Here is the transcript from This Week:
STEPHANOPOULOS: OK. Let's turn, then, to the president's agenda. In his State of the Union address Wednesday, of course the focus is going to be Iraq and Social Security reform.
And a lot of Democrats are wondering where you stand on Social Security reform. You've supported President Bush on his tax cuts. Let me ask you about these Social Security reform proposals, and there are three answers that could be: yes and no (ph).
Number one, would you support diverting the payroll tax into individual accounts?
BAYH: No, I would not, George.
And, look, the president is probably going to talk a lot about ownership and individual choice. I think those are great concepts, and I can support those -- but in addition to the current Social Security system, not as a replacement for it.
Look, you may own your home; a lot of Americans do. I bet you have insurance. Ownership and insurance have to go hand in hand.
Social Security is the insurance. Senior citizens in our country can always rely on it to make sure they're not desperately poor in their old age.
Should we have ownership and choice in addition to that? Yes, we should. But we should never do anything to undermine that insurance. That is one of the bedrock principles of our country.
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Was this enough to get the Senator out of the Faction? Josh's remarks
There was some further discussion of Social Security between the two men. One point Bayh raised was the possibility of a form of 'means testing' at the very high-end of the income scale, though it was framed around the question of whether benefits are indexed to wages or inflation. In any case, the whole exchange pointed clearly to the fact that Bayh just handed in his membership card in the Fainthearted Faction.
See the new updated Faction list here.
-- Josh Marshall
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