The Daily Howler on Social Security

One grump I have about the Social Security discussion. Do we have to abbreviate it with "SS"? Yes, I know the Second World War was a while ago. But the initials "SS" still have, you might say, a negative association.  Can't we call it SocSec or something?

But, that's not mainly what this post is about.  As readers of this blog know, I'm a big fan of Bob Somerby, aka the Daily Howler.  And I just wanted to mention that for the last several weeks, he's been providing some very good coverage on the Bush administration's effort to begin phasing out Social Security.

As one example, there's his post for 01/1/05.  In his incomparable style, he takes apart the press corps' failings on the Social Security story:

Again, a note from Earth to the Washington press corps: When a president stages a major forum, then makes wild misstatements about major policy, that will almost always be the biggest news event of the day. When a president baldly misstates basic facts, that is a major news story! But on Tuesday evening, none of the three big networks told their viewers what Bush had done. At NBC, [David] Gregory played tape of one wild statement, then pretended he just didn’t notice. But [ABC's Peter] Jennings established a great Peter Principle: Deftly, he sanitized the things Bush had said, pretending the wilder misstatements hadn’t happened. ...

Duh! Correcting misstatements by major officials is part of a journalist’s job description! And they shouldn’t feel they have to find a Democratic spokesman to contradict Bush; that is their job as reporters. As we think Michael Kinsley first asked, how stupid would it be to write something like this: "Today, George Bush said the earth is flat. A Democratic spokesman quickly challenged him." Objective reporters don’t need third parties to interject simple matters of fact.

This fall, it briefly seemed that the Post and the Times had begun to accept these basic points. In response to Bush’s campaign dissembling, the papers began to publish reports in which reporters noted the obvious—that public statements by Candidate Bush flew in the faceof established facts. When they did so, the reporters in question weren’t injecting "their opinions" into news stories. Quite the contrary—they were simply reporting objective facts. That’s what their job calls for.

And he takes off on the famous phrase that Pat Buchanan coined for Vice President Spiro Agnew, before Agnew had to resign from his office in disgrace, "nattering nabobs of negativism."  He says he's going to label reporters who refuse to correct even the most blatant factual misstatements on Bush's part the "Pandering Poobahs of Positivity."