I don't diary much, so apologies if my quick look through the diaries missed an entry similar to this one.
I stumbled across a Social Security blog entry over at Powerline that lays out a powerful talking point that the GOP is using to effect. And that is that the Treasury Bonds in the Social Security Trust Fund are just IOU's that "future generations will pay - will pay for either in higher taxes or reduced benefits or cuts to other critical government programs," in President Bush's words. A progressive friend and local politician earlier this evening had essentially bought this, believing this means that taxpayers are paying either way. It took some explaining to convince him that they're not the same taxpayers.
We need to ensure that obfuscation gets corrected loudly and clearly. To fold receipts from payroll taxes into income tax revenues is to use a regressive tax to offset tax breaks for the wealthy. It is to rob from the working poor and give to the idle rich--it is Robin Hood in reverse even if the cap on payroll taxes were removed (since FICA doesn't come from investment income).
With all their 42 think tanks, the GOP has gotten very good at framing and getting people to vote against their own interests (can you tell I've been reading Lakoff?). They're doing it again, and if we're not careful we may yet snatch defeat from the jaws of victory by relying excessivly on voters' abilities to see past intuitively appealing but absolutely misleading drivel.