Inauguration Video: Highlights From Obama Celebration Include Parade, Oath Of Office

Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), the top Republican on the Budget Committee, was not impressed with President Obama's claim in his inaugural address that the country's entitlement programs "do not make us a nation of takers."

The line was a reference to the election campaign in which Mitt Romney infamously said that he was not campaigning for the 47 percent of people who don't pay federal taxes, and in which he accused Obama of trying to "gut" the 1990's welfare reforms.

Sessions, who largely agreed with Romney's positions, took that line and others as a sign that the president will not take steps to curb the costs of Social Security, Medicare and other expensive programs.

"They ran all the way to Election Day campaigning, attacking Republicans who 'want to take your Social Security,' and it was successful," said Sessions just after the inaugural ceremony.

"He's gotten reelected, the country's still on an unsustainable debt path," said Sessions. "If he says 'No,' we probably won't have any entitlement reform, and he can put it on his tombstone that he refused to alter Social Security and Medicare and put either one of them on a sustainable course."

Obama has proposed trimming an additional $300 billion to $400 billion from health care programs, and has floated the possibility of shifting to a stingier measure of inflation to slow the growth of Social Security. Sessions estimates the move would cut $250 billion over 10 years, which he said is not enough.

"You want my opinion about the president's greatest failing of all, that dwarfs every other failing -- he will not tell the American people we are on an unsustainable course, and we have to change," Sessions said.

He found the "takers" line in Obama's speech revealing.

"I would say they're a little sensitive about it," Sessions said. "Because we're on a path to spend about $10 trillion on social programs the next 10 years, $60,000 per family that's below the poverty line -- that's how much we spend for these means-tested programs. And there is a danger of dependency. To be honest, the president should recognize that."

The debate over welfare and the 47 percent played out against the background of an economy that has created the greatest level of income equality in America since before the Great Depression -- a fact Obama took notice of in his remarks.

"We do not believe that in this country freedom is reserved for the lucky, or happiness for the few," Obama said. "We recognize that no matter how responsibly we live our lives, any one of us at any time may face a job loss, or a sudden illness, or a home swept away in a terrible storm. The commitments we make to each other through Medicare and Medicaid and Social Security, these things do not sap our initiative, they strengthen us. They do not make us a nation of takers; they free us to take the risks that make this country great."

-- Michael McAuliff

Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/01/21/inauguration-video_n_2491826.html

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