Trump Confirms He Lied About Protecting Social Security

During an appearance last Thursday at the GOP congressional retreat in Philadelphia, President Trump gave a ringing endorsement of Speaker of the House Paul Ryan and his budget plans, saying that the days of Ryan writing up his budgets and "nothing happening" were over.
"Speaker Paul Ryan very, very special and he is writing his heart out, right? And we're actually going to sign the stuff that you're writing. You're not wasting your time. He would write and he'd send it up and nothing would happen. But now it's gonna happen."
On a surface level, those comments from Trump aren't all that interesting. After all, he's just a Republican president endorsing the budget plan of a Republican Speaker of the House... right?
Wrong.
Trump didn't just endorse any old budget plan yesterday, he endorsed a budget plan written by PAUL RYAN - the guy who's called for voucherizing Medicare, privatizing Social Security and block-granting (aka massively cutting) Medicaid in EVERY SINGLE ONE of the budget plans he's come out with over the past 6 years.
Again - not totally surprising that a Republican president would endorse a budget plan like that. But remember, Trump just spent his entire presidential campaign talking about how he was the only guy who would protect the social safety net.
He even bragged about it on his campaign website, saying that he "wouldn't touch your entitlements".
So what happened?
Was Trump ever serious about protecting the social safety net or was all that talk about savings entitlements just another one of his scams?
Comments


Trump protect social security, medicare and medicaid? Yeah, right. The only people he is going to "serve" are those in the millionare and billionare classes.
Trump has no compunction to tell the truth. Everything the imposter president says is more often than not a lie.
This man is dangerous and he should not be president. A lot his been said about his narcissism, but not as much about his "grandiosity enhancing paranoia."
I think that this description by Dr. Sam Vaknin of how paranoid narcissists think and behave explains Trump. As Thom often states, "what do you think?"
Here is Dr. Vaknin:
Being the target of relentless, ubiquitous, and unjust persecution proves to the paranoid narcissist how important and feared he is. Being hounded by the mighty and the privileged validates his pivotal role in the scheme of things. Only vital, weighty, crucial, essential principals are thus bullied and intimidated, followed and harassed, stalked and intruded upon - goes his unconscious inner dialog. The narcissist consistently baits authority figures into punishing him and thus into upholding his delusional self-image as worthy of their attention. This provocative behaviour is called Projective Identification.
The paranoid delusions of the narcissist are always grandiose, "cosmic", or "historical". His pursuers are influential and formidable. They are after his unique possessions, out to exploit his expertise and special traits, or to force him to abstain and refrain from certain actions. The narcissist feels that he is at the centre of intrigues and conspiracies of colossal magnitudes.
Alternatively, the narcissist feels victimized by mediocre bureaucrats and intellectual dwarves who consistently fail to appreciate his outstanding - really, unparalleled - talents, skills, and accomplishments. Being haunted by his challenged inferiors substantiates the narcissist's comparative superiority. Driven by pathological envy, these pygmies collude to defraud him, badger him, deny him his due, denigrate, isolate, and ignore him.
The narcissist projects onto this second class of lesser persecutors his own deleterious emotions and transformed aggression: hatred, rage, and seething jealousy.
The narcissist's paranoid streak is likeliest to erupt when he lacks Narcissistic Supply. The regulation of his labile sense of self-worth is dependent upon external stimuli - adoration, adulation, affirmation, applause, notoriety, fame, infamy, and, in general, attention of any kind.
When such attention is deficient, the narcissist compensates by confabulating. He constructs ungrounded narratives in which he is the protagonist and uses them to force his human environment into complicity.
Put simply, he provokes people to pay attention to him by misbehaving or behaving oddly.

We're on the verge of a fascist dictatorship here and nobody has the will or the wherewithal to stop it. Where have we seen this before?

Need a fan? Just use the party's moral compass as a fan!

The Dems need to become the raise the cap/single payer party...and actually explain to all those Foxmerized citizens out there, just what that means. For example, Schumer needs to ignore Chuck Todd's questions and just talk over him, the same way all of the Republicans do...and get the damn message out. Go on all out offense!

First, go to JusticeDemocrats.com and sign up and or donate.
I am ten months away from Medicare, a system I have paid into (for my parents) since I started to work in 1970. Is there going to be a protest march hosted by AARP? Count me in!
My senators are democratic, and I know where they stand. Time to check out my representative--

Might as well impeach the lunatic now...no reason left not to.
With all of Trump's manufactured drama as a subterfuge, Ryan as usual has been flying under the radar. Now is the time for the Dems to pounce, screw everything else, and just focus on Ryan and his attack on the social safety net. This is the Fascist's achilles heel, and cuts to Social Security are sure to ignite even the foxmerized. I'm certain of this.
The Republicans will have no place to hide as Ryan pulls the trigger....and as Ryan bleeds, all elected Dems need to turn into sharks. We all need to speak out loud on this bipartisan issue. This is the overreach we've been waiting for... !

The Dems also need to fight the Supreme Court nomination...McConnell has set the precedent, it's OK to wait until the next presidential election... eight justices until 2020.

Actually, we're on the verge of a great educating of America. And the world is all too willing to help us find our way back to a sane path.

Much of that "social safety net" was already destroyed, with Democrats taking the lead since the 1990s. Bill Clinton ended actual welfare aid, and took the first steps to similarly "reform" Social Security. Social Security provides retirement, disability, and survivors' benefits, and Clinton targeted the disabled. In fact, by 2000, the disabled had become the fastest-growing group of homeless people. Obama was elected, and was able to get disability benefits restored, undoubtedly saving lives. However, Democrats in Congress kicked off 2015 with virtually ending food stamps to the elderly poor and the disabled (cut from roughly $115 per month, down to $10).
Did you know that what came to be called AFDC was actually first included in FDR's Social Security Act, later separated to focus on the specific needs of young families in poverty? Getting rid of that was a critically important step toward dismantling Social Security. Just as welfare was ended one part at a time (first ending General Assistance, then AFDC), we can assume that this is how Social Security will be ended.

I remember when people began saying that by the late 1980s.

It's not just another "Trump scam" that he has openly promised before and after his election that he would not touch the social safety nets. In recent decades, it has become a well practiced habit of candidates, from both sides of the aisle, to lie to the public about who they are and what they stand for, only to do a 180 once in office and follow a thoroughly corporate and Right-wing agenda. Do we really believe that Clinton would vacate her positions for more Leftist/Bernie Sanders' positions on so many things once she took office? Or would it have been more likely that it would have been business as usual and she would default to her pro-corporate positions once the public had been sufficiently tricked into electing her to office? Have a look at Obama: Did he not run on so many things that he completely reversed out once he got elected? Washington no longer respects We, the People. We are just the cash cow from which they steal and loot to do the bidding of the corporations. We, the People are trying to run a democracy while Washington is absolutely running a fascist oligarchy. It won't be until We, the People get fed up enough, organize, and do whatever it takes to get corporate money and corporate shills out of our government that things even have a glimmer of hope of changing for the better. We, the People are lied to with impunity and this is something that has got to change but that change will never come from inside the Beltway. This country has to wake up, come together over common issues, step up, be vigilant, and insist that anyone who lies to us gets a swift and resounding sacking. I also think that among the changes that need to occur are: (1) No more SCOTUS appointments; going forward we need to have elected positions on the SCOTUS only, (2) Get rid of the Electoral College and return elections to We, the People, (3) An amendment which says that if Congress votes for anything against the wishes of We, the People, such as taking us to war, or voting to bomb innocent countries whose only crime is being rich in some resource or another, that there will be an override option open to We, the People, (4) That in the event a candidate lies his way into office, his presidency can be called to account and he can be summarily dismissed from office with the possibility of the opposition candidate/party taking his/her place, or that the VP will then assume that office. (5) Lobbyists, Citizens United, and all forms of money have to be removed from the political process with limits on campaign funding. We have to begin doing things to protect ourselves from this class of political liars. As long as we tolerate this, they are going to get away with it. WE have to hold them accountable because it is self evident that they are never going to hold themselves accountable; especially when there is so much money in play.

DHBranski: All of this dismantling of social safety nets is the bad news, but the good news is, if we can regain control of the government, we can reverse out all of this dismantling and go back to whatever worked in the best interests of the country as a whole. I view this corporate take over as temporary. We have a new generation of kids coming up who are not on board with all of the changes the fascist oligarchy have made; and the better news is that many of the lynchpin personalities (like the Koch brothers) are old and will not be around forever to maintain their stranglehold on everything. If the country is united behind a government that truly operates for the best interests of the people, all of this can be gotten rid of on a fast-track basis.
Rather than king, let's refer to it (not him, as he is not a reasonable human, but "it") as "the naked emperer." And let this be the final chapter of American fascism. There shall be no legitamizing this regime- Dems in power must call it what it is, and we must all fight for our social democracy with all our might. Or we shall lose our precious lifestyle while the whole world suffers. Zero tolerance for totalitarianism is the only solution. We must absolutely win the mid terms so we can impeach and be rid of it.

Any action against the President will take time and much hard work. Much of what the current comments are about- and which I agree with- go back to the election itself and the issue of whether it was fair or corrupt. Tom- I believe your audience could best serve their purpose and beliefs by contacting their reps, their local papers, and all of the national media & esp the Democratic Party to wake up & look at Kris Kobach who was on with Judy Woodruff last night - look into "interstate crosscheck" with an independent prosecutor and a team of investigators. When this happens, and if it is true that he purged the voter rolls in many states, then I think we may find a path forward. But so many scandals, the Kennedy assassination, the invasion of Iraq, etc have been covered up after the fact until someone digs into it. We all need to dig deep with Greg Palast.

With the firing of the Attorney General it might be important to remember that there is a difference between a Presidential Order and a law passed by the Congress.

Alan Dershowitz: Acting AG Made a Mistake on Trump Exec Order, It Was ‘Political Decision’
"On CNN tonight, Alan Dershowitz criticized acting Attorney General Sally Yates for instructing the DOJ not to defend President Trump‘s travel ban as long as she’s in the position."
Help needed.
Last Thursday Thom said that Medicaid and Medicare were going to be cut 41% while Social Security was being cut 8%. I am loooking for further information on this for a disiabled friend.
I've listened to Thom for years and know he doesn't just make things up. Does anyone know where this information came from or how I can get details about this?

Since the "president" has such a thick skin & seems to really care about being popular why don't we start bombaring his twitter with a hashtag (something clever to catch his attention). Then we use it to pressure him to get what the people actually want done! Imagine the power of the people actually affecting his actions...wouldn't that be great?

Mary asked,
"Help needed.
Last Thursday Thom said that Medicaid and Medicare were going to be cut 41% while Social Security was being cut 8%. I am looking for further information on this for a disabled friend.
I've listened to Thom for years and know he doesn't just make things up. Does anyone know where this information came from or how I can get details about this?"
Mary: Sometimes words are twisted and used to scare people. Your fear of your friends SS and Medicare being cut by 41% or even 8% being a great example. Take what you hear from lefty/socialists and righty/warhawks with a huge helping of salt. Both would not exist on the radio or television without making outlandish statements and using fear tactics to keep listener ship.
Best to turn on the Hallmark channel. You will learn more and come away with a positive attitude.

@ Mary # 18:
Be wary of the "alternative facts" of the Trump trolls on this forum, whose only role is for entertainment purposes.
I'm not sure which sources Thom used, but there is much written about the rollout of this latest proposal, made by Trump's own officials. Basically, they want to cut $10.5 trillion over 10 years from the federal budget, mostly out of the hide of Social Security, Medicaid, and Medicare. Their regressive ideas came straight out of one of the worst right-wing swamps of extreme partisan ideology and misinformation imaginable called the "Heritage Foundation."
Among many other reliable sources, it was reported on by "The Hill" and analysed by "Mother Jones," and it reveals a reduction in subsidies to Medicare of 41%, Social Security of 8%, and Medicaid of ?? (I don't have this percentage at the moment).
Here's a quick synopsis of a recent article by Dylan Matthews over at "Vox":
Another proposal by the Republican Study Committee seeks to drastically reduce spending on the health of citizens: Medicare -- $662 billion; Social Security -- $261 billion; Medicaid, CHIP and similar programs -- $1.6 trillion; food stamps, earned income tax credits, and other unnamed programs to help the underprivileged -- $2.2 trillion.
If Trump and Republicans get their way, Medicare will be privatized; benefits means-tested; premiums increased; both Medicare and Social Security eligibility ages raised and means-tested; COLA's shrunken.
Trump's picks for Secretary of Health and Human Services and for Office of Management and Budget -- Tom Price and Mick Mulvaney, respectively -- in their on-the-record history (and even at their confirmation hearings, albeit purposely vague), made no bones about their intentions to reverse almost a hundred years of progressive legislation that benefits everyday hard-working Americans.

The Heritage Foundation originally and then into Paul Ryan's proposed budget.

Mary: Remember the hysterical left and right I was speaking about? The post #21above is one of those.
Proposals, plans the other guy created, specific numbers, etc, are all hate radio B.S..
Breathe easy, don't totally accept anything you hear from either side. Use your logic. If your friend is now collecting $100/month in benefits, as much as the lefties want it to happen, your friend will not suddenly start collecting $59. Last week Thom was raving about a 50% cut so at least he is moving in the right direction. Give it a few months, you may actually get a raise.
Cuts to existing SS retiree payments will not happen and Thom Hartmann knows it. More choices for future retirees is most likely the way things will turn out. Let's not panic until the plans are presented.
For the next eight years many here will twist themselves into knots that no Boy Scout could undo. Try not to join them and you will be much more at peace with yourself.

Notice how "wise" old Trump trolls are long on superiority attitude, condescending "advice," fact-free opinions, lame insults, and easily debunked falsehoods, and short on verifiable sources to back up their anemic analyses. Trump's Republican apologists seem to have adopted his reckless disregard for truth, refusing to acknowledge the facts laid bare right in front of them. The Hallmark Channel is about as deep as they are.

Its time for a General Strike. Hit the corporatists where it matters. Or we can wait until they chip away at everything so the Billionaires can become Trillionaires. WAKE UP! YOUR DISABILITY IS GOING AND NOBODY IS GOING TO CARE IF YOU INHALE THE COAL DUST OF THE BROKEN COAL MINES YOU WANT SO BADLY.
Yes, it was a scam to get elected. It's shocking, to me, that anyone would continue to believe anything he says or has said in the past. He has no moral compass, no policies, & no agenda other than achieving or remaining in power, getting attention, & making a profit. I hope, in future, our educational system will train young humans to value compassion & recognize predatory cons, just like wolf moms train cubs to recognize & avoid hyenas. After watching his juvenile & sadistic behavior in the first presidential primary debate of 2016, I felt an enormous wave of sorrow; it felt like the end of civilization, of the age of enlightenment, of the democratic experiment. Everything since then has seemed an unfolding fullfilment of that dark premonition. We can only hope the huge resistance movement currently at play will continue & shepherd us into a more enligthened era. My fear, however, is that climate change -- & life on planet earth -- doesn't have time to wait.