Republican U.S. Senate candidate Linda McMahon found herself embroiled in another flap about what she said and what she meant.
This time, the topic was Social Security, that third-rail of American politics, though her campaign says her message was clear and one news organization that reported on her statements later amended its account.
It all started with an interview that aired this morning with Christiane Amanpour of ABC News. McMahon was asked about the federal debt and what programs she would cut. (ICYMI, here's a transcript of that portion of the conversation, taken from the program's website.)
AMANPOUR: Everybody's busy trying to do the math right now on all the campaigns and regarding the budget deficit. The latest shows the Republicans can come up with something like $100 billion in cuts, which is a lot, but a pittance compared to the trillion...
MCMAHON: ... $1.3 trillion deficit...
AMANPOUR: Yes, exactly.
MCMAHON: ... and over $13 billion debt. I get that.
AMANPOUR: Exactly. So the big issues that take up most of the spending are, obviously, defense -- some 20 percent...
MCMAHON: Sure.
AMANPOUR: ... Social Security and Medicaid. Is that where you would cut?
MCMAHON: Let me just name a couple of other things, too. I just think we should freeze the federal hiring and freeze wages again, not going to make a big dent. However, I do believe we should take the balance of the stimulus money and pay down the debt.
Does that mean McMahon favors cutting Social Security? Some viewers, among them Darren Goode, a reporter at The Hill, an influential newspaper covering Congress, seemed to think so. Writing on the paper's blog, Goode reported that McMahon favored cutting Social Security and Medicaid to reduce the debt. However, by mid-afternoon Goode's post corrected to remove any implication that McMahon was proposing cuts in entitlement programs.
It's simply not true, says Mcmahon spokesman Ed Patru. "Linda understands both programs need to be strengthened because at this point insolvency is imminent for both programs unless they are strengthened,'' Patru said in an email to Patrick Scully, a political consultant, Democrat and author of The Hanging Shad, a state political blog.
"She believes any efforts to strengthen these programs must have broad bipartisan support, and she will not support any efforts to strengthen these programs that does not have broad bipartisan support. She's also opposed to and would not support any efforts to privatize these public programs."
In the wake of minimum-wage-gate, McMahon's Democratic opponent Richard Blumenthal quickly sought to capitalize on the Social Security flap. "Say no to McMahon's taking a look into a 10 percent cut in Social Security,'' Blumenthal's website blasts. It also asks supporters to sign an online petition against McMahon.