Republican opposition to Social Security began before FDR’s ink dried on the bill, because it actually returns money to poor and middle class people, when the Republican agenda is to transfer wealth from the poor and middle classes to millionaires, billionaires and criminal corporations. However, Social Security is so popular with the US public that it is considered the third rail of politics. A few Republican extremists attack it directly to their own peril, but most find more sneaky ways to chip away at its edges. Here is the latest such attempt.

Last week, Gov. Mitch Daniels (R-IN) said that he believes the retirement age for Social Security needs to be increased — despite the regressive nature and complete lack of need for such a move — because young people “will live to be more than 100.” “They’ll be replacing body parts like we do tires,” Daniels said.

Last night, Daniels was joined by another governor who may have his eye on the 2012 Republican nomination for president: Tim Pawlenty. During an interview with CNN’s Elliot Spitzer, Pawlenty said that, due to the nation’s fiscal position, young people will have to “correlate your retirement…to life expectancy“…

…Watch it:

Pawlenty never used the words “raise the retirement age,” but “correlate your retirement…to life expectancy” means precisely the same thing. Like Daniels (and many others on both ends of the political spectrum), Pawlenty is relying on a faulty understanding of America’s increasing life expectancy to push a regressive cut in Social Security that will disproportionately impact those most in need of the program.