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Cato Daily Dispatch for March 2, 2004

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Huge Struggles Facing Medicare and Social Security
Do We Really Have a 'Right to Remain Silent'?
U.S. Condemns Suicide Attacks in Iraq

Huge Struggles Facing Medicare and Social Security

"When Alan Greenspan urged Congress last week to cut future benefits in Social Security and Medicare, sending elected officials to the barricades, he was if anything understating the magnitude of the problems ahead," according to The New York Times. "Today's budget deficits are measured in the hundreds of billions, but the looming shortfalls for the two retirement programs are projected to be in the tens of trillions of dollars."

In "War between the Generations: Federal Spending on the Elderly Set to Explode," Cato Director of Fiscal Policy Chris Edwards and former researcher Tad DeHaven detail the federal government's ongoing efforts to make young America pay for graying America. The solution they suggest: "Social Security and Medicare should be turned into savings-based systems with payroll contributions funding personal health care and retirement accounts. Taxes on saving should be sharply reduced so that Americans can put more money aside for their own future."

Michael Tanner, director of Cato's Project on Social Security Choice, argues that the best way to return solvency to Social Security is to give workers the option of investing half of their FICA payroll taxes into individual accounts. In "The 6.2 Percent Solution: A Plan for Reforming Social Security," Tanner writes: "The American people can handle an open and honest debate about Social Security reform," Tanner says. "Individual accounts will create a better, fairer, and more secure retirement system."

Do We Really Have a 'Right to Remain Silent'?

"When Larry 'Dudley' Hiibel saw the flashing lights of a sheriff's cruiser approaching him near Winnemucca, Nev. on May 21, 2000, he never imagined the ensuing confrontation would lead to a constitutional dispute in front of the U.S. Supreme Court," The Associated Press reports. "But that's where Hiibel will be March 22 as a result of his arrest for failing to identify himself to a sheriff's deputy almost four years ago."

According to the friend-of-the-court brief filed by the Cato Institute, the case offers the Court the "opportunity to declare a clear, simple and just rule of law: An American citizen cannot lose his liberty for simply declining to speak with a police officer."

"This case raises profound questions regarding the power of government and the constitutional rights of the citizenry," says Timothy Lynch, director of Cato's Project on Criminal Justice, who co-wrote the amicus brief with attorney Christine Klein. "Hiibel, like most Americans, believed that he had a right to decline to answer questions posed by police officers. But when Hiibel invoked his 'right to remain silent' he was arrested and taken to jail.

"Everyone knows that the Constitution protects the right of individuals to speak," he adds. "With the Hiibel case, the Supreme Court will soon decide whether the government can criminalize citizen silence."

U.S. Condemns Suicide Attacks in Iraq

"The United States condemned attacks in Iraq that killed more than 140 Shi'ites on Tuesday as a desperate tactic but said the planned hand-over of sovereignty to Iraqis on June 30 would sap support for the deadly insurgency," Reuters reports. "In the bloodiest day since the United States toppled Saddam Hussein last year, near-simultaneous bombings killed at least 143 Shi'ites as they took part in annual rituals that were banned under the former Sunni leader."

In "U.S. Options in Iraq: the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly," Director of Defense Policy Studies Charles Peņa writes: "By now, it should be apparent to everyone that Iraq was not a cakewalk. Maybe the fight against the Iraqi military on the open battlefield was a cakewalk, but everything since President Bush declared an end to major combat operations on May 1 ... has been anything but."

He goes on to say: "The United States needs to give up on the Woodrow Wilson fantasy of creating a democracy in Iraq. Instead, the United States must be realistic, make the best of an admittedly bad situation, and do what's in the best interest of U.S. national security: hand the reigns of government over to the Iraqis and fashion an expeditious military exit. This would not be "cutting and running," but simply cutting U.S. losses before Iraq becomes a sinkhole that swallows billions more of taxpayer dollars and all too many American lives. The hard truth is that the U.S. government's first responsibility is to Americans, not to the people of Iraq."

Wyatt Dubois, editor, wdubois@cato.org