Alan Simpson, co-chair of a commission set up to “fix” Social Security, doesn’t understand some very basic and key facts about retiree ages, and refuses to believe that the Social Security Administration got them right. Color me unsurprised.
As someone who lived in Wyoming while he was Senator, I observed firsthand that Simpson’s not that sharp. It doesn’t take a whole lot of brains to be elected from that state if you have an “R” after your name (Barbara Cubin is a great example), and Al’s daddy greased the skids for him, so his election didn’t require a surplus of smarts. During his time in office, his tendency to blather on and sprinkle his conversation with incomprehensible folksy aphorisms was mistaken for some kind of maverick wit. The possibility that he simply didn’t have a clue about the subject at hand never seemed to occur to the beltway media. Now that someone has finally pinned him down on details, I hope he can totter off into well-deserved obscurity.
Poopyman
I always figured he was Abe’s older brother. Or evil twin.
Poopyman
And I thought he had tottered off into obscurity until Obama (or someone) dusted him off and propped him up for the catfood commission.
Rahim
Wow, and it’s not a scandal because the people on the teevee don’t understand basic math either.
kerFuFFler
But given the fact that his constituency is unlikely to be convinced that Simpson misunderstands the statistics involved, he won’t face any new challenge at the polls. Sure, finally one journalist exposed his faulty reasoning, but what percentage of voters understand how wrong he is?
aimai
This is the problem of not running a permanent campaign against Republicans and Republicanism *all the time* in every state. People aren’t stupid but they are bombarded with lies every day from their talk radio, their fox news, and their political leaders. To actually figure out what is going on takes work and most people don’t have time–besides why should they? The old white guy they voted for has been delegated the task of figurin’ out what those gosh darned liberals are trying to do this time to screw things up.
Paying for talk radio, for advertising, and for people to just get up at their town meetings and talk some sense would be a loss leader for the Democrats but they just won’t do it.
Trumka et al are right that the “every four years” model of politicking is dead and the unions and other liberal groups need to be organizing and talking to voters year round, day in and day out.
aimai
geg6
@kerFuFFler:
Simpson is retired. Sucking on the taxpayer tit for the less than 20 years he served in the Senate. He, not unlike his attitude while in office, gives not one little turd of a shit what voters think. He could get away with that while in office as he only had to answer to the twelve wingnuts who make up the entire population of Wyoming, but he just sounds completely unhinged to anyone who isn’t a wingnut from Wyoming. Or a Villager, most of whom revere him.
PeakVT
Giving Senator Poop-dogg a forum is bad enough, but the media continues to portray the co-chairs release as an officially endorsed work of the catfood commission. It isn’t. The report had to get 14 of 18 votes to pass, and it got 11. The commission failed, yet
peopleVillagers keep talking about it (which means it succeeded on another level, I guess).geg6
@aimai:
THIS.
And can I just say again how much I love, love, love Rich Trumka?
R-Jud
@kerFuFFler:
According to that WM blog post, he’s a former Senator. So unlikely to be running again.
EDIT: whoops. Way too slow.
sdhays
Now you’re being silly. For it to occur to the beltway media that he didn’t have a clue, they themselves would have had to have a clue first. And that kind of work is generally for unserious people who are paid less.
OMG!!!! Newt Gingrich thinks he’s Charles De Gaulle; maybe he really is!
foosion
Since when does being demonstrably and persistently wrong or out of touch affect the media’s love for any republican?
rickstersherpa
With Matt Bai going for the title of the “new David Broder” the fact that frauds, grifters, and the clueless are considered the rightful leaders of the “the most powerfule nation in the the world” should come as no surprise.
Corner Stone
@PeakVT:
Huh. Well, to me at least, that just seems god damned odd.
El Cid
__
I’m pretty sure that it wasn’t any presumption of sharp insight on SS’s workings that garnered Simpson the appreciation of the establishment and the billion dollar media.
I just think it was his folksy characterization of it as failing and little more than welfare.
Such types love the notion that a government program which uses what appears to just be tax money to give people money for social reasons will finally begin to be gotten rid of, as we all know that such big gubmit soshullism will eventually ruin us all.
And those rich people in the establishment and the billion dollar media think it’s a bad idea to let all these lower income types rely on a guaranteed gubmit program instead of being as wise as they and making enough to plan their own retirement.
Corner Stone
So, then it never occurred to the WH either, Simpson’s appointment was 11-D chess, or Simpson served his role exactly as intended.
DKF
Since most of your readers already know about Simpson’s latest idiotic expulsion, you could have just posted the title and left the rest of the post blank. That says it all. Brilliant.
Chris
@El Cid:
And they love hearing it portrayed in “folksy” mannerisms in terms of good salt of the earth common sense, too. Gives them automatic absolution for the elitism of their policies, cause hey, it’s not elitist, it’s old frontier wisdom. Even this good-hearted, simple man over here realizes that this soshulist fuzzy math doesn’t add up!
Bobby Thomson
Except Herb Simpson’s only failing was listening to his heart and trusting Homer.
So, except for everything but the surname, just like Alan Simpson.
Gregory
Or they’re simply used to it from Republicans, and just don’t care — they’ll call it “folksy” or “authentic.” Damn liberal media.
RandyH
I’m so sorry to hear that. How many years of your life were wasted in that awful place?
Yes, Wyoming is beautiful red mountains, etc. Drive through. It’s fabulous to look at. Just don’t stop for longer than a meal. Be sure to absorb the “local culture” when you make that stop. And then get the hell out of there. Keep moving…
Poopyman
@geg6: Well absolutely, but it takes money and a media. The right wing is way ahead of us on both counts.
aimai
I read an linked blog post yesterday about how small the field of potential presidential candidates is because of a general tendency of the country to see only some people as “qualified”–senators, governors, some ex military, vps. In a sense all those people are (imagined to be) vetted and approved to accept the potential role of president. I think Simpson and the entire committee functioned the same way. We tend not to create blue ribbon panels on things without a heavy sprinkling of present day or ex Senators. We have plenty of academics and public intellectuals who would be good–look at Elizabeth Warren. But the powers that be prefer a Senator as cover for the real work of each commission which, as we know, will actually be done by paid staffers with lobbyist/business backgrounds.
At this point its really clear that Senators don’t have to know anything and frequently don’t. But they have a reliable sounding identity as a grand old person with the public interest (hypothetically) in mind. They make the perfect cover for corporate interests.
aimai
Poopyman
@RandyH: The only thing rarer than a Senator from Wyoming is a Congressman, since it has only one congressional district. Wasn’t there a Congressman from Wyoming a few years back? What was his name … Cheney?
rickstersherpa
The other sad fact, besides that Bai and Lori Montgomery will repeat Simpson’s information in the paper of record is that millions of people are being drenched in both intentional lies and misinformation and unconsious narrative memes that people like Alan Simpson tell themselves just have to be true.
One of the weirder thing about Simpson’s rants, and the Village’s simple acceptance of them as self-evident truths is his talk about the Baby Boom being a “surprise” in raising the costs of Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security. Simpson was a Senator back in 1983 when the Greenspan commission came out with his its compromised reforms, including an increase in the retirement age that that eventually goes to 67 for everyone born after 1960 and affects most boomers. The whole point of the Greenspan Commission was to address the Baby Boom issue, which since most of us were born between 1946 and 1964, was not a big secret. But now it is a surprise. http://www.ssa.gov/retire2/agereduction.htm
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/05_22/b3935100_mz057.htm
The Greenspan Commission is also a lesson for us liberals and moderates. The lesson is that the there is no permanent “fix” or “deal” for Social Security for Conservatives. As soon as the ink was dried on that deal the think tanks funded by Petersen and Koch and their ilk (Cato, Heritage, Concord, etc.) began to put out zombie lies about Social Security being “a Ponzi” scheme, a fraud, broken, “no trust fund,” etc. and campaigning for privatization. Roosevelt’s Social Security and LBJ’s Medicare, both stick in the craw of our Galtian masters.
The sad part is of course we have a fair number of “New Democrats” of the Rubinite/Geithner types, who in their banker frame of mind don’t really disagree with Kochs and Petersens of the world.
Poopyman
@aimai: Alan Simpson as a Senator was elected by a state with about the same population as the county I’m currently sitting in (Anne Arundel, MD) — a little over a half million. I think it’s important to remember — and repeatedly stress — just what a disproportionate influence the man has.
LosGatosCA
So all of you think the Village is clueless? They have made a few mistakes, Bush, Iraq, Greenspan, the economy, income inequality. But those aren’t really as important as who trashes the place, keeping the lower classes, the elderly, the children, and the disabled in their place and performing the triage necessary to amputate the gangrenous danger they represent to a healthy, producer rewarding society.
You may think they are simply pseudo-serious sycophants, but that’s just envy on your part because you think you are entitled to the fruits of your labor and that all people deserve to be treated with dignity and share in the wealth of society even when through age, circumstances, or adversity they are disadvantaged. Silly, silly you. The Villagers are the only thing standing between the country and an unbridled, informed, functioning democracy – and don’t you forget it.
Dancing Dave forever!
RandyH
@Poopyman:
I repeat:
That state has a smaller population than even Sarah Palin’s Alaska. Yup, even smaller than most decent-sized cities. The average congressperson is supposed to represent about 1 million people. Places like Wyoming, Norh Dakota or Alaska don’t come anywhere near that… as a state.
I repeat…
maya
To paraphrase that other great Wyomington, Dick Cheney: “Go fock yourself, Senatur”.
geg6
@Poopyman:
Well, it may be that they are way ahead of us, but does that necessarily mean that we just say, “Oh, woe! They have beat us at the game so we’ll just let them keep doing it”? Essentially, I’m with Trumka here. He’s saying that we can’t count on our own party’s representatives to fight back and the proof of this is all around us and has been for at least 30 years. We have just had a moment that showed us that our message can arouse thousands and thousands to take to the streets in a way that hasn’t happened in my lifetime. Not just the DFHs, but the solid middle class out there taking over a state capitol, showing up in other state capitols across the nation and, most especially, in the Real Merkin Heartland. If the Dems don’t want to own this moment, it is then up to us. Fuck the GOPers and fuck the media. We will force them to pay attention. And even if we can’t, we can certainly show our neighbors that we stand up for them and for ourselves. We don’t need the media to do that. We just need to be out there doing it. I consider myself old and jaded at 52, but Trumka inspires me.
Joey Maloney
The next time a Republican stops being asked to pontificate because of blatant ignorance or dishonesty will be the first.
Citizen_X
@Chris:
I’ll go with “authentic frontier gibberish.”
Mark S.
Someone this stupid was co-chair of commission on the fate of Social Security? That isn’t funny.
Poopyman
@Mark S.:
Nor is it an accident.
arguingwithsignposts
Saxby Chambliss of Georgia currently heads the Senate Intelligence Committee. Nuff said.
Poopyman
@arguingwithsignposts: Fortunately, Chambliss only gets to be ranking member as long as the Democrats are in the majority.
Pliny
Judging by the careers of Alan Greenspan or Larry Summers, the wronger one is about everything the more they get appointed to important positions, invited to Congressional hearings, and interviewed on the teevee
Damned at Random
Is it too much to ask that candidates for high public office have basic math and reading comprehension skills? Maybe instead of focusing on birth certificates and financial statements, we should ask for SAT scores
Ruckus
@Corner Stone:
I’m sure that was snark but that’s why they released the non-report report. They knew they would never get enough votes for that piece of shit they came up with. Before they started. So they release it the idiots in the msm pick it up and voila, the new truth. Better than the old truth, better than the real truth, it’s the made up truth. It’s the reality show truth.
BobS
I agree with most of the comments regarding Simpson, Wyoming, the fucked up electoral system that gives disproportionate representation to small states, and the general ignorance of our national political leaders (although, I turned on C-Span today for the first time in months and happened to catch Al Franken questioning a telecom executive- I wouldn’t be surprised if in addition to being the funniest he’s also the smartest person in the Senate).
However, the reason I’m commenting is because the title of this post made me smile. Thanks.
DonkeyKong
Can we print up tee shirt’s for the Balloon Juice store that read “Fix Social Security Now, Euthanize Alan Simpson.” and on the back “and his little dog Erskine.”
Triassic Sands