Problematic but brilliant or is it the converse?

I must hand it to the White House. They once again have managed to make a bad situation at least appear to look good for themselves. I am referring to the recent announcement that Social Security should be more explicitly labeled--and rejiggered--as a progressive benefits program. Social Security has always had a progressive, that is, redistributive, component to it, but that bit of information is not, I think, widely known. I didn't know it until I took a course dealing with Social Security. The genius in making the pitch explicit is this: first, it creates a wedge amongst the Democrats and those who prefer to see the program continue to have a redistributive element to it. So it looks like Democrats and others who oppose the White House are somehow against helping poor people. Second, and here's the more important long-term point: it cuts the cord that FDR used to ensure that Social Security would not be ended. The original genius of Social Security was its inclusiveness. Everyone shared in a piece of the pie, so that no one cared that much about the sizes that were doled out. Making Social Security explicitly a means-tested program will destroy its universal support. Why would the middle class support a program that doesn't benefit it? So, down the road, the program will wither--probably not die, but wither so that it is not the all-encompassing success it is perceived of today. Krugman makes a similar point in today's NYT. In other words, the objective is to kill indirectly what can't be done directly. This method is consistent with other White House stratagems--always make your real objective look like something else. This allows you (a) to bamboozle most people and (b) to mischaracterize the opposition and (c) to frame the debate, since most people can't be bothered, don't have the time, or aren't inclined to dig into this kind of issue.

Oh, by the way, there are two reasons this ploy is just that--a ploy. The first is this administration's resolute hostility to means-tested programs. There is no reason to think that this hostility, which is, after all, ideological, not pragmatic, has somehow disappeared. After all, if that were the case, the administration could simply push the point it floated in the past: raise payroll taxes on the richest Americans and leave the benefit structure intact. Second, the timing here is fishy. Only after it became quite obvious that the administration plan was not going to fly did this divide and conquer strategy float to the surface. This administration is quite adept at setting ideological goals, but oddly awkward about responding to changed events, whether those events are 9/11, Terry Schaivo or, to use last week's example, higher gas prices.

Question for the Administration: if people are in fact capable of choosing the best path for themselves, which, as you observed last November, included more votes for your guy, why is it that you, as avatars of a wonderful ideology, find it necessary to cloak your goals in misleading rhetoric? If these ideas are as great as you think they are, why can't they stand on their own?