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J. Scott Applewhite/Associated PressPresident Bush leaving the White House today with his daughter Barbara. February 3, 2005Bush Takes Social Security Plan on the RoadBy REUTERS Filed at 10:47 a.m. ETWASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Bush on Thursday took his campaign to overhaul the Social Security retirement system to the American heartland where he hopes to enlist the public to help him bring skeptical members of Congress to his side.Bush laid out some specifics in his State of the Union address on Wednesday to change the 70-year-old retirement system, including adding private accounts to the program, and raised the incendiary topic of possible limits on future retirement benefits.After speaking at the National Prayer Breakfast, a traditional event the day after the State of the Union address, Bush left for Fargo, North Dakota, in the first stop on a two-day tour to promote his Social Security plans.The powerful lobbying group for seniors, the AARP, immediately issued a statement in which it stressed Social Security should not be dismantled and that solutions ``shouldn't be worse than the problem.''``Social Security is the cornerstone of retirement security. For many, it is all that stands between years of dignity and poverty,'' said AARP chief executive officer, William Novelli.Democrats, and many of Bush's own Republican Party, disagree with his assessment that Social Security was ``headed toward bankruptcy.''In his address, Bush listed options for reining in the cost of the popular program, including limiting benefits for wealthy retirees, raising the retirement age or indexing benefits to prices rather than wages, which would slow their growth.After putting Social Security at the center of the speech outlining his second-term agenda, Bush will pitch the plan in states that supported him for president last year and where he believes he might have an opening to get support from members of Congress. CAMPAIGN-STYLE TOURFollowing a visit to Fargo, Bush is set to go to Montana, Nebraska, Arkansas and Florida in a campaign-style tour that features a series of town-hall forums.Guests at these meetings have been hand-picked by the White House to discuss Social Security and some of them will be allowed to ask Bush questions.Highlighting how controversial the Social Security issue is, some Democrats groaned and hissed during Bush's speech when he said the system would be bankrupt by 2042. Democrats have accused Bush of engaging in scare tactics to convince people the system is in crisis.Bush said any permanent solution must include his 10-year, $754 billion plan for private retirement accounts, a program Democrats oppose. To soothe the nerves of those at or near retirement he said he would leave current benefits alone for Americans 55 or older.But Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid said Bush's plan to allow workers to divert some of their payroll taxes toward private accounts was a high-stakes gamble.``The Bush plan isn't really Social Security reform,'' said Reid, a Nevada Democrat. ``It's more like Social Security roulette.''A payroll tax of 12.4 percent split evenly between workers and their employers funds the current Social Security system. Under Bush's plan, workers could shift 4 percentage points of that contribution toward a private account.North Dakota Democratic Sen. Kent Conrad, one of the lawmakers Bush is trying to lobby in his two-day tour, is expected to fly on Air Force One with the president to the senator's home state and appear with him at the first event.But Chris Thorne, Conrad's spokesman, described him as skeptical of many of Bush's plans and particularly concerned about the need for borrowing to cover the cost of making a transition to private accounts.Asked why Conrad agreed to appear with the president, Thorne attributed it to good manners more than anything else.``He just feels it would be impolite not to do this,'' Thorne said. Copyright 2005 Reuters Ltd. Home Privacy Policy Search Corrections RSS Help Back to Top
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