Poll Finds Lack of Support for Arithmetic, Logic and Reason

Perhaps the questions used in this poll were crafted 'inartfully'. Otherwise this news is discouraging, to put it mildly.

Less than a quarter of Americans support making significant cuts to Social Security or Medicare to tackle the country's mounting deficit, according to a new Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll, illustrating the challenge facing lawmakers who want voter buy-in to alter entitlement programs.

In the poll, Americans across all age groups and ideologies said by large margins that it was "unacceptable'' to make significant cuts in entitlement programs in order to reduce the federal deficit. Even tea party supporters, by a nearly 2-to-1 margin, declared significant cuts to Social Security "unacceptable."

The mathematical formulae are unassailable, no more easily defeated than the law of gravity.

Someone told me this evening that when FDR initiated Social Security, full payments began at age 65 -- but the average life expectancy was actually a bit below that age.

This is why America needs an eloquent, conservative leader rather than an ideological sibling of Frances Fox Piven. Americans can understand and emphasize with a leader who speaks clearly and honestly about the problem. Failure to do so is simply criminal.


Hat tip: Memeorandum.