Just like every politician in history, conservative, liberal, etc. all the same….

The Ford family is reviled by most Tennesseans.

As for cutting bloated social spending, merely asking for accountability would be enough. Does the program produce the results it claims? Keep it. Does the program fail to produce results that can be measured? Cut it.

To put it in terms easily understood, shut down schools that harm children. Give raises (and praise) to those who effectively teach. Cut the ratio of administrators to teachers. Make part of the pay raise a bonus several years later to those who helped kids to help themselves. Don’t know how to reach many of the parents, most crying need of all.

TANSTAAFL.

There Ain’t No Such Thing As A Free Lunch.

Think this came from Larry Niven. Selling of the concept of a free lunch is an example of GIGO.

And, just as food for thought, I remember being in my 30′s (nearly 30 years ago)and having bitter arguements with my now dear departed dad over the future solvency of the SS system for my own retirement. I resented paying into it. I was convinced it would be bankrupt by the time I reached 65 and thus I never counted on it for my retirement. When 401K’s came along, I jumped in with both feet. I only wish they would have been available when I was 30. I wouldn’t be comfortable today; I’d be rich.

I often hear that the “Bush plan” to privatize social security is full of flawed logic, numbers that won’t work and other charges.

The only problem is that there is no “Bush plan” per se. He asked that smart people get together and come up with privatization ideas. And he suggested a few guidelines.

Instead of creative thinkers proposing ideas, all manner of charges were leveled at him which included trying to destroy social security.

To disavow the possibility of privatizing retirement funds is to deny the efficacy of all pension plans, the reality of mutual funds, bond funds and the ready facts of state retirement funds, and the record of the country of Chile and its privatized system.

There are many examples of flawed privatization plans and more than a few that have failed entirely. But the broken social security system we currently have must be addressed.

No candidate can solve each and every problem of his and her constituency. It is ridiculous for him or her to suggest he or she can. Just as well, it is foolish for his or her voters to think that he or she can. If Mr. Ford can produce a platform that the majority of Tennesseans can agree with, he’ll win the election. If not, he’ll lose. However, he must run on his platform and not his party’s. If his party’s platform conflicts with his, maybe its time for him to leave his party and be independent. If so, he just might get elected.

To me, its the candidate and his or her platform that matters and not the party.

Independent Conservative LaShawn Barber has a post up on Harold Ford, the frontu

I also disagree with Ford when he says that people making $300,000 a year or more should be deprived of their SS benefits. If you pay money into the damned system you deserve your damned benefits, no matter what amount of money you make during your lifetime.

I also disagree with the poster who claimed that people who make $300,000 a year or more are more productive citizens. That’s a load of class-based bullcrap. Wealthier citizens aren’t neccessarily more productive than anyone else.

We are so over-run with RINO’s anymore, a breath of FRESH air is needed, but IMO, that *fresh air* has got to be Independent AND Conservative, both parties, Repub and Dem have left their members behind.

Actually, a smaller chunk of your income gets taken out for SS if you have $300k of earned income. SS taxes (OASDI, the non-Medicare part) stop at roughly $90k of earned income, so you would have $210k of income with no SS tax. Therefore as a percentage of income, your SS taxes go down. Of course, SS payments are not linear, so that a maxed-out contributor with $90k of income doesn’t necessarially get twice what a $45k income person.

Of course, asking high income retirees to forego SS is patently unfair.

Speaking of SS.. whatever happened to the big deal W made about it? Wasn’t that a huge objective of his and the worst problem facing us according to him? Then it just quietly disappeared.