Fox's Shannon Bream asked Chris Christie yesterday how he plans to sell Social Security cuts to voters.
"Well, you sell it to people because in 2034, Shannon, if nothing is done, then there will be an automatic, by law, 24% cut in Social Security benefits. So I want every Social Security recipient out there right now, who intends to still be receiving those benefits going forward, to see what a 24% cut in their benefits would mean. We need to look at all the different options to try to fix Social Security."
BUT BUT BUT.....
"We do not need to look at raising taxes. We have plenty of taxes right now in this country. But we need to look at things like do the extraordinarily wealthy need to collect Social Security? Do we really need to have Warren Buffett and Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk collecting Social Security, and others that are very, very wealthy?
Of course. Republicans would rather cut off their right arm than raise taxes on on their wealthiest donors! But a few points, Chris.
Exactly how many billionaires are collecting Social Security, and how much are they actually collecting? Because the payouts are capped, and this is just a right-wing red herring.
Also, while this probably doesn't apply to billionaires (because their wives can afford very good lawyers), your garden-variety millionaires have been known to dump the naive first wife for a younger trophy wife -- and if she doesn't negotiate a good settlement for herself, she is going to need that Social Security she'll claim on her ex's earnings.
And also, when you look at the age of retirement, you do not want to change that for people who are now in the 50s or 60s," Christie went on.
"That would be unfair. They would not have time to plan. But I say this. I have a son who will be 30 years old this fall. If we change the Social Security age for somebody like him and he cannot figure out how to plan for that over the course of the next 35 years, he has got bigger problems than worrying about what his Social Security benefits are going to be.
It's unlikely the son of a former lobbyist and a Wall Street banker isn't going to be living in a cardboard box on the street. Because he's freakin' privileged.
But he ain't typical, you bloviating liar.
