Jack Kingston: “put Social Security first. This is the battle cry of certain leading politicians, and I agree with that. But how can we…”

“put Social Security first. This is the battle cry of certain leading politicians, and I agree with that. But how can we say put Social Security first, and then go out and introduce a whole bunch of new spending programs? The way our budget is done, Social Security is really not a separate trust fund. Right now Social Security has an overpayment in it of about $100 billion. When we add that overpayment to the deficit, we come up with the sum of zero. So let us be honest. Social Security, if taken off budget, still leaves us with a deficit. It is very important for all of us, young and old, to realize that; that when we say the budget is balanced, all we are saying is Social Security is part of the general fund. If we are going to put Social Security first, we sure do not do that and then turn right around, as the President has done, and introduce $100 billion in new spending programs. Because that money comes right out of Social Security. I am sick and tired of Social Security being the political football and used to scare all the folks who are on it in the United States of America. We need to be honest about it. I believe we need to personalize Social Security, we need to have an open dialogue, and we need to acknowledge that, right now, the way the accounting is done it is being used to offset the deficit.”