The Plot to Keep You Poor and Hated

The Stupidest Man Alive

I've been busier than a one-legged man in an ass-kicking contest lately, so I haven't had much time to post.

But because these topics are so dang important, I want to direct the attention of the two of you who occasionally stop by here accidentally after doing a Google search in France for "double-fisting" to these important items:

First, at TNR, Jonathan Chait explains in a succinct way (subscription may be required) the importance of the Social Security fight -- which I don't think is won yet, not by a long shot -- and the importance of not compromising and not creating private accounts of any kind:

"The consensus among the capital's chattering classes holds that the Social Security debate primarily concerns the program's solvency. Therefore, the questions center around political courage, and the greatest threat is that the parties will not agree on a solution. This consensus is wrong in every particular. In truth, the debate is fundamentally ideological. It does not lend itself to compromise. Despite conservatives' insistence that Social Security faces a "crisis," in reality, the fiscal threat is distant and manageable, while the political threat is immediate and dire. It follows from all this that those who believe in Social Security should make it their highest priority to drive a stake through privatization."

He explains -- and this has been explained before, but it can't be explained often enough -- that Social Security is not designed to give people a "good" rate of return. It's designed to spread risk throughout society, like an insurance policy. Today, we're exposed to risk in our 401(k) plans and outsource-able jobs. We've got plenty of freakin' risk already, making it all the more critical that we have a solid safety net -- security, if you will -- to protect us from utter ruin if the worst happens and our other investments fail.

Second, Digby ties together the threads of what's important about the astonishing nomination of Paul Freakin' Wolfowitz to head the World Bank.

I'll let you read it, but boiled down to its essence, the point is that there's a real danger that Wolfowitz is being brought in to undo some of the World Bank's recent efforts at acting like it gives a crap about the world's poor. Given his history, he's the perfect guy to restore the World Bank to the days when it would purposefully get poor nations into debt by forcing them to give enormous building projects to American conglomerates (Halliburton, Bechtel, etc.) and then use the massive debt as a stick to get them to do our bidding -- making these poor nations indentured servants, if you will. Sounds like a Project for a New American Century, doesn't it?