My sons Wilson  and Hunter  (on left) went to California and visited Yosemite National Park with our friend Sherwood Haisty Jr. (Sherwood on right) They were there from March 21 to March 27. Here you can see all the snow they had to deal with.

In his article “Harry let us down,” (Arkansas News Bureau, April 4, 2011) John Brummett observes:

The liberal is correct when he says Social Security is a separate insurance program that is solvent.

How can Brummett make that statement in light of the facts below?

Below are some details about Congressman Ryan’s views on Social Security Reform:

Congressman Paul Ryan continues his efforts to advance an adult conversation on the urgent need to protect Social Security for current and future generations. Ryan’s efforts were met — again — with false attacks earlier today on CNN’s Situation Room in a spirited exchange with Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz. By pushing desperate demagoguery and no solutions, leading Democrats threaten to shred the critical social safety net as our crushing burden of debt explodes and our critical health and retirement security programs collapse.

Facts on Social Security and Ryan’s Roadmap

Should politicians continue to cling to the unsustainable status quo, Social Security will not be able to meet its promise to our seniors, imposing painful benefit cuts on those most reliant on this critical program. The Social Security Administration continues to warn of across-the-board 22% benefit cuts for seniors in the heart of their retirement when the Trust Fund is exhausted. Social Security continues to run annual cash deficits, with over $5 trillion in unfunded liabilities.

To meet this challenge, Congressman Paul Ryan offered an invitation for solutions — putting forward a specific plan the Congressional Budget Office and the Social Security Administration’s Chief Actuaries confirmed would save Social Security, making it sustainably solvent for current and future generations. Ryan’s legislative proposal — H.R. 4529, A Roadmap for America’s Future — makes no changes to Social Security for those 55 and older, while offering future seniors the same health and retirement security options enjoyed by Members of Congress.

– Ryan’s reforms make no changes in the program for Americans 55 and older, while strengthening Social Security so it will be there for future generations.
– Ryan’s Roadmap secures the social safety net where it is most needed — providing an increased benefit for low-income individuals, while making modest adjustments in the continued growth of benefits for wealthier seniors.
– At the center of the false attacks are Ryan’s proposal to offer future seniors (those now 54 and younger) the option of guaranteed, personal accounts to help fulfill the mission of retirement security.
– Under Ryan’s Roadmap, future beneficiaries would remain in the traditional government-run system, unless they choose to direct a portion of their payroll taxes to guaranteed personal accounts, owned by the individual, managed by the Social Security Administration, and guaranteed by the Federal government. Neither the traditional system or optional accounts system would be privatized.
– In the personal-accounts system, the accounts are managed and overseen by Social Security Administration – not a stockbroker or private investment firm. Those choosing the personal-accounts option would select from a handful of low-risk, government-regulated options — just as Members of Congress and Federal employees do with the Thrift Savings Plan.
– Ryan’s Roadmap includes a fully-financed, government-backed guarantee so that individuals would get back, at minimum, every dime contributed to the optional, Social Security-managed accounts offered to those now 54 and younger.

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Free-lance columnist Rex Nelson is the president of Arkansas’ Independent Colleges and Universities. He’s also the author of the Southern Fried blog at rexnelsonsouthernfried. com.

Rex Nelson wrote in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette on April 2, 2011 a great article called “Arkansas Bucket List.” The readers of his blog http://www.rexnelsonsouthernfried.com came up with a list of things you must do at least once in your life to be considered a well-rounded Arkansan. Nelson asked others to add their suggestions at his website. I am going through the list slowly.

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1. Wait in line for a seat at the Venesian Inn in Tontitown following a Razorback football game.
2. Visit the Lakeport Plantation near Lake Village and then have supper at the Cow Pen just before driving over the new Mississippi River bridge. (I have always been amazed at the structure of the bridges going over the lower Mississippi River. Did you know that the first bridge built over the lower Mississippi River is still in use in Memphis. It was built in 1892 and at the time it was used for horse and buggy and pedestrians and when a train would come by then the people and the horses would get off and make way for the train to go over. )
3. Head to Wye Mountain west of Little Rock when the jonquils are in bloom. (One of the prettiest sites I have ever seen.)

My sons Wilson  and Hunter  (on right) went to California and visited Yosemite National Park with our friend Sherwood Haisty Jr. (Sherwood on left) They were there from March 21 to March 27. 

Senator John Boozman campaigning at Grady Fish Fry in August of 201o. Here seen with Sherwood Haisty Jr.

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My sons Wilson (on right) and Hunter   went to California and visited Yosemite National Park with our friend Sherwood Haisty Jr. (Sherwood on left) They were there from March 21 to March 27.

In his article “Harry let us down,” (Arkansas News Bureau, April 4, 2011) John Brummett observes:

If you want to start an argument between a liberal and a conservative, you need only open for discussion the question of whether Social Security is part of our federal deficit and debt.

I have been in the median on this issue and can tell you there is danger there from flying debris.

The heck of it is that both sides are absolutely right. Social Security is not part of our debt and deficit problem. And it is.

The liberal is correct when he says Social Security is a separate insurance program that is solvent. Alas, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid let us down in this regard the other day.

He spoke the truth that Social Security is fine. Then he declared with the liberal’s harmfully stubborn polarization that he wanted Social Security left alone in the ongoing debt and deficit discussions and that he would worry about it in a couple of decades (when he would be in his 90s.)

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I have to differ with Brummett concerning the condition of Social Security right now. Everything is not “fine.”

David John of the Heritage Foundation in his article “Guaranteed 22 Percent Benefit Cuts If Social Security is Taken off the Table,” clarifies the real world situation that Social Security is in:

Groups such as Social Security Works and MoveOn.org claim that Social Security is “fully funded.” But MoveOn.org then notes that “after 2037, it’ll still be able to pay out 75% of scheduled benefits—and again without any changes”[3] without noting the real implications of its argument. Moreover, their numbers are wrong—the Social Security Administration says that after 2037, the program will be able to pay 78 percent of promised benefits. Social Security Works makes the same argument[4] (and also uses the wrong numbers). However, the truth is that, while Social Security may have a legal claim on assets in the trust fund to pay full benefits until 2037, after that come the inevitable across-the-board benefit cuts.

And “fully funded” is an interesting phrase. For instance, MoveOn.org claims that “the Social Security Trust Fund isn’t full of IOUs, it’s full of U.S. Treasury Bonds. And those bonds are backed by the full faith and credit of the United States.”[5]

Technically, that is correct, but as Bill Clinton’s Office of Management and Budget noted back in 2000, “These balances are available to finance future benefit payments … only in a bookkeeping sense. They do not consist of real economic assets that can be drawn down in the future to fund benefits. Instead, they are claims on the Treasury that, when redeemed, will have to be financed by raising taxes, borrowing from the public, or reducing benefits, or other expenditures.”[6]

In short, the excess Social Security money was spent years ago on everything from schools to aircraft carriers to bureaucrats’ salaries, and it is now gone.[7] There is no huge warehouse full of dollar bills just waiting for Social Security to start sending out bundles of cash to future retirees. Those bonds will be paid back, but as Bill Clinton’s OMB noted, the money will come from raising taxes, cutting spending of some sort, or borrowing yet more money.

This repayment mechanism also shows that MoveOn.org’s contention that “by law, Social Security funds are separate from the budget, and it must pay its own way … [meaning] that Social Security can’t add one penny to the deficit”[8] is less than fully accurate. It is true that Social Security has its own funding (at least until 2037), but that funding relies on the government repaying the bonds in the trust fund—an action that will require hundreds of billions of dollars of additional taxes or borrowing each year.

If those bonds are repaid by borrowing, that action would increase the deficit. Unfortunately, those payments have already started: Social Security is expected to run a $41 billion deficit in 2010, a smaller deficit next year, and permanent annual deficits starting in 2015.

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Grady Fish Fry

Rex Nelson wrote in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette on April 2, 2011 a great article called “Arkansas Bucket List.” The readers of his blog http://www.rexnelsonsouthernfried.com came up with a list of things you must do at least once in your life to be considered a well-rounded Arkansan. Nelson asked others to add their suggestions at his website. I am going through the list slowly.

1. Make it a point to be in the Hardin pecan grove on the third Thursday in August for the Grady Fish Fry. Dance to the prison band.

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I had the opportunity for the first time in my life to attend the Grady Fish Fry for the first time. I saw Rex Nelson there and introduced him to my good friend Sherwood Haisty. The article below was written as a result.

Mr. Haisty’s son Sherwood Jr. has known our family since 1984 when he moved from Grady, Arkansas to Little Rock after graduating from high school. In 1996 Sherwood moved to Memphis to finish his college education and to get a degree from Mid-America Baptist Theological Seminary. Currently he is working on his Masters Degree at the Masters Seminary in the LA area.(Below you can see Sherwood during the Question and Answer time with a former muslim who is now an atheist.)

Sherwood joined the First Baptist Church in Little Rock and we have been good friends ever since. Now Sherwood is street preaching at the Santa Monica Promenade every week.

Back to Grady (and other Arkansas favorites)

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Grady Fish Fry August 2010

I got a chance this year to eat with Mark Darr who had lost about 80 lbs before the Fish Fry this year. I commented to him about all that weight he lost and he said he did it in order to enjoy this fish!!

All the politicans come by your table while you are eating and they tell you that they hate to stop you while you are enjoying that good meal but they wanted to just say hi.

It is always a good time.

My sons Wilson (on left) and Hunter   (on right) went to California and visited Yosemite National Park with our friend Sherwood Haisty Jr.  They were there from March 21 to March 27.

My sons Wilson (on right) and Hunter (on left) went to California and visited Yosemite National Park with our friend Sherwood Haisty Jr. March 21-27. Here they are standing in front of the tallest waterfall in North America

President Obama and other politicians are advocating higher taxes, with a particular emphasis on class-warfare taxes targeting the so-called rich. This Center for Freedom and Prosperity Foundation video explains why fiscal policy based on hate and envy is fundamentally misguided. For more information please visit our web page: www.freedomandprosperity.org.

In his article “Harry let us down,” (Arkansas News Bureau, April 4, 2011) John Brummett asserts:

If you want to start an argument between a liberal and a conservative, you need only open for discussion the question of whether Social Security is part of our federal deficit and debt.

I have been in the median on this issue and can tell you there is danger there from flying debris.

The heck of it is that both sides are absolutely right. Social Security is not part of our debt and deficit problem. And it is…

That is to say you reduce the budget deficit on its own terms with spending reductions and tax increases. And it is to say you concurrently make adjustments now to attend responsibly to Social Security’s longer-term sufficiency. The first simple fix: You tax income in excess of $106,000 for Social Security.

In the article “Can the rich save Social Security,” (USA Today, May 31, 2005) the concluding paragraphs make these observations concerning the same solution that Brummett suggests:

David John, a Social Security expert for the conservative Heritage Foundation in Washington  says denying the affluent benefits for added contributions would be a mistake. “That makes it a welfare program,” he says. “It requires abandoning the idea that Social Security benefits are tied to the contributions,” he says.

Liberals take an even harder line at denying benefits to the rich, saying the system should be considered a pension program. “It’s a breach of faith to make the wealthy pay and get nothing in return,” says Michael Ettlinger, director of economic analysis at the liberal Economic Policy Institute.

The idea that rich and poor are treated alike in retirement programs is so central that Kennedy tried to block the Medicare prescription drug benefit in 2003 because it charged the rich more than the poor. “Hold on to your hat,” he declared. “Today, Medicare. Tomorrow, Social Security.”

 “It’s the strangest thing,” says Bruce Josten, chief lobbyist for the American Chamber of Commerce and a supporter of cutting benefits for the affluent. “I (mention) cutting benefits for the wealthy everywhere I go, and I can’t find anyone willing to buy the argument — not politicians or even well-off people themselves.”

Rex Nelson wrote in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette on April 2, 2011 a great article called “Arkansas Bucket List.” The readers of his blog http://www.rexnelsonsouthernfried.com came up with a list of things you must do at least once in your life to be considered a well-rounded Arkansan. Nelson asked others to add their suggestions at his website. I am going through the list slowly.

1. Attend the Gillett Coon Supper and actually eat the coon. (I have been thinking about going to this. I hear that all the politicans show up and I wonder if they eat the coon.)

2.  If you’re a man, attend the Slovak Oyster Supper. No women allowed. Buy some raffle tickets while there.