Obama Wrongly Describes the Origins of Welfare as the Origins of Social Security -- AGAIN

At his Tuesday press conference President Obama repeated the claim he
first made in his interview with Jon Stewart six weeks ago: that
Social Security began as a program for widows and orphans. (See my 10/31/10 posting for a clip from the Stewart interview).

At the most elemental level, this is a false claim as Social Security
actually left out widows and orphans when it was enacted in 1935. It
was only in 1939 that Social Security provided for widows and orphans
-- and then only if they were heirs/survivors of husbands/fathers who
were covered by the Social Security system.

Social Security was exactly the opposite of the program Obama
apparently thinks it was created to be. It was pegged to the white,
male worker who was employed in jobs that were available mainly to
white men. It was tied to white, male lifetime labor patterns of
uninterrupted employment. It was (and is) based on contributions from
wages.

Social Security was and is a contributory social insurance program.
The program that initially "only affected widows and orphans" (quoting
from the President's press conference) was welfare -- mothers's
pensions, as it was called in the Progressive Era, then Aid to
Dependent Children, as it became in the New Deal.

Does Obama think that Social Security is welfare? ....ahhh... That
explains everything! No wonder he is so quick to sacrifice Social
Security to the cause of deficit reduction. He must think ending
Social Security is the next phase of welfare reform (which he loved).
Dont be surprised if he tries to extend marriage promotion (along with
fatherhood, his alternative to welfare for single mothers) -- to
seniors.

For more on this see  http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/12/08/while-whacking-left-obama_n_794061.html