Exposing the Republican Party's Sleazy Playbook to Destroy Social Security

The new Congress is busy manufacturing a Social Security crisis.

In one of its first actions, the Republican House of Representatives of the 114th Congress, changed its rules to manufacture a Social Security crisis.

GOP Representatives Tom Reed and Sam Johnson introduced a procedural rule change, which was buried on page 30 of 32 in House Resolution 5.   It forbids the House from transferring money between the Social Security Retirement Fund and the Social Security Disability Fund, a move that Congress has made 11 times in the past, irrespective of which party was in control. The result is that the Disability Fund, which is expected to run out of reserves next year, cannot be helped using money from the Retirement Fund.  Without this “easy fix”—as the New York Times called it—recipients of Social Security Disability will see a 19% cut in benefits.

At a glance, this move by the GOP-led House seems irrational, cynical and counterproductive.  But if you consider Jude Wanniski’s playbook, it makes complete sense.

Odds are you've never heard of Jude, but without him Reagan never would have become a "successful" president, Republicans never would have taken control of the House or Senate, Bill Clinton never would have been impeached, and neither George Bush would have been president.

When Barry Goldwater went down to ignominious defeat in 1964, most Republicans felt doomed (among them the then-28-year-old Wanniski). Goldwater himself, although uncomfortable with the rising religious right within his own party and the calls for more intrusion in people's bedrooms, was a diehard fan of Herbert Hoover's economic worldview. In Hoover's world (and virtually all the Republicans since reconstruction with the exception of Teddy Roosevelt), market fundamentalism was a virtual religion. Economists from Ludwig von Mises to Friedrich Hayek to Milton Friedman had preached that government could only make a mess of things economic, and the world of finance should be left to the Big Boys – the Masters of the Universe, as they sometimes called themselves – who ruled Wall Street and international finance. READ MORE