“Not surprisingly, the Board of Trustees of the Social Security and Medicare Trust Funds annual report released Monday covered territory we’ve been over before but is as timely as ever. The path Social Security is on now is unsustainable. Clearly, the current system that so many retirees depend upon is a ticking time bomb. Only the foolish or those attempting to score political points would want to turn their backs on meaningful reform.”

Live From The National Press Club In Washington, DC- Saving The System For The 21St Centur. Panelists: Dr. Rudolph G. Penner, Senior Fellow, Urban Institute, former Director, Congressional Budget Office, Grover Norquist, President, Americans for Tax Reform, Phyllis Berry Myers, President, Centre for New Black Leadership. Moderators: Jim Martin and Roger Zion, President and Chairman, 60 Plus Association Time: 1:30-2:30 pm, August 14, 2002 Place: The Holeman Lounge, National Press Club

The 60 Plus Association, a national, non-partisan senior citizens organization, today announced formation of a traveling truth squad to counter election year Social Security scare tactics. 60 Plus President Jim Martin said he was actively enlisting experts from all fields; academia, economists, public policy groups, senior citizens, minorities, Baby Boomers, Generation X-ers and union members.

A conservative seniors group Thursday launched a political pre-emptive attack against the Democratic Party and its strategists who are mapping out ways to damage Republicans on the issues of Social Security and Medicare.”60 Plus pledges to send traveling ‘truth squad’ members, especially from the African American and Hispanic American communities … into the battle in every congressional district and every state in America to set the record straight,” said 60 Plus President Jim Martin.

By a 51 to 34% margin, the American public trusts President Bush more than Senate Majority Leader Daschle to reform the Social Security system. A nationwide poll of 1200 adults, January 14-17, 2002, the 60 Plus Association conducted by Fabrizio Mclaughlin Associates showed that President Bush is trusted on this issue one and a half times more than Senate Majority Leader Daschle (D-S. Dakota).

The head of a national senior citizens group today declared that to equate the $1.3 trillion tax cut with the economic downturn is “ingenious at best, and dishonest at worst.” 60 Plus Association President Jim Martin issued a statement in response to a speech by Majority Leader Tom Daschle (D-SD) on the state of the economy. Martin, head of the nine year old seniors group charged that Daschle was “doing a disservice to seniors.”

“This is an exciting time not only for seniors but just as importantly for our children and grandchildren for they will benefit in the future from a new and improved Social Security system that will result from these options offered today by the bipartisan Commission to Strengthen Social Security. President Bush tasked the Commission with the responsibility to see that current and near retirees’ benefits are preserved, while allowing young workers to take more control of their own financial destiny with personal retirement accounts (PRA’s),” said Jim Martin, President of the 60 Plus Association.

James L. Martin, President of the 60 Plus Association, hailed President George W. Bush’s prescription drug benefit proposal “as fulfilling a campaign promise that senior citizens will receive a benefit which will help them meet the high costs of prescription drugs.”

The head of the first national senior citizens organization to call for personalization of the 66-year-old Social Security system today called on Congressional Democrats to “stop scaring seniors for political gain.”

The head of the first national senior citizens organization to call for a major overhaul of the Social Security system today urged Congress to “move boldly into the 21st century to save Social Security for future retirees.” 60 Plus Association President Jim Martin hosted his group’s 5th annual forum on the 66th anniversary of the system signed into law on this date in 1935 by President Franklin D. Roosevelt.