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octoberlib

(14,971 posts)
Tue Mar 26, 2013, 02:23 AM Mar 2013

Senate Unanimously Votes Against Cuts to Social Security: Media Don’t Notice

There are few areas where the corruption of the national media is more apparent than in its treatment of Social Security. Most of the elite media have made it clear in both their opinion and news pages that they want to see benefits cut. In keeping with this position they highlight the views of political figures who push cuts to the program, treating them as responsible, while those who oppose cuts are ignored or mocked.
This pattern of coverage was clearly on display last weekend. Both the New York Times and Washington Post decided to ignore the Senate's passage by voice vote of the Sanders Amendment. This was an amendment to the budget put forward by Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders that puts the Senate on record as opposing the switch to the chained CPI as the basis for the annual Social Security cost of living adjustment (COLA).

With all the Republicans who pronounce endlessly on the need to cut entitlement spending, there was not a single Republican senator who was prepared to say that switching the Social Security COLA to a chained CPI was a good idea. And even though President Obama has repeatedly stated as clearly as he could that he supported the switch to a chain CPI, there was not one Democratic senator who was prepared to stand up and speak in solidarity with the president.
This is a clear case of the elite lining up together against the bases of both political parties. If the chained CPI were put to a vote of the people it would lose in a landslide. But the elites are prepared to use their control of the political process and the media to do everything they can to push this cut forward.


http://truth-out.org/news/item/15308-senate-unanimously-votes-against-cuts-to-social-security-media-dont-notice
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Senate Unanimously Votes Against Cuts to Social Security: Media Don’t Notice (Original Post) octoberlib Mar 2013 OP
K&R Media negligence has become so common we don't care anymore? n/t Egalitarian Thug Mar 2013 #1
K & R !!! WillyT Mar 2013 #2
The Sanders Amendment was a nothing burger that didn't deserve any more attention onenote Mar 2013 #3

onenote

(42,701 posts)
3. The Sanders Amendment was a nothing burger that didn't deserve any more attention
Tue Mar 26, 2013, 12:59 PM
Mar 2013

than the literally dozens of other non-binding amendments passed by the Senate by voice vote during the budget debate.

Here's what the amendment said:

SEC. 3__. DEFICIT-NEUTRAL RESERVE FUND FOR DISABLED VETERANS AND THEIR SURVIVORS.

The Chairman of the Committee on the Budget of the Senate may revise the allocations of a committee or committees, aggregates, and other appropriate levels and limits in this resolution for one or more bills, joint resolutions, amendments, motions, or conference reports related to protecting the benefits of disabled veterans and their survivors, which may not include a chained CPI, by the amounts provided in that legislation for that purpose, provided that such legislation would not increase the deficit over either the period of the total fiscal years 2013 through 2018 or the period of the total of fiscal years 2013 through 2023.

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