Cat Food Commission or Catfood Commission (Deficit Commission nickname)

Many elderly and infirm people rely on Social Security to survive; without Social Security money, it’s sometimes said that they’d be eating cat food. (Cat food is not necessarily cheaper than food for humans, however.) 
 
U.S. President Barack Obama established the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform (dubbed the “Deficit Commission”) in 2010. Critics have feared that this commission would recommend large cuts in Social Security. The nickname “Cat Food Commission” (or “Catfood Coimmission”) has been cited in print since at least November 2009. The progressive blog FireDogLake (FDL) has frequently used the “Cat Food Commission” nickname.
 
   
Wikipedia: National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform
The National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform was created in 2010 by President Barack Obama to identify “...policies to improve the fiscal situation in the medium term and to achieve fiscal sustainability over the long run.” The commission first met on April 27, 2010.
 
History
The original proposal for a commission came from bipartisan legislation that would have required Congress to vote on its recommendations as presented, without any amendment. In January of 2010, that bill failed in the Senate by a vote of 53-46, when six Republicans who had co-sponsored it nevertheless voted against it. Thereafter, Obama established the Commission by executive order. Former Republican Senator Alan Simpson, after his appointment to co-chair the Commission, criticized the former supporters who had voted against the bill, saying that their purpose “was to stick it to the president.”
 
FireDogLake
Hedge Fund Billionaire Pete Peterson Key Speaker At Obama “Fiscal Responsibility Summit,” Will Tell Us All Why Little Old Ladies Must Eat Cat Food
By: Jane Hamsher
Wednesday February 18, 2009 5:13 pm
After a report in the Wall Street Journal appeared indicating that Obama “met with 44 fiscally conservative ‘Blue Dog’ Democrats this week and gave a nod to legislation that would set up commissions to deal with long-term deficit strains,” noting that “the commissions would then present plans to Congress for an up-or-down vote,” it appears things moved rather swiftly.
   
OurFuture.org
It’s Baaaack: The Catfood Commission
By Digby
November 13, 2009 - 9:42am ET
Not that it ever went away. The catfood commission is the Zombie that has been clawing at the door since Obama was elected:...
   
FireDogLake
Conrad Pushes “Cat Food Commission” On White House; White House Tries To Defuse
By: David Dayen
Wednesday November 25, 2009 8:53 am
The White House has raised yet another trial balloon about empowering a deficit-cutting commission, a day after meeting with key Senators in favor of the idea.
 
The Burned Over District
Monday, July 12, 2010
Cat Food Commission fucks over states, too!
In addition to their much anticipated benefit cuts to Social Security and Medicare, President Obama’s Deficit Devils a/k/a the Cat Food Commission is giving the kiss of death to the states as well.
     
Unsilent Generation
Obama’s Cat Food Commission, Alan Greenspan, and the Dancing Grannies for Medicare
Posted on August 9, 2010 by James Ridgeway
President Obama’s Deficit Commission is all smoke and mirrors. Its members are making a big show of laboring over ”painful” choices and considering all options in their quest to bring down the deficit. But inside the Beltway everyone knows what’s going to happen: The commission will reduce the deficit on the backs of the old and the poor, through cuts to Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. Some opponents have taken to calling it the Cat Food Commission, since that’s what it’s victims will be forced to eat once the commission gets done slashing away at their modest entitlements.
 
FireDogLake
WSJ Leaks Cat Food Commission’s Social Security Deliberations
By: David Dayen
Friday August 20, 2010 7:20 am
Despite distrusting Mike Allen’s version of events at all times, there’s no question that the Administration resurrected a deficit panel that the Senate killed, and the President staffed it with a number of people who would be open to Social Security benefit cuts. And that set of decisions is bearing fruit on the panel, according to the Wall Street Journal.
       
Seeing the Forest
August 24, 2010
Congress: Act Now To Preempt The Catfood Commission
—by Dave Johnson
The President has appointed a commission to study ways to reduce the deficit, but the only thing anyone is hearing from this commission (they meet in secret) is that they are going after Social Security instead. For this reason it has become known as the “Catfood Commission” instead of the “Deficit Commission” because any reductions in benefits will force so many older Americans to eat catfood instead of more expensive human food.