Kathleen Antrim
Friday, Feb 25, 2005

"We have leaders who love to create crises that don't exist. Social Security isn't a crisis," said Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev.

Story Continues Below

But experts like Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan are warning that Social Security is in trouble due to an impending influx of 77 million baby boomers that will drain the program. By 2018 Social Security will be paying out more than it will be bringing in, and by 2042 or 2052, depending on whose calculations are used, the system will be defunct.

This topic isn't new, but the Democrats' assessment has taken an abrupt turn.

In February 1998, then-President Bill Clinton told a Georgetown University audience that a poll indicated that young people felt they were more likely to see a UFO than they were to receive Social Security benefits. He spoke of the "looming fiscal crisis in Social Security," saying that Social Security would be bankrupt by 2030 if nothing were done.

Senator John Edwards, D-N.C., told the 106th Congress that the Social Security system was "riddled with holes. ... And if Congress does not start considering an overall Social Security reform, we will eventually have a hole too big to fix." In June 2002, Edwards warned again of the "Social Security crisis."

On March 30, 2001, Senator Robert Byrd, D-W.V., talked about the "long-term financing crisis [that] faces the Social Security program." Again, in May 2003, Byrd referred to "the impending Social Security funding crisis."

The above examples illustrate that Democrats have been railing about the Social Security crisis for years. But like a petulant child who must take a contrarian position against his parents, the Democratic leadership is now demanding that no crisis exists.

Who will suffer for such childish behavior? We will.

As Greenspan said in August 2004, the country will face "abrupt and painful" choices if Congress doesn't act quickly to deal with the Social Security problem. Last week, Greenspan told the Senate Banking Committee that, while he cautioned a gradual implementation, he endorsed Bush's overhaul of Social Security, including personal accounts, which Greenspan expected to be very popular.

However, Democratic leaders like Reid have dug in with a resounding "No!" – placing themselves on the wrong side of history once again.

As Reid said earlier this month: "President Bush should forget about privatizing Social Security. It will not happen." Yet in 1999, Reid said on "Fox News Sunday," "Most of us have no problem with taking a small amount of the Social Security proceeds and putting it into the private sector."

Such illogical reversals are telling, indeed. The Democrats' position appears to be that there's no Social Security crisis unless they say so, and that all ideas are bad unless they come from a Democrat. And if the Republicans agree with the Democrats on an idea, it then becomes a bad idea.

If the Democratic leadership continues to serve up such obstructionism and petty partisan politics, the American people may well reject their entire menu.

Kathleen Antrim is a weekly columnist for the San Francisco Examiner and author of the political thriller "Capital Offense." She appears every Monday at 3 p.m. (EST) on "Battle Line with Alan Nathan" (www.radioamerica.org), and on alternating Mondays at 8 a.m. (PST) on KSFO 560 AM, on 'The Lee Rogers and Melanie Morgan Show." For more information go to www.kathleenantrim.com.

Editor's note: