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2008

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More Hagee Fun

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John Hagee Creatively Interprets the U.S. Great Seal

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Making John Bolton look like Woodrow Wilson:

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Katrina is God’s Punishment for  New Orleans’ sins:

TG: I just want to ask you one question, based on one of your sermons, and this is not about Israel — you said after Hurricane Katrina, that it was an act of God, and you said when you violate God’s will long enough, the judgment of God comes to you. Katrina is an act of God for a society that is becoming Sodom and Gomorrah re-born.

Do you still believe that Katrina is punishment from God for a society that is becoming like Sodom and Gomorrah?

JH: All hurricanes are acts of God, because God controls the heavens. I believe that New Orleans had a level of sin that was offensive to God, and they were recipients of the judgment of God for that.

The newspaper carried the story in our local area, that was not carried nationally, that there was to be a homosexual parade there on the Monday that the Katrina came. And the promise of that parade was that it would was going to reach a level of sexuality never demonstrated before in any of the other gay pride parades.

So I believe that the judgment of God is a very real thing. I know there are people who demur from that, but I believe that the Bible teaches that when you violate the law of God, that God brings punishment sometimes before the Day of Judgment, and I believe that the Hurricane Katrina was, in fact, the judgment of God against the city of New Orleans.

Why would such a loon back McCain?  Bomb, Bomb, Bomb Iran:

 For Hagee’s new project, his influence in washington is probably less important than his influence over his audience. With the clout of his listeners, he can serve Bush administration hawks by firing up grass-roots support for a military strike against Iran. TBN has provided several opportunities for Hagee to promote his book on Praise the Lord, several installments of his own program, and a two-day appearance on Benny Hinn’s show. Through the marketing efforts of Strang Communications, which placed national radio advertising spots for Jerusalem Countdown on The Sean Hannity Show, The O’Reilly Factor, and Janet Parshall’s America, Hagee brought his Armageddon message to a wider conservative audience. His end-times theology is nothing new; countless numbers of self-proclaimed prophets of the end of the world have demanded attention since the beginning of time. The difference now is that TBN’s relentless fund raising — along with advances in digital and satellite broadcasting technology — has permitted worldwide dissemination of his ominous predictions. Through TBN, other religious and conservative media, and the growing mega-churches, Hagee has turned his Bible-thumping not only into a multi-million dollar business, but into a pro-war movement as well.

How crazy is Hagee, so crazy that Bill Donahue of the Catholic League sounds reasonable discussing him

“There are plenty of staunch evangelical leaders who are pro-Israel, but are not anti-Catholic. John Hagee is not one of them. Indeed, for the past few decades, he has waged an unrelenting war against the Catholic Church. For example, he likes calling it ‘The Great Whore,’ an ‘apostate church,’ the ‘anti-Christ,’ and a ‘false cult system.’ To hear the bigot in his own words, click here. Note: he isn’t talking about the Buddhists.

“In Hagee’s latest book, Jerusalem Countdown, he calls Hitler a Catholic who murdered Jews while the Catholic Church did nothing. ‘The sell-out of Catholicism to Hitler began not with the people but with the Vatican itself,’ he writes.

“For the record, Hitler persecuted the Catholic Church and was automatically excommunicated in 1931—two years before he assumed power—when he acted as best man at Joseph Goebbel’s Protestant wedding. Hitler even bragged about his separation from the Church. As for doing nothing about the Holocaust, Sir Martin Gilbert reminds us that Goebbels denounced Pope Pius XII for his 1942 Christmas message criticizing the Nazis (the New York Times lauded the pope for doing so in an editorial for two years in a row). Much to Hagee’s chagrin, Gilbert also says that Pius XII saved three quarters of the Jews in Rome, and that more Jews were saved proportionately in Catholic countries than Protestant countries. Indeed, Israeli diplomat Pinchas Lapide credited the Catholic Church with saving 860,000 Jews. No religion can match that.

One might think Donahue hates the guy more than even Amanda Marcotte and Kathy Griffin even.

 

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Timmeh’s Next Assignment: Talk To the Straight Talker About White Religious Fanatics

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I seem to remember suggesting that the press cared an awful lot about black anti-semitic leaders, but tended to ignore white anti-semites and other bigots who are fundamentalists:

The thing is, everyone is missing the point about how fucking stupid this line of questioning was. When was the last time Timmeh took on some right wing fundamentalists for being anti-semitic? So why isn’t George Bush asked about every anti-semitic rant by LaHaye or Wildmon since by the transitive property Timmeh is invoking, Bush has close spiritual adivisors who work closely with them?

The Council on National Policy alone contains a whole host of anti-semitic right wing Christians who hobnob with the Tony Perkins and the Richard Lands and the Dobsons of the world, but that transitive connection would never be brought up would it? This isn’t just a connection of someone who goes on a trip with or says something nice, it’s a working group of conservative fundamentalists who welcome anti-semitism into their efforts to bring about a Christian government. Of course, the Bush administration has routinely played footsy with Wildmon, not just had a friend of his be nice to him on occasion.

This would never be an issue for a white candidate and shame on Timmeh for trying to do it to Obama. If Timmeh wants to be concerned about anti-semitism he should start asking the Mike Huckabee’s of the world about their supporters who they actually work with to get elected.

Who could possibly be another example that is relevant to John McCain? I just don’t know….

John Hagee!

Hagee isn’t anti-semitic though. He’s anti-Catholic.  He likes Jews. They are necessary for the apocalypse.

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His views on the Catholicism are, ahem, interesting…..He most often uses the dogwhistle Church of Rome to refer to the Catholic Church, a phrase that n many fundamentalist circles essentially argues that the Catholic Church is evil and will produce a Pope who will be the anti-christ.  Check out Rapture Ready for the phrase

What does Straight Talkin’ John McCain think about the guy:

Mr. McCain deflected a question about whether he agreed with Mr. Hagee’s end-times theology in which he connects Iran’s nuclear threat with the Apocalypse, the final battle of good and evil on earth.

“All I can tell you is I’m very proud to have pastor Hagee’s support,” Mr. McCain said.

Perhaps, Timmeh, the Catholic boy from Buffalo can ask McCain what he’s proud of?

The larger issue is that if a black religious conservative bigot like Farrakhan opens his mouth, every black person running for office has to play the game of denouncing him no matter how tenuous the relationship.

But when it comes to white religious conservative bigots like Hagee, LaHaye, and others from groups like the Council for National Policy who are anti-Catholic or anti-semitic and actually interact with political leaders, the press is silent.  Bush himself addressed them in 2000 and Cheney made a special trip last year.

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Today’s Tosser: Bill Pascoe, What’s Most Amusing About Bill Pascoe’s Fine Whine

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Are his comments about how to run a campaign in 2004:

First, understand why your opponent has problems with significant elements of his base, and drive wedges where you can, to the maximum extent possible; second, recognize that it is not your campaign’s job to tell the objective truth, it’s your campaign’s job to tell the version of the truth that puts your opponent in the worst light possible (it’s his campaign’s job, after all, to do the same to you); third, don’t get suckered into the trap of only talking about issues the media says are important – instead, choose the issue matrix over which you want to wage war, and stick to it no matter what; and fourth, if need be, if you can’t make a legitimate argument against your opponent on a key issue, use your opponent’s party’s position on the issue as the battleground, and wrap it around his neck. Make him pay for the sins of his party. Guilt by association still works, so don’t be shy in exploiting it.

Live by the sword, die by the sword.

Oh wait, the claims about Oberweis are all true…

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10 More Years

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Bill Pascoe isn’t known for being a part of the reality based commmunity:

“Finally: Has anyone noticed that the quote the Foster campaign constantly uses — ‘I’ve supported the President on almost everything’ — comes from a newspaper article that’s more than FOUR YEARS OLD? That’s more than half the length of time George Bush has been in the White House! Has anyone noticed that the very title of the article cited — ‘GOP Senate rivals back away from Bush’ — has been deliberately hidden by Mr. Foster? Has Mr. Foster not read any newspapers between January 2004 and today? Has he not been made aware of the many instances in which Jim Oberweis has publicly disagreed with the President since then — particularly, for example, on the twin issues of immigration reform and management of the Iraq war?

The problem here is that immigration he disagreed with Bush in 2002 and, in fact, that’s why he was frozen out by Karl Rove.  The same for re-importation of drugs. So that was even before the interview.  And in terms of the Iraq war, this ‘disagreement’ with Bush is disingenuous.  Supposedly he disagrees with something that Bush did, but he agreed with Bush at the time:

When asked about Bush’s temporary tax cuts, for example, all seven Republicans who answered the survey said they would make them permanent, while the six Democrats who answered said they would rescind the cuts for the wealthy but keep them for the middle class. Similarly, when asked to comment on Bush’s handling of the Iraq war, the Republican candidates were unanimous in their praise of him, and the Democrats were united in their criticism.  

Post-Dipatch March 7, 2004

Oberweis’ argument in the below video indicates he disagrees with decisions after the initial invasion, but he was wholeheartedly in favor of the President’s policy while the President was implementing those policies.  That’s not criticism of the President, that’s rewriting history.

[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/tS60P6NZ1iQ" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]

So the only thing that Oberweis seems to have changed since the 2004 quote is that he finds supporting the Iraq War a liability.  He doesn’t want to change from Bush’s policy, he just wants to criticize Bush decisions that he supported at the time.

Writing a manifesto about how bad your opponent is might only be weird for Pascoe, but he’s not only weird, but entirely wrong about his own candidate.

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3 Years Before Bush Ever Had a Plan for Social Security?

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Pascoe below makes the claim:

“The on-screen sources listed for Mr. Foster’s ridiculous allegation are the Daily Herald of Feb. 17, 2002, and Jeff Berkowitz’s ‘Public Affairs’ show of Dec. 7, 2007. NOWHERE in the contents of EITHER source is there ANY indication that Jim Oberweis ‘supported Bush’s scheme to privatize Social Security’ — in fact, that would have been quite impossible, given that the Bush Administration DIDN’T EVEN OFFER A PLAN TO ADDRESS SOCIAL SECURITY’S LONG-TERM STABILITY UNTIL 2005, THREE YEARS AFTER THE FIRST SO-CALLED ‘SOURCE’ CITED!!!

Let’s start with when did Bush offer a plan to address Social Security Long-Term Stability:


Social Security has emerged as a critical issue in this year’s presidential campaign, but neither candidate seems prepared to address the system’s long-term financial problems. Instead, Gov. George W. Bush wants to let individuals invest a small part of their Social Security contributions in the stock market, where he thinks they will earn a better return, and Vice President Al Gore proposes to keep the system largely intact with an infusion of general tax revenues. Neither proposal would really stabilize the system in the long run. In truth, though Social Security is projected to become bankrupt in four decades, the system is not all that far out of kilter. It would not be hard for bold politicians to devise a fix.

Social Security may well be, as Governor Bush has said, “the single most successful government program in American history.” It was created in 1935, during the depths of the depression, to provide a guaranteed income to retired workers for as long as they live. Unlike private pension plans, Social Security benefits keep pace with inflation and, unlike 401(k)’s and other popular private plans, Social Security benefits do not fluctuate with stock and bond markets. Social Security provides the majority of income for most retirees and all the income for about a fifth of the elderly.

From its inception, the system has taken in payroll taxes from the working generation and turned almost all of them over to retirees. At the core of Social Security are the notions of social insurance — everyone participates in a common plan — and redistribution — the program tilts in favor of low-paid workers. The benefits for low-paid workers are about 80 percent of their average lifetime earnings, while benefits for high-paid workers are about 30 percent of average earnings. The progressive formula has cut the poverty rate among the elderly by two-thirds, reducing their poverty to below that of the general population. That is a remarkable triumph.

The question before voters is whether a program born out of depression — when poverty was rampant, few married women worked for pay and no one had 401(k)’s or I.R.A.’s to provide for retirement — needs to be revamped.

One reason for thinking so is the projected bankruptcy — a sobering but manageable situation. The system will run surpluses for the next 15 years, building a large reserve. But in 2010, the first wave of the baby boomers — the nearly 80 million people born between 1946 and 1964 — will begin to retire and collect retirement checks. The number of people in the work force for every retiree will fall from about five today to about three in only 30 years or so. That, and the fact that people are living longer, will put a strain on workers to support the retirement needs of the elderly. The system will begin to run deficits around 2015. By 2037, the trust fund is expected to be empty.

But for all the talk of bankruptcy, the system is not facing irreparable financial crisis. Even after 2037, payroll taxes will cover about 70 percent of promised benefits. Deficits over the next 75 years, the planning horizon for the program, will equal less than 2 percent of total payrolls — hardly a catastrophic shortfall. If the economy were to grow only slightly faster than the actuaries at the Social Security Administration now project, the deficit would disappear.

One proposed remedy for financial imbalance is partial privatization, the approach favored by Governor Bush. Under current law, workers and employers pay a 12.4 percent payroll tax that goes into a public trust fund. Under partial privatization, workers could divert, say, two percentage points of that tax to private accounts that the worker could then invest in stocks and bonds. Workers would collect less money from the trust fund when they retired, alleviating financial strain on the system. But they would expect to more than make up for the loss by drawing from their private accounts.

Mr. Bush’s sketchy proposal fails to answer where he would find the money to pay retirees as payroll taxes were diverted into private accounts. But there are other fundamental problems with the proposal as well.

New York Times, May 29, 2000

Hmmmmm….Pascoe has some issue with dates apparently.

But more interesting is there is a point here.  Just it makes Oberweis look worse:

Specifically, Oberweis believes workers should be allowed to invest half of the current 6.2 percent tax in a personal account. Cox supports a lower percentage but would not specify a percentage. Durkin also has not offered details about what kind of personal savings account plan he would support.

Chicago Daily Herald, February 17, 2002

Oberweis actually would have had larger private accounts than Bush at the time in 2002.

Perhaps Bill Pascoe should know something about his own candidate?

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Kooks Away….Bill Pascoe Writes Another Manifesto

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Pascoe’s most recent work of ‘art’

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE CONTACT: Bill Pascoe
FEBRUARY 28, 2008

FOSTER, EXPOSED AS A TAX-HIKER, MAKES STUFF UP

(BATAVIA, February 28) — Oberweis for Congress spokesman Bill Pascoe today criticized liberal Democrat Bill Foster for airing a television advertisement made up of half-truths, distortions, and outright lies.

“Bill Foster’s latest television advertisement should come with a parental warning notice — ‘Smear campaign ahead,'” said Pascoe. “But that shouldn’t be surprising — if I’d been caught planning to raise taxes by $3,914 per taxpayer, I’d probably have to consider making stuff up, too. The choice for voters couldn’t be clearer: Bill Foster wants to hike taxes and spend more on failed big-government programs, while Jim Oberweis wants to cut taxes and shrink government so families can keep more of their own money.

“Of the three major claims made in Mr. Foster’s advertisement, two of them are demonstrably false, and the remaining claim is deliberately misinterpreted to create an impression at odds with reality. Bill Foster — whose own mudslinging began two days into the special election (as noted by the Beacon News) — should be ashamed.

“To begin: the Foster ad falsely claims that Jim ‘supported Bush’s scheme to privatize Social Security, gambling your retirement in the stock market.’ Bill Foster knows this isn’t true, because he sat next to Jim Oberweis yesterday in the Chicago Tribune’s editorial board endorsement session and heard Jim talk about his plan to strengthen Social Security, to make sure it’s still there 30 years from now. (Interestingly, Mr. Foster himself suggested he wasn’t at all concerned about Social Security’s impending troubles, indicating it ‘wouldn’t be [his] first priority,’ and suggesting that a 30 percent cut in benefits to future retirees would be all right with him.)

“The on-screen sources listed for Mr. Foster’s ridiculous allegation are the Daily Herald of Feb. 17, 2002, and Jeff Berkowitz’s ‘Public Affairs’ show of Dec. 7, 2007. NOWHERE in the contents of EITHER source is there ANY indication that Jim Oberweis ‘supported Bush’s scheme to privatize Social Security’ — in fact, that would have been quite impossible, given that the Bush Administration DIDN’T EVEN OFFER A PLAN TO ADDRESS SOCIAL SECURITY’S LONG-TERM STABILITY UNTIL 2005, THREE YEARS AFTER THE FIRST SO-CALLED ‘SOURCE’ CITED!!!

“The Foster ad continues its calumny with this whopper: ‘Oberweis thinks we should end employer provided health insurance.’ That’s patently false, and Bill Foster knows it — he’s heard Jim say that to his face in editorial board meetings that have taken place over the last 48 hours. The two companies that bear Jim’s name — Oberweis Asset Management and Oberweis Dairy — both pay for health insurance for their full-time employees, and Jim has made clear he supports employer-provided health care.

“The Chicago Tribune even acknowledged that it had inadvertently mischaracterized Jim’s position on this issue, and issued a clarification that reads, ‘A story in the Feb. 23 West edition of the Metro section mischaracterized 14th Congressional District Republican candidate Jim Oberweis’ position on health care. While Oberweis advocates replacing the current employer-based health-care system with tax incentives that encourage people to buy their own insurance polices, he did not say the system should be eliminated.’ (See: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/chi-claris_2-27feb27,0,7738809.story)

“Jim Oberweis believes we should offer Americans MORE choices in health care, not fewer. And he believes we should not force Americans to give up control over their own doctors and their own treatment by forcing them into a one-size-fits-all ‘universal’ health care scheme that cost hundreds of billions of dollars, as Bill Foster proposes.

“Further, the Foster ad declares, ‘Oberweis said ten more years in Iraq is the right approach.’ Actually, what Jim Oberweis said was that General Petraeus’s ‘Surge’ strategy is working, that we should continue to withdraw our troops gradually, as Iraqis take more responsibility, and we may have to leave a residual force in Iraq for up to ten years.

“Finally: Has anyone noticed that the quote the Foster campaign constantly uses — ‘I’ve supported the President on almost everything’ — comes from a newspaper article that’s more than FOUR YEARS OLD? That’s more than half the length of time George Bush has been in the White House! Has anyone noticed that the very title of the article cited — ‘GOP Senate rivals back away from Bush’ — has been deliberately hidden by Mr. Foster? Has Mr. Foster not read any newspapers between January 2004 and today? Has he not been made aware of the many instances in which Jim Oberweis has publicly disagreed with the President since then — particularly, for example, on the twin issues of immigration reform and management of the Iraq war?

“Liberal Democrat Bill Foster has been exposed as a man who wants to raise taxes on married couples, on families with children, on small businessmen and farmers, even on capital gains and dividends — this, as the economy is going into a rough spot. Liberal Democrat Bill Foster has been exposed as a man who wants to allow employers to hire illegal immigrants, as long as they’re willing to pay an ‘amnesty tax.’ Liberal Democrat Bill Foster has now been exposed as a man willing to force another $440 billion, big-government health care program down the throats of the American public. It’s no wonder he’s reaching for the standard Democrat playbook — distort, misinterpret, or falsify, whatever it takes — because his only alternative is to give up.”

— 30 —

Paid for by Oberweis for Congress

Never mind that most of this is just wrong–this is one of the worst press releases ever and it’s  because Bill Pascoe has to prove he’s right regardless of what helps his candidate the most.

Already, I exposed above that Oberweis’ own site supports eliminating employer provided health insurance.  More in the next few posts.

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Today’s Tosser: Illinois Review, Apparently Jim Oberweis’ Web Site is Lying About Him

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Illinois Review, with issues of honesty themselves, attack Bill Foster’s commercial as being untrue because it claims:

The false claim in the ad is that somehow Jim Oberweis doesn’t support employer provided health care. However, according to the correction that ran in today’s Chicago Tribune, Foster’s charge is false. You have to read the fine print, but hey, it’s there . . .

Well, let’s look at Jim’s web site:

In the long run, then, a fundamental element of health care reform must be to move away from the third party payer system, and reintroduce incentives for managing one’s own health care expenditures. Tax-free Health Savings Accounts are an excellent first step in the right direction.

[kml_flashembed movie="http://youtube.com/v/hobjGiNadCc" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]

So, Oberweis does say he wants to end employer provided health care insurance.  It’s on his web site.  Did someone hack into it and put it there to smear him?

What’s the problem here?

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Do Steve Greenberg’s Loyalties Lay With Israel over the US?

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That’s the kind of bullshit line you find all of the time about Jewish candidates at White Supremacist and Anti-Semitic sites–like JewWatch, the site run by a gay Nazi.

I think we’d all be appalled by such a line.  And we get such a line from the Greenberg campaign:

Republican challenger Steve Greenberg circulated a news release Wednesday referring to the Barrington Democrat as Melissa Luburich Bean, adding her Serbian maiden name.

The news release blasted Bean for not supporting Kosovo’s move to separate from Serbia and her backing by pro-Serbian organizations.

Greenberg defended the news release Wednesday, saying her maiden name was fair game and her support for Serbia is disturbing, especially in light of last week’s attack on the U.S. embassy in the Eastern European country.

“I think ultimately when you run for office you are being vetted many ways — your middle name and last name and you get called many names,” said the Long Grove businessman. “If we are thin-skinned about it … we are probably in the wrong business.”

Bean has a long record of supporting Serbian groups and Serbia’s efforts to prevent a Kosovo succession. The position is in conflict with the official stance of the Bush administration and that of several key Western European allies.

The attack on the embassy was reportedly carried out by rioters upset with the U.S. support of a separate Kosovo state. The Serbian government denounced the attack.

Bean was not available for comment Thursday, but her spokesman did issue a one-sentence statement.

“As a rule, the congresswoman does not respond to ethnically and religiously divisive statements,” Jonathan Lipman said.

Disagreeing with Bean over policy on Serbia is fine and I’m frankly closer to Greenberg on this very narrow issue. However, trying to slur her ethnically is beyond the pale.

The Adults are Back In Charge

Dan, You are Better Than This

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Dan Curry, a nice guy who I genuinely appreciate a good back and forth with, tries to argue that the decline in violence over the last 8 months is evidence of victory.  Choosing the peak and then showing a decline is a misrepresentation of the data. 

The violence is back to 2006 levels which is better than 2007 levels of violence, but hardly victory and certainly still a civil war. More importantly, the point of the surge was to reduce violence as a path to political reconciliation–that is not happening. Despite claims of progress on benchmarks, the Iraqis again failed to pass key legislation:

The legislation was vetoed because of the opposition of Adel Abdul-Mahdi, a Shiite vice president who sits on the three-member presidency council, which must approve all laws unanimously, according to his aides and other lawmakers. Abdul-Mahdi’s aides said he believed the law was unconstitutional and would put too much control in the hands of the central government instead of the provinces.

The passage of the law, which delineated the scope of provincial powers, was considered a crucial step not just because it fleshed out the constitution’s definition of Iraq as a federal state, but also because it would have required provincial elections to be held by Oct. 1. The last nationwide elections took place in 2005.

The entire language of the right on this issue guarantees failure. The point isn’t to militarily defeat anyone. The point is to create a stable democratic government in a country that is divided sharply on ethnic and religious grounds. The problem with this goal is that the different factions don’t appear to share that goal.

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Daily Dolt: Phyllis Schafly

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Lying twice wasn’t enough over at Illinois Review, they pulled in Phyllis Schlafly to lie a third time about the ERA and Social Security.

The passage Eaton and Schlafly are lying about is on page 206 in Sex Bias in the U.S. Code

Here is what they claim supports them on page 206:

“Congress and the President should direct their attention to the concept that pervades the Code: that the adult world is (and should be) divided into two classes – independent men, whose primary responsibility is to win bread for a family, and dependent women, whose primary responsibility is to care for children and household. This concept must be eliminated from the code if it is to reflect the equality principle.”

This, of course, is out of context given directly following this passage is:

Underlying the recommendations made in this report is the fundamental point that allocation of responsibilities within the family is a matter properly determined solely by the individuals involved.  Government should not steer individual decisions concerning household or breadwinning roles by casting the law’s weight on the side of (or against) a particular method of ordering private relationships.  Rather, a policy of strict neutrality should be pursued.  That policy should accomodate both traditional and innovative patterns.  At the same time, it should assure removal of artificial constraints so that women and men willing to explore their full potential as human beings may create new traditions by their actions.

I also cited page 45 and since Eaton and Schlafly continue their lie, let’s cut and paste pages 45 and 46 of the report.

1. Revise social security law to provide father’s benefits in all cases where mother’s benefits are provided under present law;

2. Eliminate the dependency requirement for husband’s or widower’s benefits;

3. Provide derivative social security benefits to divorced husbands;

4. Make the age 62 computation point applicable for men born prior to 1913;

5. Eliminate the 20-of-4O quarter work test required now to qualify for disability
benefits;

6. Establish an occupational definition of disability for workers 55 years and older;

7. Make eligibility for benefits available all disabled widows and disabled surviving divorced wives regardless of age, and make the benefits not subject to actuarial
reduction;

8. Provide benefits to disabled spouses of beneficiaries;

9. Define dependents to include relatives live in the home;

10. Reduce the duration of marriage requirement from 20 to 5 or 10 years for a divorced spouse to qualify for benefits on the basis of the wage-earner spouse’s earnings record, and remove the requirement of consecutive years of marriage. In the alternative, divorced wife’s right to receive benefits should be based on the economic relationship between the parties and not the length marriage;

11. Allow additional dropout years to relate benefits more to current earnings;

 12. Compute primary benefits and spoused benefits to increase the primary benefits for workers by approximately one-eighth, and reduce the spouse’s proportion from one-half to one-third, maintaining thereby the current total benefit of 15 percent for a couple while at the same time improving the protection for single workers, working couples, and surviving spouses; and

13. Amend the Social Security Act to eliminate separate references to men and women.

Phyllis Schlafley is lying and doing it badly.  When the report (it wasn’t a book by Ruth Bader Ginsburg, it was a report to The United States Commission on Civil Rights) was issued men did not receive the same survivor benefits women did.  That was changed not long after the report actually and as such, the lie at the center of this scare tactic was made moot nearly 30 years ago.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg wasn’t arguing that survivor and spouse benefits should be eliminated to make individuals more equal, she was arguing that men should receive the same benefits in the same situation.  The reason for this is that families should decide upon the proper roles within the family, not the government. The point was to increase liberty while still providing the same level of benefits–which is what the system has done over this time.

That Eaton and Schlafly would so boldly lie isn’t terribly surprising.  Schlafly is still touting unisex bathrooms. The issue is why does anyone give them any attention or space to print this crap other than on wingnut blogs.  Eaton took her lie to the Southtown Star and got it pubished presumably because it was an opinion piece. It was an opinion piece, it just had several facts supporting the claims wrong.  And not just wrong, but the opposite of her claims.

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