It is interesting to observe the utter silence of the Bush administration on Social Security these days. As opposed to Presidents Truman and Clinton who both went down fighting with their health care proposals, it seems more likely that this administration might be planning to drop their Social Security reform proposal and let future presidents address the issue.

This is a very big change from the tone that the administration took right after the second term began. If President Bush drops his Social Security proposal, I’ll be curious to see what kind of “feedback” effect, as the political scientists say, this will have on the next attempt to reform the program.

Will the impact be more like President Clinton’s health care proposal, where the failure resulted in a silence on the issue for a decade, or more like President Truman’s health care proposal where proponents of the plan regrouped and focused on a narrower and more incremental approach (Medicare).

Oscar Chamberlain - 8/17/2005

I think we will see strong attempts at more targeted reforms. The issue really can't die the way health care then. Too many people from too many stratas of life are touched by Social Security for that to happen.

Also, I tend to think that more targeted reforms would have a better chance of doing some good for younger Americans without totally scrambling the system. That would help it politically.