").

By the way, nice job continuing to pretend that a news anchor shouldn't be held to a higher standard of objectivity than a political party.

"millions are just as aware of Eason Jordan's 'slip up' thanks to that one blogger"

Uh, that's not the point. The point is you're pretending Jordan's remark before a small invited audience is the equivalent of Hume's scripted statement before an audience of millions.

"Soooo...in other words you ain't got shit?"

I realize you think there's nothing remarkable about the fact that a pseudononymous tax-cheating prostitute (or at best an ex-prostitute) with no prior experience as a paid journalist spent two years inside the White House press room, and was called on frequently, even though he had been formally denied regular press credentials and even though his so-called "news" organization didn't even exist at the time he first started appearing inside the White House.

"Was Gannon/Guckert handling highly classified material in your fantasies?"

Some people think he didn't know anything about Plame that he didn't read in the WSJ. On the other hand, in his own freeper posts he seemed to have been bragging about access to a Plame document. Not to mention how he seemed to know four hours in advance exactly what time Bush was going to announce the invasion, and also seemed to mysteriously be a hot source for similar news tips. So you're asking a good question, and hopefully one way or another we're going to find out the answer.

"Given your tendency to fantasy, I'm not going to assume what you have written is the best summary of the situation though."

You need to assume nothing. Since you raised the subject of perjury, and since you apparently think lying about a blowjob is a matter of great national importance, I assume you'll be interested in this account of Gonzales's perjury.

"Since I don't have an audience of millions I'm free to mislead my little heart out."

I have to admit it's refreshing you're so open about it.

"Here are some of Victor's posts where Drum made some misleading comments."

Nice job answering a question I didn't ask. I didn't claim Hume never makes mistakes. All humans do. I asked you to give me an example of where you posted in his comments area to report an important error, and he still refused to be held accountable. I imagine there are millions of blogs Drum doesn't read, and probably your's and Victor's are in that category, trackback or not. When you post a complaint in a comments area, it means you have enough confidence in your facts that you're willing to engage in a dialog with him and his readers. It also means there's a public record to show who relies on name-calling, and who relies on facts.

Thanks for confirming (by omission) that you've apparently never done this.

"Drum makes so many mistakes"

Then I find it odd that you can't present even a single example of where you engaged in a direct dialog about it. Unless it's that you feel safer throwing stones that no one will notice.

"I did not label the quote as coming from him, so I can understand how it could be missed."

I think that's what happened. I was looking for his name.

Thanks for the link, but I guess it doesn't add anything to what you had already quoted. Miles indicates a need for a reserve fund. In my opinion, there's a big difference, potentially, between a reserve and a full reserve. This important distinction is discussed at great length in the other thread I cited.

I asked you to give me an example of where you posted in his comments area to report an important error, and he still refused to be held accountable.

Steve DID do this. Good grief, did you actually click any of those links? Who do you think "victor" is http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2004_12/005280.php or http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2004_10/004884.php ... incidentally, Drum DID come by to my blog on that one. I did correct a factual error in my own post (as you can see from the trackbacks, I think) ... but Drum in his comments on my own blog screwed up, calling all non-defense spending domestic discretionary.

Commenting in Drum's comment section doesn't help the quality of his work one iota.

And given the quantity of spam/porn links in his comment sections, we shouldn't be surprised that he doesn't visit there that often.

In my opinion, there's a big difference, potentially, between a reserve and a full reserve.

1) Of course it doesn't add anything, my case has already been made.

2) If you set aside $1,000 of your money today, and get benefits back of $1,030, is that a "full reserve"?

The Old-Age reserve was set up so that the interest ($30 in the above case) would cover all estimated future shortfalls in the system. I.e., it was fully-funded by intent and design.

This hasn't happened with modern Social Security reforms since, well, I don't know when. The 1983 reform set up funding through 2058. That's the closest we've come.

As to the rest, I will repeat one last time.

Question: Is today's system the same as FDR's compulsory accounts (CA)? A: No. Why? A few repetitive items and some additional ones:

1) CA had death benefits
2) CA had, effectively, a guaranteed rate of return,
3) CA was "actuarially sound" and established under accepted private-industry pension standards.
4) CA was more like a private savings plan than the 1939 reforms (see the 1939 actuaries' memo I linked to above); this is corroborated by the statement from Miles, Rosen, etc.
5) CA was based upon accumulated earnings rather than average earnings
6) There were no survivorship benefits
7) There were no automatic indexing or COLA increases
8) The normal retirment age is currently greater than age 65 and there are early withdrawal privileges
9) The current system will automatically cut future benefit increases if the Trust Fund drops below a certain level.

In contrast to these points, evidence that they are the same:

* They both pay benefits to elderly based upon earnings
* They both have a "reserve account" invested in Treasuries
* They are both run by the US government
* They are both based upon laws written in the language commonly understood as English
* Both laws were set up in the 20th century
* Both are commonly referred to as "Social Security"
* You want to believe they are the same.

Actually, Juke, let me quickly apologize for the tenor of my last post. Most people (left and right) aren't necessarily concerned about an honest and in-depth analysis of the real world, and so it was only natural for you to assume that steve and I were just like everyone else. I should have made my initial point much nicer:

a) I have posted many times to various comment threads on Washington Monthly,
b) Only one time has he acknowledge the data (see second link above) ... that time he came to my blog, made a factually incorrect assertion and exhibited not a little bit of hubris. http://www.deadparrots.net/archives/politics/0502kevin_drum_and_the_big_lie.html

For the record, I went on over the next few weeks to discuss that issue in detail with actual facts from the Public Budget Database, something that, to my knowledge, no one else bothered to do.

Further, many of Drum's errors are basic. His proclamation that Estimate I from the Trustee Report could be achieved by simply boosting productivity a bit is a classic example. That later morphed into the LA Times article he wrote, and I also criticized that (see the links Steve gave you).

The bottom line is that it is not really worth the time and effort to confront Drum with inconvenient things like reproducible facts. For just another comic example, try to find the post he made on statistical significance and interpreting poll data. That's how I found steve verdon ... I was going apoplectic at Drum's confusion between Bayesian and Classical inference, but steve laid the smack down. Drum never posted a correction; I emailed the stats profs that supposedly "consulted" with him, and they likewise did not respond (notably, they never endorsed his usage of the statistics, they only provided the spreadsheet. If I was them, I wouldn't want to have anything to do with it, either.)

Drum has an exceptional ability to cull complicated topics down to simple basics, and explain them in language that is provocative. Unfortunately, he is either incapable of understanding the basic dynamics underlying many of those ideas, or purposefully ignores them.

My hunch is that he's caught up in a bit of an ego trip, thinking he's a lot smarter than he actually is. This, coupled with the inevitable trash and noise from his typical commentator has put him in a cocoon of ignorance. He probably reads his comments threads cursorily every now and then, but for the most part, he's working on his own thing and moving on. Therefore, he misses it whenever someone brings, you know, real facts.

But that is sheer speculation. You'd have to break through and ask him to find out for sure. Regardless, I do have a very productive life that takes time. It is not my self-appointed mission to correct the ignorance of the Left.

My mission is simply to explore the world, and then practice writing by blogging ... when I have the time, and when I can feel I can accurately give value-added.

If people read, fine. If not, fine. I really don't care a lot. If Drum wants to be ignorant, he can feel free. Just like Media Matters. But that doesn't I have to sit on the sidelines and not point out how silly things are from time to time.

jukeboxgrad, interestingly enough I had no difficulty following the explanation for why the Democrats had coded a fraud as a "calculator" of SS benefits.

It was certainly more interesting reading that your tortured attempts - at many times more length - to construct a false claim of dishonesty against Hume.

But the bottom line remains that you have demonstrated your complete and utter lack of integrity. You've been stripped down to your core of propagandist.

The Guckert stuff you keep inserting into a thread on social security wonkery just shows that you are quite disturbingly obsessed. Certainly, you continue to lack any evidence for your claims.

Oh, by the way, I knew four hours in advance of the beginning of the Iraq invasion. It was kind of obvious to all - more so if one was around the White House watching the clues in their behavior.

Here is the one Victor is talking about with regards to Bayesian vs. Frequentist statistics.

Link

Granted it is a small issue, but that makes it even more mind boggling why Drum doesn't change it, if he reads his comment section. My guess is he doesn't and hence trundles along pretty much ignorant of his "mistakes".

Tim Lambert also pointed out an error in the spreadsheet as well.

I know this will do nothing to persuade you Jukebox, but it is an example you were asking for. I've given up e-mailing Drum and commenting at his site. He seems impervious to knew information.

Victor said "Question: Is today's system the same as FDR's compulsory accounts (CA)? A: No."

Thanks for all the detailed information. As I've said, I think the points you raise are addressed elsewhere (in posts by me and others).

Thanks for providing what I asked for (links to comments you posted at Drum's place).

I looked fairly closely at "The Big Lie" stuff you cited. (I'm not industrious enough to plow through the other two; the one about MOE is especially beyond my patience at the moment.) FWIW, my assessment is that you have a point, and I would be more impressed with Drum if he had posted an update to reflect some of the things you said. I see why you claim his headline "The Big Lie" was excessive.

At the same time, I find it hard to understand where you place your emphasis (unless it's just a question of pure partisanship). It seems to me that you're bending over backwards to excuse bad behavior when you make a statement like "if Bush were in an academic debate, then yes, he deceived. As it was, however, he was in a political debate." It strikes me that Bush's statement in his debate is remarkably similar to the statement Hume made, in the sense of very carefully using language not to inform or even persuade, but to distort and mislead. In both cases a mass audience was being addressed, and in both cases my guess is that most viewers were misled in exactly the way the speaker intended. I think this is how we end up, for example, with massive numbers of citizens who think that Saddam did 9/11, and that we did indeed find WMD in Iraq.

By the way, speaking of the way bloggers respond (or don't respond) to feedback, my experience with Glenn Reynolds, Powerline and Captain's Quarters is that they are highly immune to correction. I have a number of stories I could tell about this.

For example, posted here is a thoroughly documented example of Powerline failing to take responsibility for their errors.

Robin said "I had no difficulty following the explanation for why the Democrats had coded a fraud as a 'calculator' of SS benefits."

If you're that clever, you should have no trouble understanding the significance of Bush telling the country that stocks are a sure thing. Yet you studiously sidestep that issue. I guess that makes it clear where your blind spot is.

"The Guckert stuff you keep inserting into a thread on social security wonkery"

There's a direct line connecting Gannon and Hume, the same line that goes through Armstrong Williams and others. If you're too blind to connect the dots, that's your problem.

"a false claim of dishonesty against Hume."

Have you let our host know he lacks integrity for calling Hume "misleading?" Or have you decided that there's a world of difference between "dishonest" and "misleading?" I just want to be clear about which hairs you're splitting at the moment.

"Certainly, you continue to lack any evidence for your claims."

If you mean evidence that can get past your obvious blind spot, I guess you're right.

"I knew four hours in advance of the beginning of the Iraq invasion."

If you knew the exact time Bush would go on the air, as Gannon apparently did, then you could probably advance your career by joining the White House press corps.

There's a direct line connecting Gannon and Hume, the same line that goes through Armstrong Williams and others. If you're too blind to connect the dots, that's your problem.

Are you suggesting that Hume is paid to promote Bush's plan?

Then pray tell, who paid Rather to go after Bush, and who paid Jordan for his despicable acts? George Soros? Wait, wait, wait....oohhh, this is good, was it Richard Mellon Scaife and Karl Rove hatching a brilliant plan to discredit news sources other than Fox?

"Are you suggesting that Hume is paid to promote Bush's plan?"

I realize you won't believe it until you see the cancelled check (and even then you and Victor would be explaining how it's a perfectly legal currency transfer that only represents a form of corruption in a certain academic sense, and it really isn't so bad by comparison because after all Kevin Drum once forgot to pay a parking ticket). But there are many ways to exert influence, aside from handing someone a wad of cash. I see a significant amount of mutual back-scratching between Bush and Murdoch.

"Then pray tell, who paid Rather to go after Bush"

You mean with an incredibly inept effort that had the result of completely neutralizing the TANG story? With friends like that who needs enemies.

By the way, the fact that there are still a few journalists who sort of remember the meaning of the word is hardly proof that the press is alive and well.

By the way, in case you forgot, the reason for a free press in a democracy is to question and criticize the government, and hold it accountable. I wonder if you lose any sleep over what appears to be a deliberate campaign to treat dissent as a form of treason.

jukeboxgrad spews "There's a direct line connecting Gannon and Hume, the same line that goes through Armstrong Williams and others. If you're too blind to connect the dots, that's your problem."

There is no direct line. Only your delusions. You have no evidence whatsoever for your false claims. There is no campaign to treat "dissent" as treason. These are all manifestations of your own mind.

You have given us all the information necessary to correctly specify your species. lunarius peiorus solacium formidilosus.

the reason for a free press in a democracy is to question and criticize the government, and hold it accountable.

Strange, I thought it was to report the truth rather than advocate against government policy.

Robin said "There is no campaign to treat 'dissent' as treason. These are all manifestations of your own mind."

Here are some more "manifestations."

When Time Magazine's Blogger of the Year casually says "the whole mainstream of the Democratic party is engaged in an effort that really is a betrayal of America" (video here, text here), I think it's fair to say there's a campaign to treat dissent as treason.

When that same blogger calls an ex-president a traitor for doing something far more benign than what Reagan did at the same time, I think it's fair to say there's a campaign to treat dissent as treason.

When a decorated war hero gets death-wish messages because he dared to express an opinion, I think it's fair to say there's a campaign to treat dissent as treason.

When the president threatens to arrest three schoolteachers because they dared to express an opinion, I think it's fair to say there's a campaign to treat dissent as treason.

When the Secret Service gets involved because some high school kids sing the exact words of a 40-year old Bob Dylan song, I think it's fair to say there's a campaign to treat dissent as treason.

When you can lose your job for having a Kerry bumper sticker, I think it's fair to say there's a campaign to treat dissent as treason.

When a congressman says that a vote for Kerry is a vote for Osama, I think it's fair to say there's a campaign to treat dissent as treason.

When there are many, many incidents of dissenters being fired, harrassed and threatened, I think it's fair to say there's a campaign to treat dissent as treason.

You have given us all the information necessary to correctly identify your position.

Victor seemed to object to my statement that the reason for a free press in a democracy is to question and criticize the government, and hold it accountable.

Funny that you know more about this subject than folks like James Madison and Hugo Black.

By the way, in case you forgot, the reason for a free press in a democracy is to question and criticize the government, and hold it accountable. I wonder if you lose any sleep over what appears to be a deliberate campaign to treat dissent as a form of treason.

What the fuck? I'd suggest calling your doctor, your prescription isn't strong enough.