It would make more sense for the government to keep extending unemployment benefits until the recession lets up, because the effects of this poverty-inducing trend are far more harmful to the long-term economy than putting out cash now to keep people afloat:

Reporting from Washington -- Instead of seeing older workers staying on the job longer as the economy has worsened, the Social Security system is reporting a major surge in early retirement claims that could have implications for the financial security of millions of baby boomers.

Since the current federal fiscal year began Oct. 1, claims have been running 25% ahead of last year, compared with the 15% increase that had been projected as the post-World War II generation reaches eligibility for early retirement, according to Stephen C. Goss, chief actuary for the Social Security Administration.

Many of the additional retirements are probably laid-off workers who are claiming Social Security early, despite reduced benefits, because they are under immediate financial pressure, Goss and other analysts believe.

The numbers upend expectations that older Americans who sustained financial losses in the recession would work longer to rebuild their nest eggs. In a December poll sponsored by CareerBuilder, 60% of workers older than 60 said they planned to postpone retirement.

Goss said it remained unclear whether the uptick in retirements would accelerate or abate in the months ahead. But another wave of older workers may opt for early retirement when they exhaust unemployment benefits late this year or early in 2010, he noted.

The ramifications of the trend are profound for the new retirees, their families, the government and other social institutions that may be called upon to help support them.

On top of savings ravaged by the stock market decline and the loss of home equity, many retirees now must make do with Social Security benefits reduced by as much as 25% if they retire at age 62 instead of 66.

"When the recession ends and the economy bounces back, there may be a band of people for whom things will never be the same again. They'll still be paying the price for 10, 20, 30 years down the road," said Cristina Martin Firvida, director of economic security for AARP, the nation's largest membership organization for people 50 and older.

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Sean Hannity couldn't have been too pleased last night when his "All American Panel" -- which he usually manages to keep nicely docile -- took a decidedly liberal detour on the subject of Nancy Pelosi's charge that the CIA lied to her.

First, Sunny Hostin, a former federal prosecutor, pointed out the obvious:

Why do we think that she is the liar?

Regina Calcaterra, a Democratic consultant, promptly chimed in:

It's a smokescreen. I think this is a smokescreen by Republicans, because Republicans are concerned about Congress holding the Truth Commission, which you know is going to be the parallel to the 9/11 Commission.

Later, Hostin raises the really relevant point:

The issue here is that everybody knows that waterboarding is torture. And that was an approved policy. It is torture! Everyone knows that. And that was the policy of the Bush administration. Why don't we talk about that?

Indeed. Because on Planet Wingnuttia, claiming that "Nancy Pelosi knew about it too" justifies the policy.

The bizarre thing about making this a "he said/she said" issue is that we already know for a fact that the CIA lied to Pelosi about the torture.

Marcy Wheeler points out that (as she's been reporting for weeks,) we already have documentary evidence that "when the CIA briefed Pelosi and Goss on September 4, 2002, it told them that waterboarding was not being employed."

Yet this was in fact a lie. Because we also know from Lawrence Wilkerson that the CIA had been engaging in waterboarding since at least February of that same year. As Marcy observes:

While we can't be sure of the date when Cheney started ordering people to be waterboarded even after they were compliant, we know this order had to have occurred before February 22, 2002--because that's when al-Libi first reported on ties between Iraq and al Qaeda.

... So sometime in February 2002--when Bush was declaring that the Geneva Convention did not apply to al Qaeda and when Bruce Jessen was pitching torture to JPRA--Cheney was personally (according to Wilkerson) ordering up waterboarding. The DIA immediately labeled the result of this session of waterboarding probable disinformation.

The Beltway pundits have been eager to cast Pelosi as a liar. (Wayne Simmons just called Pelosi a "pathological liar" on Fox.) Is Bob Graham a liar too? We're taking the word of the disgraced Porter Goss over the sitting Speaker of the House?

And gee, guess what we're not talking about here. Sonny Hostin, say it again:

The issue here is that everybody knows that waterboarding is torture. And that was an approved policy. It is torture! Everyone knows that. And that was the policy of the Bush administration. Why don't we talk about that?