Well, "dems", you have a big credibility deficit

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Peter Peterson. (Photo: Reuters)

Peter Peterson is coming to get your Social Security and Medicare. Peterson was the commerce secretary in the Nixon administration. He then went on to make billions of dollars as one of the top executives at the Blackstone Group, a private equity fund. Mr. Peterson is known as one of the top beneficiaries of the fund managers' tax break, through which he personally pocketed tens of millions of dollars.

Mr. Peterson has been using his Wall Street wealth to attack these social insurance programs for decades, but he recently stepped up his efforts. Last year, he spent $1 billion to endow the Peter G. Peterson Foundation to further his efforts.

In politics, it's not easy to counter the impact of $1 billion. In addition to its money, the Peterson crew enjoys the support of many important news outlets, most importantly The Washington Post, which pushes his line on both its editorial and news pages.

In fact, The Post even went so far as to identify Peterson's foundation by its boilerplate, an organization that "advocates for federal fiscal responsibility," instead of telling readers of its political leanings, the normal mode of identification for such organizations. (The Center for Economic and Policy Research was established "to promote democratic debate on the most important economic and social issues that affect people's lives.")

While the Peterson crew may have the money and the support of the media, the rest of us can rely on logic and ridicule to counter the attack. In this spirit, we have the Peter G. Peterson Intergenerational Fairness Tax Credit. (Mr. Peterson is apparently fond of having things named after him. In addition to his new Peter G. Peterson Foundation, he also has a think tank named after him, the Peter G. Peterson Institute for International Economics.)

The Peterson tax credit would essentially take the Peterson crew at their word. They claim that they are worried that huge tax burdens will leave future generations worse off than the generations that preceded them.

This isn't true. There is no plausible scenario, short of war or environmental disaster, that would leave future generations worse off than their parents or grandparents. But we don't have to argue with the billionaire; let's just give future generations the option to trade places with their parents or grandparents who made out so well.

This is where the tax credit comes in. The tax credit would allow an individual to trade her after-tax income for the after-tax income that someone born 20 or 40 years sooner would have earned at the same age. For example, if someone born in 1990 believes in 2020 that their grandparents got a better deal, they would simply check off the year 1940, and they would have their taxes adjusted so that they would have the same after-tax income of a person born in 1940, when they were also age 30.

Of course, the young ones would end up big losers in this story. Real wages, on average, will be more than 50 percent higher in 2020 than they were in 1970. Even if tax rates were, on average, 5 percentage points higher, workers in 2020 will still have after-tax wages that are more than 40 percent higher than their counterparts in 1970.

This means that anyone who chose to take advantage of the intergenerational equity tax credit would end up as a big loser. That is why it can help solve the deficit problem. If people check off the tax credit, they will pay more in taxes and, therefore, increase government revenue.

It might be hard to convince large numbers of people to voluntarily pay more in taxes. This is where the Peterson Foundation comes in. They are spending huge amounts of money trying to convince young people that they are being ripped off by their parents and grandparents. They are even promoting front groups of young people to advance this effort.

With his billion dollars, Peterson could convince a huge number of gullible young people to tax advantage of the intergenerational equity tax credit. Insofar as he is successful in this effort, he can help to generate billions of dollars that can be used for items like health care, preschool education, and other pressing needs.

So, let's join efforts with Mr. Peterson and encourage his followers to take advantage of the Peter G. Peterson Intergenerational Fairness Tax Credit. There is a word for taking money from willfully ignorant young people who would deny their parents and grandparents the Social Security and Medicare benefits they need to survive: justice.

how do you know no one has anyone serving over there. You have no way of knowing that.

Now, what Americans need to understand is that that means every single day of the year, our government goes into the market and borrows money from other countries to finance Iraq, Afghanistan, Katrina and our tax cuts, Clinton added. We depend on Japan, China, the United Kingdom, Saudi Arabia and Korea primarily to basically loan us money every day of the year to cover my tax cut and these conflicts and Katrina. I don't think it makes any sense. I think it's wrong.

Clinton also discussed bringing world leaders together to combat the world's chronic problems � including extreme poverty, global warming and religious conflicts � as well as the Hurricane Katrina recovery effort and Hillary Clinton's political future.

STEPHANOPOULOS: We're here on your initiative, and I want to talk about that, but let's begin with Katrina. President Bush has brought you into the recovery effort, but he's not taking all of your advice. You say roll back the tax cuts for the wealthy. He says no tax increase of any kind. We're spending $5 billion a month in Iraq, probably $200 billion on Katrina. Something's got to give.

CLINTON: Well, that's what I think. I think this idea � I think it's very important that Americans understand, you know, tax cuts are always popular, but about half of these tax cuts since 2001 have gone to people in my income group, the top 1 percent. I've gotten four tax cuts.

They're responsible for this big structural deficit, and they're not going away, the deficits aren't. Now, what Americans need to understand is that that means every single day of the year, our government goes into the market and borrows money from other countries to finance Iraq, Afghanistan, Katrina and our tax cuts. We have never done this before. Never in the history of our republic have we ever financed a conflict, military conflict, by borrowing money from somewhere else.

CLINTON: They should continue to oppose it, and they should make it an issue in the 2006 election, and they should make it an issue in the 2008 election. And they should hope, to goodness, for the sake of our country, that the cows don't come home before we have time to rectify it.

I mean, sooner or later, just think what would happen if the Chinese � We're pressing the Chinese now, a country not nearly rich as America per capita, to keep loaning us money with low interest to cover my tax cut, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Katrina and at the same time to raise the value of their currency so their imports into our country will become more expensive, and our exports to them will become less expensive. And by the way, we don't want to let them buy any oil companies or anything like that.

So what if they just got tired of buying our debt? What if the Japanese got tired of doing it? Japan's economy is beginning to grow again. Suppose they decided they wanted to keep some of their money at home and invest it in Japan, because they're starting to grow?

We depend on Japan, China, the United Kingdom, Saudi Arabia and Korea primarily to basically loan us money every day of the year to cover my tax cut and these conflicts and Katrina. I don't think it makes any sense. I think it's wrong.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Is there anything coming out of this initiative here that you can apply directly to Katrina and the poverty we saw revealed there?

CLINTON: Oh, yes, we have raised quite a bit of money for Katrina here. And former President Bush and I, you know, we were asked to raise money. We already have $90 million to $100 million. And what we're trying to do is make sure that our money goes directly to the poorest people who have been dislodged by working with church groups and others. We're working on some mechanisms now to do that, and we'll have some announcements in the next week or so.

But I think there will be a lot of money coming forward from the federal government. A lot of it will be necessary, you know, to build the infrastructure, rebuild the fabric of life and not simply in New Orleans but along the Gulf Coast.

CLINTON: Yes; you know, keep in mind, Mississippi was devastated. Everything from a mile in Mississippi was blown down, and Alabama, but we've got to do that.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Excuse me; the problems of race that were tied to poverty here, and I know you don't think there's any conscious racism at play in the response, but we saw one more time blacks and whites looked at this event through very different eyes. What can President Bush do about that, and looking back, do you think there was anything more you could have done as president?

CLINTON: Well, I think we did a good job of that. For example, we had the lowest African-American unemployment, the lowest African-American poverty rate ever recorded. We had the highest homeownership, highest business ownership, and we moved 100 times as many people out of poverty in eight years as had been moved out in the previous 12 years.

This is a matter of public policy, and whether it's race-based or not, if you give your tax cuts to the rich and hope everything works out all right, and poverty goes up, and it disproportionately affects black and brown people, that's a consequence of the action made. That's what they did in the '80s; that's what they've done in this decade.

Credibility can be judged from what someone wrote on the chat board. MT wrote that she will join the civilian corp in Iraq. Obviously, she was not credible in that comment. Now there is commentary that it doesn't matter, or that she didn't lie. Gawd, it is so much like this administration it's laughable, but somehow it makes me feel like crying instead of laughing. You say it won't matter in 100 years. Well, it might. The collective lies that got us into this war may matter to the relatives still alive of those killed in Iraq after 100 years. So in a very small but important way it does matter. It is symbolic of the web of lies bringing this whole country down.

By the way the civilian corps would include aid workers, truck drivers, engineers, etc. This was most certainly not a rhetorical question, yet another lie on the part of one of the posters worried about manners.

Wow, if my in-laws (in their 80s) knew that they were looked upon like that, I'd get a black eye (and deserve it) Incidentally, they could do it, too. They travel abroad, work out, all that stuff.

Maybe we should get a little sampling of how many fossilized 70YOs there are out there. I'm embarrassed for you.

It also seems to me that anyone who could endure the worst imaginable torture for 5 years must be made of something.

fact checking, research.....get the idea yet? Again, rumors started by a person who won't even identify themself is not fact the last time I checked.

Oh, and by the way, why is it okay for this person to stay anonymous and not okay for the source of the infamous tape you like to talk about so much?

He has lied to Americans and to the world so many times that if he actually made a mistake and told the TRUTH, nobody would be able to recognize it.

LOL at *pro-terrorist.* Is that the *talking point* word of the day that you studied at the table while drinking your daily dose of Kool-Aid? I'm not pro terrorist by any stretch of the imagination. I'm also not gullible. As far as bizarre, I think people who can't think for themselves, see the forest from the trees and continue to defend a known manipulative, deceitful liar until the end, regardless of facts to the contrary, are beyond bizarre.

And as far as J. C. Penney bills, check the date below. As I said, this is nothing new. I doubt you need to worry about your credit card bills, though. Bush only attacks those who disagree with him or catch him in lies. Ask Valerie Plame.

PROVIDENCE, R.I. -- Walter Soehnge is a retired Texas schoolteacher who traveled north with his wife, Deana, saw summer change to fall in Rhode Island and decided this was a place to stay for a while.

So the Soehnges live in Scituate now and Walter sometimes has breakfast at the Gentleman Farmer in Scituate Village, where he has passed the test and become a regular despite an accent that is definitely not local.

And it was there, at his usual table last week, that he told me that he was madder than a panther with kerosene on his tail.

He says things like that. Texas does leave its mark on a man.

What got him so upset might seem trivial to some people who have learned to accept small infringements on their freedom as just part of the way things are in this age of terror-fed paranoia. It's that everything changed after 9/11 thing.

But not Walter.

We're a product of the '60s, he said. We believe government should be way away from us in that regard.

He was referring to the recent decision by him and his wife to be responsible, to do the kind of thing that just about anyone would say makes good, solid financial sense.

They paid down some debt. The balance on their JCPenney Platinum MasterCard had gotten to an unhealthy level. So they sent in a large payment, a check for $6,522.

And an alarm went off. A red flag went up. The Soehnges' behavior was found questionable.

And all they did was pay down their debt. They didn't call a suspected terrorist on their cell phone. They didn't try to sneak a machine gun through customs.

They just paid a hefty chunk of their credit card balance. And they learned how frighteningly wide the net of suspicion has been cast.

After sending in the check, they checked online to see if their account had been duly credited. They learned that the check had arrived, but the amount available for credit on their account hadn't changed.

So Deana Soehnge called the credit-card company. Then Walter called.

When you mess with my money, I want to know why, he said.

They both learned the same astounding piece of information about the little things that can set the threat sensors to beeping and blinking.

They were told, as they moved up the managerial ladder at the call center, that the amount they had sent in was much larger than their normal monthly payment. And if the increase hits a certain percentage higher than that normal payment, Homeland Security has to be notified. And the money doesn't move until the threat alert is lifted.

Walter called television stations, the American Civil Liberties Union and me. And he went on the Internet to see what he could learn. He learned about changes in something called the Bank Privacy Act.

The more I'm on, the scarier it gets, he said. It's scary how easily someone in Homeland Security can get permission to spy.

Eventually, his and his wife's money was freed up. The Soehnges were apparently found not to be promoting global terrorism under the guise of paying a credit-card bill. They never did learn how a large credit card payment can pose a security threat.

But the experience has been a reminder that a small piece of privacy has been surrendered. Walter Soehnge, who says he holds solid, middle-of-the-road American beliefs, worries about rights being lost.

If it can happen to me, it can happen to others, he said.

(Bob Kerr is a columnist for The Providence Journal. E-mail bkerr@projo.com.)

(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, www.shns.com.)