Smears, Sadism and Social Security
Why Elon Musk wants to make seniors suffer
Cruelty is an integral part of fascism - both dogma and practice. We see it here on NT now, with members playing "can you top this" in their willingness to inflict suffering.
There are links in the seed.
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
Now the Social Security Administration, following orders from Elon Musk's DOGE, appears set to subject disabled Americans to immense hardship. And everything we know indicates that this act of cruelty is mainly motivated by a combination of ego and spite.
The story so far: On March 12 the Washington Post reported that the Social Security Administration was considering ending phone service for Americans filing retirement or disability claims. The SSA quickly backed off that idea — sort of. The day after the Post report, however, the agency circulated an internal memo — acquired by the newsletter Popular Information — laying out a plan that would be almost equally destructive.
Under this plan, beneficiaries would still be able to call the SSA. But they would have to verify their identity either over the internet or through in-person visits to field offices.
Bear in mind that we're talking about older and/or disabled Americans, many of whom are unable to access the internet and physically unable to visit SSA offices — which would in any case be overwhelmed by the increased traffic, given that the agency is already facing large staffing cuts. So this would be a move of almost cartoonish cruelty, and a nightmare for millions of Americans.
Why do this? The alleged justification is to combat fraud. But ProPublica has acquired audio of a closed meeting held with Leland Dudek, the Social Security Administration's acting administrator, in which he acknowledged that fraudulent benefit claims are not, in fact, a serious problem.
So what the Musk is going on here? This plan would save some money, not by eliminating fraud, but by effectively cutting off aid to Americans who are legally entitled to that aid, and specifically those who need it most. But I don't think the savings are the point.
My guess, instead, is that it's an ego thing, that Social Security has become to Musk what Canada has become to Donald Trump. Both men at one point said something stupid, something that would have turned them into laughingstocks if there weren't so much fear in the air. But both men have been unable to let go, doubling down in what amounts to an attempt to redeem their initial foolishness.
In case you've forgotten, back in December, when Justin Trudeau visited Mar-a-Lago, Trump taunted him by suggesting that Canada become a U.S. state, calling him "Governor Trudeau." Some people suggested that it was meant as a joke, but it would be more accurate to call it a dominance display.
But once Trump realized how ridiculous the performance made him look, he refused to let go. Instead, annexing Canada seems to have become a fundamental plank of Trump's foreign policy, with his demands getting ever more insistent the more obvious it becomes that Canadians loathe the idea.
Musk's big blooper was his claim that millions of dead people are receiving Social Security checks. This claim probably reflected the failure of young Musk staffers — what Dudek called the "DOGE kids" — to understand how the SSA's databases work, combined with a complete lack of common sense. I mean, if there really were huge numbers of dead people receiving Social Security payments, don't you think someone else would have noticed?
In a normal political environment, getting something that big that wrong would have destroyed Musk's credibility and led to his permanent exile from any role in setting policy. But this is America in 2025, so Trump amplified the already-refuted claim when addressing Congress, and Musk seems more powerful than ever.
Furthermore, Musk refuses to give up his Social Security smears, making the completely implausible claim that fraudulent use of Social Security numbers accounts for 10 percent of federal spending. And I'd argue that that the plan to effectively cut off many disabled Americans is best seen as part of a desperate effort to find or pretend to find Social Security fraud, retroactively justifying Musk's big mistake.
Still, does the plan have to be this cruel to the most vulnerable Americans? As I see it, the cruelty is a feature, not a bug.
After all, gratuitous, seemingly gleeful cruelty has been a hallmark of DOGE's operations. Even if you think DOGE's mass layoffs — some quickly reversed when it turned out that critical workers were fired — make sense, think of the way they are being carried out. In general, workers are being fired with no warning, no chance to make plans for the future, and often face insulting (and false) claims that they were poor performers.
It's hard to escape the sense that DOGE staffers are actually enjoying this. And why not? We're mostly talking about poorly socialized young men suddenly given the power to ruin other people's lives, taking their cues from a leader who has declared that "the fundamental weakness of Western society is empathy." So why should we be surprised that the DOGE kids' rampage through the government looks more and more like a remake of Lord of the Flies?
Back to Social Security: There will, I expect and hope, be a huge backlash if the plan to effectively cut off millions from benefits goes through. But don't count on Musk — or Trump — to change course. These are men with fragile egos, who never, ever admit being wrong.
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I have a hard time accepting that people can truly believe that empathy is wrong. That seems downright asocial... evil. I can accept that Elon Musk is evil - we see his behavior. I do not want to believe that our NT members are of the same nature... but some of us are working hard to prove just how asocial they can be.
The absence of empathy for others is a personality disorder...
... and if we apply that to MAGA...
Explain begrudging starving kids a bowl of gruel...
absence of empathy
You need to find a better source that Krugman.
He's too biased to be taken seriously.
Why do MAGA Hat Voodoo Economists never win the Nobel Prize?
Why are liberal financial experts failures and finance? Krugmans net worth is a rounding error to most financial experts.
Ortman is about 75 milliom
Kramer is about 150 million
Krugman's net worth is estimated at fifteen million dollars, which is not bad for an academic, without his own TV show!
Again, why do MAGA Economists NEVER win any Nobel Prizes?
Because they don't participate in the liberal circle jerk that is the Nobel commitee is my guess.
It's like wondering why Muslim fraternal organizations don't select Jewish men to be their man of the year.
More like why dropouts do not receive PHDs in Economics...
I see two possibilities here: either you actually believe you are competent to judge the Nobel committee (which is fucking hilarious), or you're just preening (which is fucking sad).
Ummmmmmmmmmmmm.............
Ya know.....if Musk wasn't born to a wealthy father he might have had to find some kind of social security or whatever is in South Africa. I believe he is on the autism spectrum
He never created a thing in his life. He's not a genius.
like the other half of President Trusk...
How much do the rich contribute to Social Security? Why should the rich be exempted from empathy? Why is Paul Krugman blowing smoke to divert attention away from his preferential treatment of the rich?
The disability scam dumped the problem onto the backs of working Americans to protect the rich from paying taxes for welfare. The rich cannot be expected to pay taxes to address these problems. Social Security had a big surplus that allowed the rich to avoid contributing to any solutions. Forcing Social Security to pay for the disability scam was a windfall for the rich.
The disability scam was a deliberate, malicious policy to tax the poor and protect the rich. And Paul Krugman loved that scam. Now Paul Krugman is voicing phony liberal outrage to defend and protect taxing the poor. Who is stupid enough to believe Paul Krugman is a hero?