And the NY Times is endorsing the Democratic presidential candidate. Dur. But Jason still does a fine job of deconstructing the monkey-logic behind the decision:

When the nation fell into recession, the president remained fixated not on generating jobs but rather on fighting the right wing's war against taxing the wealthy ... As a result, money that could have been used to strengthen Social Security evaporated

Nice try, bozos. But the fact is that general fund money CANNOT be used to "strengthen Social Security." It is simply impossible as a matter of logic and structure to do so. The ONLY ways Social Security can be strengthened now is via some form of privatization, an increase in Social Security taxes in years going forward (which would only be relevant for the fiscal year in which the money is collected) or a reduction in promised benefits.

There is no way to use current revenues to strengthen Social Security against a cash-flow problem in future years unless you are willing to privatize. What else are you going to do? Buy Treasuries, dumbass? It's impossible. (Some idiot always writes in and says "put it in a bank." To be insured by what body? And to be invested in what? Congratulations, loser, you just privatized Social Security!)

I'll be so very glad when this is all over. Yeah, we talk about it too much as well, but we were blogging long before the election came along. We'll have other things to talk about. Unfortunately I'm not sure what some of the over-the-top political bloggers are gonna do once it's all over.