The opposite of Intercourse, Pennsylvania

From the “News Hour with Jim Lehrer” here are columnists Mark Shields and David Brooks discussing Social Security:

MARK SHIELDS: What we have here really I think are two competing American narratives. The first is the great frontier story, myth if you would, of the rugged individualist, the guy who owes nothing to anybody, who by sheer guts, determination, self reliance, prevails over others and wears no man's collar.

The other is the competing frontier narrative of the small town where people pool their talents, their time, their energy, resources to build a barn or to build a school, and Social Security certainly follows that second model. And that's what it has been about. And I think what we're talking about here is something, you know, rather profound, and I think that's what we're going to be wrestling with over the next, it's going to be a great philosophical fight as well.

JIM LEHRER: Do you agree with that?

DAVID BROOKS: I imagine the third frontier town called Crush Your Children, Wyoming, where one generation imposes incredible costs on the generation to come. And which is what the Social Security system is right now; it's an over promised program where today's seniors are getting benefits, and my generation, frankly will be getting benefits that will impose ruinous tax rates on my kids' generation. And that's just where the burdens are being thrust and that's why this system and why the Medicare system aren't sustainable.

Only in Dick Cheney’s Wyoming!