The Social Security Misinfotainers

by Steve Young

President Bush took his Social Security message on the road this week and his puppy dog followed so close in step you'd have to be surprised he didn't trip on the pooch. More amazing is how anything with their nose so far up the president's ass ever gets the smell off.

I'm not speaking about Miss Beazley. I'm talking about that adorable little Talk Radio, who would never admit to taking talking points directly form the Prez or the GOP. That job belongs to the mongrel, Jeff Gannon of Talon (Bush's Good) News, who (apologies to Robert Greenwald) makes Fox News look like The National Review. Not really, but the analogy is too cute to pass up.

I find it amazing how the boys (and Ms Ingram) instantly become authorities on issues they never encountered or studied in real life. Kind of like how they became military experts able to trash decorated veterans like Kerry, McGovern and Cleland, who actually served our country in battle. Must have come by way of Osmosis 101 during their undergraduate days at dear ole Bull U. Certainly the intricacies of Social Security and the machinations necessary to determine the twenty-to-forty years down the road possibilities couldn't have been taken directly from Republican Party (read: Heritage Foundation).

Reminds me how Hannity and I spent about an hour on his show debating employment numbers. I got mine from the Department of Labor figures normally used to gauge job growth (or, heh-heh, loss). Sean read his from the "Household Survey," which had become the Republican's newest, more fashionable statistic base or what Franken has tagged "The eBay Job Force." They include the people who have taken to "licking envelopes at their dining room table." The Republicans call it "entrepreneurship." Those doing it might call it the "that's the last time I answer a freakin' ad that takes my life savings and delivers this piece of shit fraud where I earn a dollar-fifty an hour and actually end up losing money." That's right. These job figures include people who literally lose money for a living. But Sean was quite insistent that his numbers were more precise an indicator of Bush's policies than the actual 2,479 new jobs created per month under W. No wonder. In an economy that calls for some 150,000 new jobs per month to keep up with population growth, Bush's record shows he only fell 95 percent short of breaking even. Applause, applause.

In what might be conservative talk radio's most historic moments, and Hannity's most contrite, he decreed that "we were both right." That's almost like Mark Levin admitting he's wrong, which of, course, being that Hell has not dipped under 32 degrees, probably never happened. I should have retired my pundit boots right then and there. I could expect no more if I lived to see Rush Limbaugh give credit to a black quarterback, which would not take place unless the liberal media decided to place one in the Super Bowl. A black quarterback in the Super Bowl? Come on.

But I come here not to skewer the Lords of Loud. Well, I do, but I also want to warn those who wander into the Bullys' air space, not to listen to their lockstep administration social security talk-speak nor pay attention to the numbers they have been given to give to you. Check out the real experts. The one's who get paid to supply facts, not votes. Remember, this administration is full of the same people who told you there were enough WMD in Iraq to kill plenty of us and found out the only truth was that plenty of us have been killed. Plenty more of innocent civilian them too. And if we want to agree that President Bush didn't lie about that and he just had received bad information, fine. But let's not let misinformation kill our economy any more than it has already.

TALK RADIO P.S. You might want to listen to Air America's Al Franken Monday morning direct from L.A.'s Magic Castle. Could be interesting.