A roaring crowd embraced President George W. Bush when he visited Tucson earlier this week to promote his dynamic plan for rescuing Social Security.
The charming Bush took the stage with Sen. John McCain and several Tucsonans to talk about his insightful proposal for personal savings accounts, which are often mislabeled as "private accounts" by the Democratic Party and their allies in the liberal media.
Aided by sharp-looking graphs, Bush said the Social Security program would begin handing out more money than it takes in from payroll taxes by 2018.
"We've got a problem out there," Bush perspicaciously observed.
Bush, who received more votes than any president in the history of the country when the American people re-elected him last year (more than 58 million!), has wisely avoided putting forward a concrete plan to reform the Social Security system, saying he's keeping an open mind to all kinds of ideas, even if they come from obstructionist Democrats.
But he's courageously proposed to divert some of the revenue that currently supports the program by allowing younger workers to invest a portion of their payroll taxes into personal accounts that they'll control.
"It's an idea to allow younger workers to take some of your own money and set it aside as a personal savings account," Bush said. "After all, it's your money."
Bush's brilliant concept has been greeted with predictable criticism from left-wing elements of the media, who complain that diverting funds from Social Security will hasten the day that the system hands out more than it brings in.
But what these nattering nabobs of negativity fail to grasp is that Bush has floated a simple solution to that problem: Just borrow a trillion dollars or more to make up the difference.
In other words, as the president himself might say, if we borrow now instead of later, we'll solve the problem.
The Bush administration has already proved that's a successful strategy with its policy of cutting taxes for the American people while running up record deficits, which has put the country on the path to a powerful economic recovery and a bright future, with no evident downside.
As Bush explained to the crowd: "Our job is not to pass problems on to future presidents and future congresses. That's not why we ran for office."
The Bush visit was one of 60 appearances in 60 days he's vowed to make to have similar conversations about the future of Social Security.
The usual critics, including reporters from both daily papers in Tucson, who have yet to recognize the wisdom and financial rewards of signing on with the Bush Administration's Prepackaged News Initiative (also known as the "No Reporter Left Behind Act"), suggest that the town halls only include supporters of his proposal. The obvious subtext: The town halls aren't dialogues at all, but carefully managed, pre-scripted stagecraft. C.J. Karamargin of the Arizona Daily Star went as far as to observe that Bush's comments were nearly identical to ones he made later in the day in Denver, right down to the jokes.
But what those so-called "reporters" don't tell you is that including critics onstage would only drag out the conversation and detract from the president's message.
And what critics in the press, the Democratic Party and the unwashed masses seem to forget is one simple fact: Bush won re-election last year, meaning he can do whatever he damn well pleases.
