by Tony Lee 1 Aug 2012, 12:30 AM PDT
On Tuesday, Darrell Issa (R-CA) suggested that despite the heroism of the “Greatest Generation,” they are responsible for spawning many of the programs that have caused many of today’s financial problems.
“The Greatest Generation created many of what the private sector would call Ponzi schemes,” Issa said at an Association of Government Accountants conference in San Diego, according to the Federal Times. “They created Social Security, they created Medicare on their watch, [they] created Medicaid.”Issa said all of these programs were created ”without resources or funding.”
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part2
D.S. Collins, Aug 2012
The USPS is now required to pre pay set aside benefits twenty five years into the future, something no other program is required to do. This pre-payment program is the fundamental cause of this crisis. Rep Darrell Issa in a blatant attempt to force the demise and privatization of the Postal Service.Prior introduced legislation to require the Postal service to have this cash in hand for benefits twenty five years into the future for current employees, Prior to this new statute, the USPS enjoyed a modest surplus. Issa is one of the most contemptuous right wing ideologues of our Congress.
"USPS spokespersons have been adamant in emphasizing that they are not requesting taxpayer funds from the federal government to make this year’s payment. Rather, t
hey say, the USPS is asking Congress to authorize access to an estimated $7 billion that they overpaid into the future retiree pension fund in previous years."
That's $7 BILLION in OVERPAYMENTS!
That's $7 BILLION in OVERPAYMENTS!
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July 30, 2012 RSS Feed Print
Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), chairman of the House Committee on Oversight, co-sponsored with Rep. Dennis Ross (R-Fla.) a bill in the works, but it has yet to be brought to the House floor.
"Chairman Issa has agreed to some modifications and continues to be willing to alter aspects of the legislation in order to strengthen the bill," the spokesman says. "This effort is intended to ensure that meaningful reforms not only win House approval, but are ultimately signed into law by the President."
But the post office's struggles could continue for months before anything is done.
"It's an election year, this is complex and it is not very sexy," DeHaven says. "Members of Congress are ignoring this because they are not permanently concerned about economics and finance, they are concerned about politics.
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part 4
By Rachel Rose Hartman, Yahoo! News
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) also pointed a finger at House Republicans Wednesday. "To manufacture yet another crisis, the Republican leadership refused to allow consideration of postal reform legislation that passed the Senate with a strong bipartisan majority months ago and that would have easily prevented a default," Pelosi said in a statement. "Instead, Republicans have shown no interest in offering meaningful solutions-- including a path to address the Postal Service's unique requirement to prepay retiree health benefits."
The Republican bill allows for more drastic and immediate cuts, such as switching to five day delivery, cluster box instead of door-to-door delivery, more liberal branch closings and the renegotiation of labor contracts.
"And while Democratic Sen. Claire McCaskill worked across the aisle to protect Missouri's rural post offices, [Rep. Todd] Akin, [former state treasurer Sarah] Steelman and [businessman John] Brunner all said they would prefer to let the U.S. Postal Service go bankrupt and privatize its services instead,"
