I just returned from a town hall meeting with my congressman, Rodney Frelinghuysen (R-11). Here's a report on the fight to save social security from the trenches of the Garden State. (More below the fold)
Rodney Frelinghuysen is holding town hall meetings in his district to talk about social security. For those who are not familiar with it, the 11th district of NJ is pretty solidly Republican. The core of the district is Morris County, which aside from a few towns with Democratic mayors and councilmen is dominated by the GOP. It's an affluent, mostly suburban/exurban county with lots of corporate and Wall St. types who work in NYC or in the various suburban office parks that are scattered across northern and central NJ. Bush beat Kerry 58%-42% here.
Morris County has been the core of his district since he was first elected in 1996 (the 2000 redistricting didn't change the boundaries of his district too much). He comes from an old NJ political family, served in the legislature, and is what passes for a moderate Republican these days, meaning he's pro-choice, not virulently anti-gay, and not horrible on the environment, but still voted for Bush's tax cuts, Iraq, etc.
Personal note: I called his office ask to him not to vote to authorize the Iraq war back in 2002, and while he went ahead and voted for it, he was at least nice enough to send a signed letter explaining why (WMDs, threat, intelligence, blah blah) and thanking me for calling. Anyway...
The hall was packed. It was not a very big room and people were spilling out into the halls and an adjoining room where they listened. I'd say there were close to 200 people there. Almost all white (it's a very melanin deprived district) and mostly 40 to 70 somethings, although there were some younger people (like me) and a few families with kids there.
Rodney had set up several charts behind him: one showing SS crossing into deficit in 2018, another with a pie chart showing how SS benefits are paid out, and another showing the number of workers per retiree over the history of the program. He also provided handouts of several editorials form local papers.
He started off by talking about how proud he was of American soldiers in Iraq, of the need to support them, etc. Once he'd flogged the "nation at war" meme for about 10 minutes he segued into social security:
- He shied away from using the word crisis and only referred to the situation as a problem.
- He said he was a supporter of the AARP and obliquely criticized the smears against AARP.
- He reminded the audience that Bush hadn't actually presented a plan yet, so there was nothing yet on the table for him to take a definitive position on. (Hedging his bets on this one.)
- He explicitly stated that he had not taken a position for or against private/personal accounts or any other proposals that have been floating around. (Hedging again.)
- His purpose at the meeting was to get ideas and opinions from his constituents and see how they felt. (Reading between the lines I think he meant that he's testing the waters to see if it's safe for him to back Bush or not.)
Then he opened up the floor to questions, which lasted for about an hour. Probably about 20 or 25 people spoke. There was only one person who expressed strong support for creating personal/private accounts, and 2 or 3 "Maybe" types. The rest were overwhelmingly and vocally hostile. People raised all the criticisms that we've read on Kos, Atrios, TPM, Thereisnocrisis, etc:
- What about the risk factor of private investments?
- Would the government pick up the tab and pay for guaranteed benefits if your account lost money?
- What about the other aspects of Social Security (disability and survivor's benefits?)
- How is borrowing $2 or $3 trillion to transition to this system going to help us in the long run?
- Why should we believe assurances from the same people who lied to us about Iraq, Medicare, etc.? Again and again people kept saying that the Bushies have a major credibility problem.
- Why the rush to "reform" social security when Medicare and the budget deficit both seem to be bigger problems that will both come to a head much sooner than social security?
- Why is Bush only pushing private accounts instead of other options like raising the payroll tax cap, increasing the retirement age, and the like?
And of course, the doubters' criticisms drew lots of applause. (I didn't speak, but made sure to applaud as loud as I could so I could add to the volume.)
Frelinghuysen said he didn't want to raise payroll taxes or the $90K cap because of the effect on the economy. Several audience members responded that adding $2 trillion to the national debt might be even more damaging to the economy. He said he didn't want to borrow either. Nor did he want to cut benefits. He also fell all over himself to say that they would move slowly and not do anything rash. So essentially, he didn't take any strong stands and seemed to be trying hard not to say anything too incendiary.
It's hard to say since I was way in the back, but I think by the end he was a little uncomfortable. I think he may have been surprised at the outpouring of hostility to Bush's plan, especially given that he was in a Republican area of a safe Republican district. He sounded a little defensive at times and made it a point to say that he wanted to protect social security (which was his biggest applause line).
A side note: several people brought up the ballooning costs of the Medicare drug bill. Rodney didn't offer a defense; he just said, "That bill had bipartisan support." So that made it ok. This is why it is so important that Democrats like Joe Lieberman don't try to "compromise". As Josh Marshall and others have pointed out, if the GOP can get even one Democrat in the Senate to support them they will have bipartisan cover.
When we left the meeting, there were several people outside holding placards with slogans like "Save Social Security!" and "Hands Off My Social Security!"
We'll see what happens, but today I think the constituents sent our Republican congressman a pretty strong message. I think the hard work activist organizations and the blogosphere have been putting in are paying off, at least in this corner of the union. Rodney has to run for re-election next year. Bush doesn't. Let's hope Rodney sees the light.