From: "Angus"


From: Eli Pariser, MoveOn.org
Sent: Thursday, February 10, 2005 2:22 PM



More than 360,000 people have signed our petition to stop George W. Bush's plan to privatize Social Security and cut benefits. But we want to get to 500,000 before we deliver the petition to Congress during in-person meetings only ten days from now. Can you add your name?

Three weeks ago, we launched MoveOn's campaign to save Social Security and announced a goal of 200,000 petition signers. We've blown past that goal -- more than 360,000 Americans have joined the effort so far. They're rejecting the Bush-led effort to privatize Social Security and cut benefits.

It's a great start, but together, we can get to 500,000 signers on the petition before MoveOn members deliver it to Congress in just ten days. If you haven't had a chance to sign our petition, please take just one minute right now to do so by clicking on the link below.
http://www.moveon.org/socialsecurity/

After you sign, please ask your friends, family and colleagues to get involved by forwarding them this e-mail. We're setting a new goal of 500,000 petition signers before Congress returns home in ten days when we'll deliver the petitions during in-person meetings.

The more signers we have, the more they'll listen to our concerns -- and the less likely Bush's plan will be successful. Members of Congress know that for every person who signs a petition, there are dozens who feel the same way.

A broad coalition of citizen organizations is opposing Social Security privatization, from seniors at AARP to young rockers at Rock the Vote to faith groups like Catholic Charities USA. Young and old are united. Great leadership is being provided by the Campaign for America's Future, the AFL-CIO and US Action. But the most important voices that members of Congress will be listening to are the voices of their constituents -- you.

Please take just one minute right now to sign the petition at the link below or keep reading for more information. http://www.moveon.org/socialsecurity/index.html


One MoveOn member, Charlotte from Sunnyvale, California, told her members of Congress why Social Security is important to her:
"My mother lives on Social Security. She and my father worked hard all of their lives, but raising 4 children didn't leave much money for retirement savings. Social Security means that she has lived proudly and independently since she had to stop working."

There are millions of stories like Charlotte's. Please share your story when you sign the petition.
Here are some of the key facts we want you to know about Bush's plan to privatize Social Security. These points are a great primer to use to talk about Social Security with your friends, family and colleagues.

George Bush's plan would make massive cuts in Social Security benefits for future retirees in order to pay for private accounts. Social Security privatization requires diverting taxes used to pay current benefits into private accounts. Without that money, Social Security benefits will inevitably be cut -- up to 46 percent for future retirees. Even under rosy projections the private accounts don't make up the difference. The deepest benefit cuts are for young people.

Somebody in their twenties today would see benefit cuts as high as 30 percent. Should we really have to pay for Bush's risky private accounts with our guaranteed benefits?

Privatization means trillions of dollars of new national debt. Because current Social Security taxes are used to pay for private accounts taking that money out means huge deficits -- as high as $15 trillion over the next 40 years.

Social Security is not going bankrupt, contrary to the president's claims. That is a deception perpetrated in order to create the urgency for radical changes. Under conservative forecasts, the long-term challenges in Social Security do not manifest themselves until 2042. Even then Social Security has 70 percent of needed funds. George Bush's Social Security crisis-talk is an effort to create a specter of doom -- just like the weapons of mass destruction claim in Iraq.

So who does benefit? George Bush's base. Giant financial services firms have been salivating for decades over the prospect of taking over Social Security. They'd make billions in new fees -- essentially a new tax -- off of our Social Security payments.

These are just some of the reasons it is so important to speak out now before our representatives have really formed their opinions. Please sign the petition at the link below and forward this e-mail.
http://www.moveon.org/socialsecurity/index.html

Thanks for all you do.

--Tom Matzzie, Eli Pariser and the whole MoveOn.org team
  Thursday, February 10th, 2005

P.S. For more information, here is a great resource from American Progress Action Fund's new blog, Think Progress:
How to Talk to a Conservative About Social Security (If You Must)
http://thinkprogress.org/index.php?p=206
The White House and their deep-pocketed allies have launched a $35 million public relations effort to spread misinformation about President Bush's Social Security Privatization scheme. This fact sheet will arm you with all the facts you'll need to take them on.

FISCAL OUTLOOK
CLAIM: "By the year 2042, the entire system would be exhausted and bankrupt." [President Bush, 2/2/05]
FACT: In 2042, enough new money will be coming in to pay between 73-80 percent of promised benefits. Even with this reduction, new retirees will still receive more money, in inflation-adjusted dollars, than today's beneficiaries. [WP, 2/5/05]
CLAIM: "In the year 2018, for the first time ever, Social Security will pay out more in benefits than the government collects in payroll taxes." [President Bush, 12/11/04]
FACT: "In 14 of the past 47 years, including 1975 to 1983, Social Security paid out more in benefits than the government collected in payroll." [MSNBC, 1/14/05]
FACT: Under Bush's plan, expenditures will begin to exceed revenues even earlier, in 2012. [New York Times, 2/4/05]
CLAIM: "Under the current system, today's 30-year old worker will face a 27% benefit cut when he or she reaches normal retirement age." [GOP Guide to Social Security Reform, 1/27/05]
FACT: According to the Congressional Budget Office, younger workers would receive better benefits from Social Security as it exists now, even if nothing changes, than from President Bush's private accounts plan. [EPI, 2/05]
THE PRESIDENT'S PLAN / PRIVATE ACCOUNTS
CLAIM: "As we fix Social Security, we also have the responsibility to make the system a better deal for younger workers. And the best way to reach that goal is through voluntary personal retirement accounts." [President Bush, 2/2/05]
FACT: Analysis of the plan so far does not prove the accounts would be a better deal for anyone not working on Wall Street. Workers who opt for the private accounts would recover forfeited benefits through their accounts only "if their investments realized a return equal to or greater than the 3 percent earned by Treasury bonds currently held by the Social Security system." But CBO factors out stock market risks to assume a 3.3 percent rate of return. With 0.3 percent subtracted for expected administrative costs on the account, "the full amount in a worker's account would be reduced dollar for dollar from his Social Security checks, for a net gain of zero." [WP, 2/4/05]
CLAIM: "You'll be able to pass along the money that accumulates in your personal account, if you wish, to your children or grandchildren." [President Bush, 2/2/05]
FACT: Most lower-income workers will be required to purchase government lifetime annuities, financial instruments that provide a guaranteed monthly payment for life but that expire at death. Money in these annuities cannot be passed on to heirs. [NYT, 2/3/05]
CLAIM: "We must pass reforms that solve the financial problems of Social Security once and for all." [President Bush, 2/2/05]
FACT: "A Bush aide, briefing reporters on the condition of anonymity [said] that the individual accounts would do nothing to solve the system's long-term financial problems." The long-term gap in revenue would "have to be closed through benefit cuts that have yet to be detailed." [LAT, 2/3/05; WP, 2/5/05]
CLAIM: "A personal account would be your account, you would own it, and the government could never take it away." [President Bush, 2/8/05]
FACT: Bush's Social Security plan is a far cry from the private ownership he's touting, however. For example, instead of private plans that let Americans control their own investments, there are tight restrictions on which conservative stocks and bonds the public will be allowed to buy. And, as the New York Times reports, "the more restrictions there are, the harder it would be for people to achieve the outsized returns the administration has generally promoted to sell the public on private accounts." [NYT, 2/6/05]
CLAIM: "Best of all, the [private] accounts would be replacing the empty promises of government with the real assets of ownership." [President Bush, 2/8/05]
FACT: Social Security trust funds "hold nothing but U.S. Treasury securities," recognized as "the safest, most reliable investment worldwide." [Century Foundation, 1/26/05]
CLAIM: "The problem that we now face is not one that we can tax our way out of, for a very simple reason: The costs and the current program are growing faster than the underlying tax base. So if we were to raise taxes today to deal with it, and the costs of the program continued to grow faster than the tax base, then in the future, future generations would simply have to come back and raise taxes again." [Senior White House Official, Press Conference, 2/3/05]
FACT: An alternative proposal by Peter Diamond and Peter Orszag would resolve Social Security's funding problems directly and permanently through modest tax increases. The Congressional Budget Office states that, "under Diamond-Orszag, the trust fund balance would always be positive and scheduled benefits would be fully financed." [CBO, 12/22/04]
HISTORY
CLAIM: "Social Security was a great moral success of the 20th century, and we must honor its great purposes in this new century." [President Bush, 2/2/05]
FACT: Conservatives have been trying to gut Social Security since its inception. Both Barry Goldwater and Ronald Reagan endorsed privatization in 1964. In 1983, the Cato Institute laid out a privatization plan similar to President Bush's, stating, "We will meet the next financial crisis in Social Security with a private alternative ready in the wings." [Miami Herald, 2/7/05]
RHETORIC
CLAIM: "I think it's important for people to be open about the truth when it comes to Social Security." [President Bush, 2/4/05]
FACT: The Bush administration has lobbied hard for privatization while being notably closemouthed about the details. [WP, 2/6/05]
FACT: The Wall Street Journal reports the White House is quietly assembling a coalition of deep-pocketed allies "that will privately raise $35 million for an advertising and lobbying effort to push the politically risky measure through Congress." [WSJ, 2/4/05]
CLAIM: "The role of a President is to confront problems - not to pass them on to a future President, future Congress, or a future generation." [President Bush, 2/4/05]
FACT: Dick Cheney admits trillions of dollars in future borrowing will be necessary to cover the cost of establishing private accounts. This deficit would have to be repaid by today's younger workers. [NYT, 2/6/05]