social security

Vice President Joe Biden (D)

There are now multiple press reports that President Obama will agree to a fiscal deal that enacts a so-called ai???Chained CPIai??? to calculate Social Security and veteransai??i?? benefits.Ai??Under this plan, ai???a person age 75 in the future will get a yearly benefit thatai??i??s $653 lower after ten years of chained CPI than that person would get under the current formula. An 85-year-old will have $1,139 less to live on.ai??? This represents a huge cut to benefits.

This contradicts an Obama-Biden campaign pledge to not cut benefits for current beneficiaries.

In fact, in August, Vice President Biden actually explicitly told a group that there would “be no changes to Social Security”:

“Hey, by the way, let’s talk about Social Security,” Biden said after a diner at The Coffee Break Cafe in Stuart, VA expressed his relief that the Obama campaign wasn’t talking about changing the popular entitlement program.

“Number one, I guarantee you, flat guarantee you, there will be no changes in Social Security,” Biden said, per a pool report. “I flat guarantee you.”

Obama and Biden should stand by their words on the campaign and back off all cuts to Social Security benefits.

We set up an ActBlue page to highlight and reward bold progressive members of Congress who are speaking out publicly today.Ai??Check them out and donate $3 to them here.

Click here to pledge to hold any Democrat who agrees to a deal that cuts Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid benefits accountable.

Click here to call your Member of Congress and demand that they oppose this bad deal.

AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka

President Obama has endorsed a plan to cut Social Security benefits through a so-called ai???chained CPI.ai??? AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka released the following statement with regards to this possible cut:

Republicans are once again demanding benefit cuts to pay for tax cuts, and threatening to harm the economy unless they get their way.Ai?? House Speaker John Boehnerai??i??s recent ai???Plan Bai??? proposal would extend tax cuts for people earning between $250,000 and $1 million, at a cost of $400 billion. At the same time, Republicans are demanding to cut Social Security COLAs through the so-called ai???Chained CPI.ai??? We call on Congress to reject House Speaker Boehnerai??i??s proposal to extend tax cuts for people earning up to $1 million and support President Obamaai??i??s demand for at least $1.2 trillion in additional tax revenues. We further call on Congress to reject Republican hostage-taking and reject any cuts to Social Security, Medicaid, or Medicare benefits, regardless of who proposes them.

We set up an ActBlue page to highlight and reward bold progressive members of Congress who are speaking out publicly today.Ai??Check them out and donate $3 to them here.

Click here to pledge to hold any Democrat who agrees to a deal that cuts Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid benefits accountable.

Click here to call your Member of Congress and demand that they oppose this bad deal.

President Obama has endorsed a plan to cut Social Security benefits through a so-called ai???chained CPI.ai??? Today, several major progressive organizations denounced this proposed deal and announced their strong opposition to it.

The Progressive Change Campaign Committee:

“This proposed deal will cut Social Security benefits. Any deal that cuts Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid benefits is unacceptable — and progressive organizations join with the overwhelming majority of Americans who oppose it.”Ai??— Stephanie Taylor, Co-Founder, PCCC

MoveOn.org:

“MoveOn members overwhelmingly oppose cuts to Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid benefits, and they’ve made clear that they would see any fiscal agreement that cuts such benefits as a betrayal that sells out working and middle class families — whether the cuts come via a chained CPI, increased Medicare eligibility age, or in some other form. If such a deal were proposed by the President and Speaker, MoveOn members would expect every Senate and House DemocratAi??to do everything in their power to block it. Senate Majority Leader Reid would play a crucial role, as MoveOn members would count on him and other senators to remain true to their repeated promises to keep Social Security benefitsAi??off the table.” — MoveOn.org Executive Director Justin Ruben

Social Security Works:

“Almost every elected official just spent an entire election season saying they wouldn’t cut the benefits of those 55 and older. The truth is the chained CPI hits everyone’s benefits on day one. It hits the oldest of the old and disabled veterans the hardest. If it wasn’t being bandied about as being ‘on the table,’ I would guess that it was created as an office joke to see who could create the most noxious and offensive policy possible.” — Social Security Works Executive Director Alex Lawson

Credo Action:

“It would be a massive betrayal if the White House …

Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-IL)

President Obama has endorsed a plan to cut Social Security benefits through a so-called ai???chained CPI.ai??? Today, Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-IL) spoke out against a plan like Obama’s that would offer only a tiny increase in taxes for the wealthy in exchange for cuts to Social Security benefits:

SCHAKOWSKY:Ai??Ai??Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I rise today because I justAi??don’t get this discussion aboutAi??the fiscal cliff. Republicans are saying that inAi??order to raise taxes on theAi??very wealthiest Americans andAi??actually buy historically smallAi??– by historically smallAi??amount, that the price that hasAi??to be paid is to ask theAi??poorest adult Americans to payAi??more. That is to reduce socialAi??security and medicare benefits. I don’t get the equivalencyAi??that is being asked for. The richest to pay a bit moreAi??and the price to be that theAi??poor, the poorest have to payAi??more. Seniors in this country have aAi??median income of just $22,000 aAi??year. That means half of all seniorsAi??are below that. They also spend an averageAi??right now of $4,500 a year onAi??health care costs out of theirAi??own pockets. And so I think that we have toAi??change the debate here andAi??there’s a parable in the BibleAi??that makes this point.Ai??when you ask a person with oneAi??coat to give up that coat, it’sAi??not the same as asking someoneAi??with 10 coats to donate one toAi??the cause. I yield back.

Watch it:

We set up an ActBlue page to highlight and reward bold progressive members of Congress who are speaking out publicly today. Check them out and donate $3 to them here.

Click here to pledge to hold any Democrat who agrees to a deal that cuts Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid benefits accountable.

Click here to call your Member of Congress and demand that they oppose this bad deal.

Rep. Barbara Lee (D-CA)

President Obama has endorsed a plan to cut Social Security benefits through a so-called ai???chained CPI.ai??? Today, Rep. Barbara Lee (D-CA), rejected the deal, saying that it’s “unacceptable” to cut Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid benefits:

We set up an ActBlue page to highlight and reward bold progressive members of Congress who are speaking out publicly today. Check them out and donate $3 to them here.

Click here to pledge to hold any Democrat who agrees to a deal that cuts Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid benefits accountable.

Click here to call your Member of Congress and demand that they oppose this bad deal.

Rep. Raul Grijalva (D-AZ)

President Obama has endorsed a plan to cut Social Security benefits through a so-called ai???chained CPI.ai??? Today,Ai??Rep. Raul Grijalva (D-AZ), Ai??the co-chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, issued a statement saying he would “never support” the chained CPI, which is the cornerstone of the Obama deal’s changes to Social Security. Hereai??i??s his full statement:

ai???Federal law has always prohibited Social Security from contributing to the deficit. Any talk of shrinking the program to ai???save moneyai??i?? is flawed from the start because Social Security is not part of the national budget in the same way as military spending ai??i?? itai??i??s paid for through a dedicated payroll tax separate from general budgeting.

ai???Some have suggested that Social Security benefits should be based on a chained Consumer Price Index (CPI), which assumes that when the price of one item rises, people buy something else ai??i?? no matter how popular or necessary that original item might be. If this change goes into effect, Social Security benefits would stop reflecting the rising prices of popular goods.

ai???The average Social Security recipient rakes in a whopping $13,000 a year. If we pass chained CPI, projected annual cuts for a typical retiree would be about $560 a year by age 75, $984 a year by age 85 and $1,400 a year by age 95.

ai???The less money our Social Security recipients ai??i?? including 9 million veterans ai??i?? are able to spend, the less money goes to the businesses that create jobs.Ai??Chained CPI makes life harder for millions of retirees, weakens Social Security and doesnai??i??t reduce the deficit by a penny. Itai??i??s a Beltway fig leaf that I will never support, and I call on my colleagues to make their feelings known as soon as possible before this becomes yet another piece …

Rep. Charlie Rangel (D-NY)

President Obama has endorsed a plan to cut Social Security benefits through a so-called ai???chained CPI.ai??? Today,Ai??Rep. Charlie Rangel (D-NY), Ai??issued a statement calling this an ai???irresponsibleai??? cut to the program and to benefits, and vowed to “oppose” any deal that cuts Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid benefits. Here’s his full statement:

ai???Everyone has a grandparent, a friend or a neighbor who relies on the Social Security benefits they earned to pay for medical care, food and housing. A move towards chained Consumer Price Index (CPI) would be a long-term benefit cut for every single person who receives a Social Security check.

ai???The current average earned benefit for a 65 year old on Social Security is $17,134. Using chained CPI will result in a $6,000 loss for retirees in the first fifteen years of retirement and adds up to a $16,000 loss over twenty-five years. This change would be devastating to beneficiaries, especially widowed women, more than a third of whom rely on the program for 90% of their income and use every single dollar of the Social Security checks they’ve earned. This would require the most vulnerable Americans to dig further into their savings to fill the hole left by unnecessary and irresponsible cuts to Social Security.

ai???Reducing cost of living adjustments is a Social Security benefit cut. Any deal that cuts Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid benefits is unacceptable and I will oppose it.ai???

We set up an ActBlue page to highlight and reward bold progressive members of Congress who are speaking out publicly today. Check them out and donate $3 to them here.

Click here to pledge to hold any Democrat who agrees to a deal that cuts Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid benefits accountable.

Click here to call your …

Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN)

President Obama has endorsed a plan to cut Social Security benefits through a so-called “chained CPI.” Today, Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN), the co-chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, issued a statement calling this an “irresponsible” cut to the program and to benefits, indicating that he stands against the deal:

ai???Everyone has a grandparent, a friend or a neighbor who relies on the Social Security benefits they earned to pay for medical care, food and housing. A move towards chained CPI would be a long-term benefit cut for every single person who receives a Social Security check.

ai???The current average earned benefit for a 65 year old on Social Security is $17,134. Using chained CPI will result in a $6,000 loss for retirees in the first fifteen years of retirement and adds up to a $16,000 loss over twenty-five years. This change would be devastating to beneficiaries, especially widowed women, more than a third of whom rely on the program for 90% of their income and use every single dollar of the Social Security checks they’ve earned. This would require the most vulnerable Americans to dig further into their savings to fill the hole left by unnecessary and irresponsible cuts to Social Security.

ai???I am committed to standing against any benefit cuts to programs Americans rely on and tying Social Security benefits to chained CPI is a benefit cut.”

We set up an ActBlue page to highlight and reward bold progressive members of Congress who are speaking out publicly today. Check them out and donate $3 to them here.

Click here to pledge to hold any Democrat who agrees to a deal that cuts Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid benefits accountable.

Click here to call your Member of Congress and demand that they oppose …

There are now multiple press reports that President Obama will agree to a fiscal deal that enacts a so-called “Chained CPI” to calculate Social Security and veterans’ benefits. Under this plan, “a person age 75 in the future will get a yearly benefit thatai??i??s $653 lower after ten years of chained CPI than that person would get under the current formula. An 85-year-old will have $1,139 less to live on.” This represents a huge cut to benefits.

But during the presidential campaign, the Obama team swore up and down that it would not agree to slashing Social Security benefits. Here’s an October 6th statement:

President Obama will under no circumstances agree to put your retirement at risk by privatizing Social Security,Ai??and he will reject any plan that slashes Social Security benefits.

And his campaign web site said “no current beneficiaries should see their benefits reduced” and that the “administration will not accept an approach that slashes benefits for future generations”:

President Obama should keep his promise to the 61 million Americans who voted for him and back off of his proposal to cut Social Security benefits.

We set up an ActBlue page to highlight and reward bold progressive members of Congress who are speaking out publicly today.Ai??Check them out and donate $3 to them here.

Click here to pledge to hold any Democrat who agrees to a deal that cuts Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid benefits accountable.

Click here to call your Member of Congress and demand that they oppose this bad deal.

(Photo credit: Flickr user Steve Rhodes)

Many Republicans and a few Democrats have suggested an idea corporate lobbyists love — raising the Medicare age and dumping millions of seniors into private insurance. This would cost seniors $11.4 billion annually.

Nobel laureate economist Paul Krugman decided to look at how much doing this would reduce the deficit versus President Obama’s tax proposal of ending the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans and returning the estate tax to 2009 levels (it was cut by President Bush as well). Here’s his conclusion:

So I thought Iai??i??d look at the dollars and cents ai??i?? and even I am somewhat shocked. Those tax hikes would raise $1.6 trillion over the next decade;Ai??according to the CBO, raising the Medicare age would save $113 billion in federal funds over the next decade.

So, the [tax] proposal would reduce the deficitAi??14 times as muchAi??as the [Medicare] proposal.

The choice seems clear. If you’re serious about tackling our long-term deficit, you should be for ending the Bush tax cuts for the richest Americans, not harming benefits for America’s seniors.

Sign up here to pledge to hold bad Democrats who agree to cuts in Medicare, Medicaid, or Social Security benefits accountable.

House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) wants to cut your Medicare and Social Security benefits.

House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) presented his latest offer to President Obama on Friday. Boehner is offering to agree to a tax rate increase on millionaires only if Democrats agree to major cuts in Medicare and Social Security benefits through a possible combination of a benefit-cutting “chained CPI” and hiking the retirement age.

The first thing to note is that Boehner’s proposal is not particularly ground-breaking. For weeks, leading Republicans like Senators Bob Corker (TN) and Saxby Chambliss (GA) have said they would be open to some revenue increases in exchange for cuts to Medicare and Social Security benefits.Ai??So this isn’t a “cave” or a compromise on behalf of House Republicans. It’s the position they’ve been bargaining towards for the past month.

Second of all, the plan asks seniors to pay for debt problems they did not cause. Two wars, tax cuts for the richest Americans, and Wall Street’s irresponsibility are responsible for our long-term deficits. It is simply unfair for them to have to pay for debt that they did not cause.

As the New York Times’s Paul Krugman writes, “Why on earth would Obama be selling Medicare away to raise top tax rates when he gets a big rate rise on January 1 just by doing nothing?” Furthermore, these tax increases would include rich Americans earning $250,000 or more, not just millionaires.

We should look instead to Senator-elect Elizabeth Warren for a credible approach to dealing with the deficit over the long term.

Warren has an alternative, truly “balanced approach” to tackling the deficit. During a campaign debate last month, she laid out a popular vision for dealing with the deficit: cut back on wasteful military …

When Warren laid out the approach in a debate with departing Sen. Scott Brown during the campaign, it instantly entered the progressive canon… And the plan has widespread support beyond just liberals, progressives argue. Case in point, the PCCC polled voters in two swing states (Virginia and New Hampshire), and in Obama’s home state of Illinois, about Warren’s plan. The poll, conducted by PPP and shared with Salon before its release, didn’t mention Warren’s name, but asked about individual components. All had broad support.

A coalition of liberal groups this week delivered petitions with more than 21,000 names to Villaraigosa’s office, demanding that he resign from the Campaign to Fix the Debt, which those on the left consider to be a right-wing plot to slash Social Security, Medicare and other social service and support programs, and protect the wealthy against tax increases. Move.on, the Progressive Change Campaign Committee and the California-based Courage Campaign are joining forces to pressure Villaraigosa, as detailed in this item on the Calitics website.

In a sign that progressive push-back against Los Angeles Mayor Villariagosa’s membership in the right-wing “Fix The Debt” lobbying group isn’t abating, activists from MoveOn.org and the Progressive Change Campaign Committee delivered over 21,000 signatures to LA City Hall this afternoon demanding Villariagosa resign from the group’s steering committee.

Sen. Tom Harkin (D-IA)

As Democrats and Republicans continue to negotiate over the contours of a fiscal deal, many Democrats have propositioned the idea that any agreement should include a ratio of cuts-to-revenue of 2-to-1. This is a model that President Obama chose for his most recent budget request, for example.

But 2-to-1 isn’t balanced. Balanced means at least equal parts cuts and revenue. Progressive Senator Tom Harkin (D-IA) has stepped up to the plate and unveiled a new petition to Obama that not only calls on him to reject damaging cuts to Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security benefits, but also assure a 1-to-1 ratio of cuts to revenue in any deal:

Senator-elect Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) has a credible approach to dealing with the deficit over the long term that lays out specific cuts to wasteful spending as well as making the rich pay their fair share in taxes.

Here’s her alternative, truly “balanced approach” to tackling the deficit. During a campaign debate, she laid out a popular vision for dealing with the debt: cut back on wasteful military and agriculture subsidy spending, and make the rich pay their fair share with higher tax rates. Watch Warren explain:

Show your support for Warrenai??i??s “balanced approach” by clicking here to add your name as a citizen supporter of her vision.

Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN)

Senior Republican Senator Bob Corker (TN) made headlines this weekend when he said he would be willing to let the Bush tax cuts for the richest Americans expire. But Corker wanted something else in return — major cuts to Social Security and Medicare benefits. He has laid out a plan that not only includes so-called “means testing” but also a hike in the eligibility/retirement age for both programs.

He even explicitly talked about using the debt ceiling as “leverage” in order to enforce such a deal. Watch it:

Here’s the important thing to remember about Corker’s offer. The Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans are already expiring. Even if Congress does nothing, the tax policy will once against return all the rates to those of the Clinton era starting in 2013. Congress would then be free next month to pass tax cuts for working class and middle class people, without necessarily having to once again lower taxes on the top 2 percent of Americans.

The Republicans are essentially asking the Democrats to cut benefits for all Americans in exchange for something that is going to happen, anyway. That’s not a deal they should even think about taking.

We think that any Democrat who would endorse a deal that cuts Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid benefits needs to be held accountable. Click here to sign up to help us hold their feet to the fire.Ai??

Cutting Social Security, Medicaid, and Medicare benefits is vogue among elites in Washington and their corporate lobbyist allies. These programs did not cause our deficits, but many elites want to cut them because they fundamentally want to see them privatized.

Take Arthur Brooks. He’s the president of the right-wing American Enterprise Institute. Yesterday he tweeted that raising the Medicare eligibility age is “at least a step in the right direction”:

The Kaiser Family Foundation estimates that raising the Medicare age from 65 to 67 would result in “$3.7 billion in higher costs for 65- and 66 year-olds, $4.5 billion from employers through company-sponsored insurance, $0.7 billion from state governments, and $2.5 billion in higher average prices for third parties once younger seniors are shifted out of the Medicare risk-pool and into the general population.”

For the incredibly wealthy Brooks, that’s probably not much of a problem. According to disclosures, he nets an annual salary ofAi??$528,272. Higher costs for seniors are not a problem to him.

As Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) and others have noted, you can save billions of dollars for Medicare, beneficiaries, and taxpayers by enacting common sense reforms that don’t cut benefits by even a penny.

For example, if we simply dropped the protectionist trade barrier and allowed Americans to import drugs from Canada, we could save as much as $80 billion over ten years. Empowering Medicare to negotiate for lower drug prices just as the Pentagon negotiates for basic goods like paperclips could save as much as $156 billion over ten years.

These are very basic reforms that would save enormous amounts of money without costing taxpayers or beneficiaries anything. But they require standing up to Big Pharma. That’s …

Why is LA’s mayor helping a corporate front group cut your Social Security benefits?

Los Angeles mayor Antonio Villaraigosa has shocked progressives by joining the board of Fix The Debt, a group driven by corporate CEOs that seeks to cut Social Security and Medicare benefits while lowering the corporate tax rate. Over 12,000 people have signed a SignOn.org petition calling on Villaraigosa to reverse course and leave the organization.

Last night, Villaraigosa appeared on Huffington Post Live for an in-studio interview Ai??to discuss a variety of issues. Host Jacob Soboroff asked him about the controversy surrounding Fix The Debt, and the mayor responded by saying that he joined Fix The Debt to promote a “balanced approach” to the national debt:

VILLARAGOISA: “Isn’t what’s broken in Washington right now that Democrats wont talk to Republicans, Republicans won’t talk to Democrats? There’s this blind allegiance to ideology…I’m a progressive abashedly, but I’m also practical…It’s true that a large number of people on Fix The Debt coalition are Republicans, and have supported Republicans…they also said we need a balanced approach, supported the Simpson Bowles plan as a balanced framework..I understand why some people would take umbrage particularly on the Democratic side and the progressive side but I’m not a university professor, I’m a mayor.

Watch it (the relevant section starts at 8:18):

It’s important to remember that Social Security does not add a dime to the deficit, something that both former right-wing president Ronald Reagan and current progressive Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders (I) have said.

There is simply nothing “balanced” about making the poor and middle class pay for a debt caused by the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans, two wars, and Wall Street’s recession.

Recall that the mayor supported and passed legislation in his own city …

Alan Simpson, author of a plan to cut Social Security

You might’ve seen a new video of Alan Simpson — the former senator and Washington lobbyist who authored a plan to lower corporate taxes and cut Medicare and Social Security benefits — where he does the popular “Gangnam Style” dance. If not — here it is:

At the end of the video, Simpson warns young Americans to beware of “old coots who clear out the Treasury before you get there.” Considering that the entire video is made to recruit young Americans to sign a petition calling for cuts to benefits for programs they rely on, like Social Security and Medicare, Simpson’s warning is particularly ironic.

Here’s another interesting fact. The popular Gangnam Style song is itself a parody of the residents of the region of Gangnam, a wealthy part of the South Korean capital city of Seoul. As Foreign Policy’s Max Fisher writes, the song is made to lampoon the “self-importance andAi??ostentatiousAi??wealth” in Gangnam. The star of the song, the Korean artist Psy, is a “clownish caricature” of a an out of touch rich person.

Then perhaps it is fitting that Simpson would utilize this song in a desperate attempt to enlist young Americans to cut benefits in programs like Medicare and Social Security while lowering the corporate tax rate.

Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-MD)

During his weekly address yesterday, House Minority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-MD) told the press that major cuts to Medicare benefits must be on the table:

Hoyer said GOP proposals to raise the Medicare eligibility age, make wealthier seniors pay higher Medicare rates and limit the cost-of-living increases for some federal programs are legitimate ones, even as he warned he might not support them.

ai???They clearly are on the table,ai??? Hoyer said of the Medicare changes during his weekly press briefing in the Capitol. ai???They were on the table in the Boehner-Obama talks. They’ve been on the table for some period of time. That does not mean that I’d be prepared to adopt them now, but they’re clearly, I think, on the table.ai???

Seniors on Medicare did not cause our deficit — Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans, two wars, and Wall Street’s recession did. They should not be asked to pay through their hard-earned benefits.

We’re asking PCCC members to make calls to Hoyer’s office to ask him to take cuts in Medicare, Social Security, and Medicaid benefits off the table. Click here to make a call.

Rep. Tom Cole (R-OK)

As we wrote about last week, the Republican Party’s new strategy is to agree to raising revenue from ending token tax deductions — essentially, Mitt Romney’s plan — in exchange to getting Democrats to agree to cut Medicare and Social Security benefits.

Appearing on ABC’s This Week yesterday, Rep. Tom Cole (R-OK) explicitly said that Republicans want Democrats’ help in order to enact “entitlement reform” — code for cuts — so that they could not be blamed in the next election:

COLE: To be fair to Leader McConnell, he’s always been very forthright, entitlement reform takes both sides — and then it’s not an issue in the next election, because they both did it.

Watch it:

To be clear, Cole is part of the House Republican leadership teamAi??that just sent a proposal that would cut Medicare benefits by raising the eligibility age and Social Security benefits by adjusting the Cost-of-Living Adjustments (COLA). This is what the Republicans mean by “entitlement reform.”

This is more evidence that Democrats should not fall for Republicans’ trap. They are seeking Democratic cover to move to their real goal: cutting Medicare and Social Security benefits.

The “Fix The Debt” campaign, backed by tens of millions of dollars from corporate CEOs, is pushing an aggressive campaign to cut Social Security benefits while lowering the corporate tax rate. It claims that it is bipartisan and that it represents all Americans, not just the wealthy elite.

But Fix The Debt’s carefully crafted messaging fell apart over the weekend, as it quietly conceded that it won’t even take a position on one of the most popular ideas for deficit reduction: ending the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans.

In a statement to The National Journal, the organization wrote, “The Campaign to Fix the Debt does not have a position on raising tax rates.ai???

We conducted polling in the crucial swing state of New Hampshire an found that 66 percent of those surveyed want to end Bush tax cuts for households making more than $250,000 a year.

Fix The Debt can’t claim to be representing all Americans if it can’t even commit to some of the most basic and fair policies that they want.

The truth is that on every prominent economic issue of our time, the public overwhelmingly agrees with the progressive position. If 74 percent of voters oppose cuts to Medicare benefits and only 17 percent support them (which is true in New Hampshire), progressives insisting on the 74 percent position is different than the Tea Party insisting on the 17 percent position. One is democracy. The other is fringe incalcitrance. Equating the two is either ignorant or dishonest, but in either case destructive. The Progressive Change Campaign Committee did our homework and hired the No. 1 most-accurate pollster of 2012, Public Policy Polling, to poll New Hampshire voters on these fiscal issues (with more states to come). As the Union Leader’s John DiStaso reported, huge majorities of voters in the “Live Free Or Die” state support taxing the rich, oppose cutting benefits, and support cutting corporate welfare. They also say that President Obama’s mandate is not to compromise for its own sake, but to “stand up for regular families – even if that means fighting.” That’s a mandate – a mandate for “the left.” The only question is whether Democrats will use it to fight for the will of the people.

In a story already making waves across Washington, Politico’s Jim VandeHei and Mike Allen reported this morning that a bipartisan “grand bargain” is emerging from talks between the White House and Republicans. The contours of the deal are this: About $1.2 trillion in new tax revenue, most likely from an rate increase on income over $250,000, along with at least $400 billion over 10 years in entitlement cuts “and perhaps a lot more,” mostly from Medicare.

Liberals have drawn a hard line against entitlement cuts and $400 billion is a lot of money, so some progressives are not pleased with the idea….However, there’s an important caveat that’s missing from the deal described by Politico… The details of the cuts in the Politico article were vague, and it’s unclear if they represents real cuts to benefits or not. “That’s a crucial distinction,” said Adam Green, the co-founder of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee. “What’s worried some about the Politico article is that it kind of tossed in reforms or efficiencies along with talk about raising the Medicare retirement age or adjusting the cost of living adjustment — those two things would essentially start a nuclear war on the left,” Green said. “Those are the two big things. Those are benefit cuts. Those actively hurt seniors.” But Green said he was encouraged by Durbin’s speech yesterday, and he doesn’t think raising the retirement age is a real possibility.

The poll gave strong indication that Granite Staters oppose cuts to Medicare and Medicaid benefits and support higher taxes for the rich. If Shaheen supported cuts to Medicare of Medicaid, 46 percent said they would be less likely to vote for her, while 35 percent said it would not make a difference, 13 percent said they would be more likely to vote for her and 7 percent were not sure, according to the poll. If Shaheen “led the national fight to raise taxes on the rich,” 48 percent said they would be more likely to vote for her, while 31 percent said they would be less likely to vote for her, 19 percent said it would not make a difference and 1 percent said they were not sure.