Orszag strikes out as Social Security goes bankrupt

Before he came to Obama's Office of Management and Budget, Peter Orszag used to work for the Congressional Budget Office. While there, Orszag warned that Social Security would start running deficits in 2019 unless the system is reformed. Orszag was off by about 3,285 days. The New York Times is reporting that as of today, Social Security is officially producing red ink.

This year, the system will pay out more in benefits than it receives in payroll taxes, an important threshold it was not expected to cross until at least 2016, according to the Congressional Budget Office.

Stephen C. Goss, chief actuary of the Social Security Administration, said that while the Congressional projection would probably be borne out, the change would have no effect on benefits in 2010 and retirees would keep receiving their checks as usual.

With the Obama Administration having done nothing to help create jobs, somewhere near 20% of the country is estimated to be unemployed or underemployed. Those people are paying little to nothing to the Social Security Administration, which has rapidly accelerated its collapse. Turns out you actually need people to be productive in order to tax them. And with the economy already teetering on top of massive debt and a $1 trillion health care bill on the way, Social Security recipients will find there isn't very much money left to go around. The program could go bust any day at this point.

The same CBO that miscalculated Social Security's red ink by nine years also claimed the health care bill would reduce the deficit. Its former oracle, Orszag, now has the president's ear on all budget matters.

Obama puts his inside man Andy Stern on the deficit commission

Yesterday ObamaWatchNews reported that the deficit commission the president is planning is a total sham. As if we needed any more proof, now comes word that the president is considering appointing Andy Stern, SEIU president and his favorite crony, to the commission.

Stern is the last person qualified to help take down the country's debt. His entire mission has been to enact regulations that cost businesses and taxpayers billions of dollars. He has wholeheartedly supported every one of Obama's wasteful spending schemes, including health care reform and cap-and-trade. He is less of an advocate for working people than a left-wing activist demanding that the government do more. Meanwhile unions have cost state governments, which can't fire organized public employees, millions.

More likely, Obama is appointing Stern to his fraud of a commission as another kickback. Stern and the unions have been kicked around a lot lately. Congress has abandoned card check and the president is now supporting an excise tax on expensive health care plans, which would cost Big Labor millions. Looks like the president wanted to soothe Stern's nerves. And with Stern's close relationship to the president, Obama can now control the "independent" commission from the inside.

Obama appoints powerless debt commission so he doesn't have to do anything

Whenever Obama doesn't want to deal with a problem, he signs an executive order appointing a commission to "examine" it. Last week he created a commission to tackle the $14.3 trillion national debt racked up by his massive spending spree. The commission will spend eight months talking about the debt before making recommendations. The president then may or may not hand these recommendations to Congress who then may or may not do something.

When Obama wanted to socialize the health care sector or create a cap-and-tax energy system, he didn't create a useless commission. He told Congress to ram legislation through immediately. If Obama actually cared about reducing his debt, he could start by cutting up his proposed budget of more than $3 trillion. But instead he'll create a commission, allowing him to ignore the issue for another year.

Tax and spend Obama breaks yet another campaign promise

Back during the presidential campaign, Barack Obama promised that he would reduce the deficit to 3% of GDP by the end of his first term in office. It was a sham, of course. There's no way Obama, drunk on spending taxpayer money, would follow through on something like that.

Now it's official. Over the weekend, Obama announced his new $3.8 billion budget, which ramps up spending on all kinds of useless government programs. Meanwhile his Office of Management and Budget announced that the deficit would be reduced to a minimum 3.6%...by 2020. Right now, deficit spending is at its highest point since World War II, thanks to Obama.