Tennise Broeck Morse
I’m an 80 year old woman with a BA in American Studies, and an MFA in Fiction Writing from Columbia University’s School of the Arts. I have also lived with Multiple Sclerosis for more than 50 years.
The MS detail is important. In the late 1970’s and early 1980’s, I had two major attacks less than two years apart. This led to a prognosis that I would be in a wheelchair in my 40’s and dead in my mid-fifties. Clearly, that was wrong.
By the time my first attack of left-sided paralysis eventually led to an MS diagnosis, my dismal attendance record forced my employer to tell me to apply for disability benefits or be fired. I applied for Social Security disability benefits, but the two year process was so stressful that I believe it was caused my second attack.
Because of my two attacks, I was approved for disability benefits, and my MS began to convert to the gradually progressive kind.
This sounds like a smooth process, but it wasn’t. It was as if I had a series of “tiny” attacks, which led to extremely variable symptoms. In bed one day, walking on one cane the next, walking with 2 canes on another day, extreme aphasia which made me unable to remember the names of common objects like index cards, followed by days in which I was able to read, remember, and comment on complex articles, but could not figure out which way to turn the hot water faucet on and off.
I tried to keep up with current events, and was dimly aware that in 1980, Congress mandated periodic disability reviews, expecting to save $218 million dollars over 4 years. In 1981, following his election, Ronald Reagan started disability “reviews,” which were conducted so improperly that – in 1985 – the estimated savings to the program was $2.7 billion dollars, 12 times the amount Congress anticipated.
The reviews dragged on for at least 12 years. During a review, your disability benefits stopped and you lost your Medicare coverage. My review began in 1981 and lasted six years. I then had to wait another ten years before MS treatments became available. When they did, my condition stabilized, but the damage could not be undone. Even today, I struggle with severe fatigue, and other MS related symptoms.
This is an explanation of why it took me so long to write the book now titled Work or Die – The Great Disability Benefits War – a Partial History of the First Use of Project 2025 by an American President. My title references a 1983 New York Times editorial Work or Die, about a disability review suicide.
I kept journal notes, and gathered together mainstream articles on Social Security, Social Security Disability, and the “reviews” from the late 1970’s up to 1992, but it took me a long time. It took even longer to read them, and longer than that to understand them. I wrote when I could and, after I started taking disease-modifying medication, my energy levels were more stable, and I made steady progress. My work had an impact. I had several early versions of my book out for free on the internet, and I continued to get heartbreaking e-mails for years. One woman wrote me that finding and reading my book stopped her from killing herself.
I considered my book a social/personal history of the “reviews,” which included a Bibliography that referenced 115 articles, from 105 Ways to Slash Federal Budget to Work or Die. In 2024, I put up what I thought was my final draft on Amazon. In it, I stated that I believed Reagan was following a plan to downsize Social Security Disability, a plan he brought with him when he took office. Then, just months later, the Heritage Society published Project 2025, which stated that it gave Reagan the first draft in 1981, and he used it.
My book now became current events, because in it I detailed the strategies – the playbook – used by Project 2025; strategies the published Project 2025 failed to mention. Still, despite my efforts, publishers rejected the short articles I wrote about that playbook, and I had to sit at home and watch it being used in real time. I was an unknown, and theoretically writing about the past.
I do not have degrees in social policy, economics, etc., but I am quite a bit more knowledgeable than the general public in the Social Security area. I know that the three trust funds surpluses have had billions of dollars in the past. Those surpluses have been invested in government securities, so hefty interest payments have increased the surpluses even more.
I also know that in 1981, Reagan’s Social Security solution was bound to lead us to where we are today. In 1988, an economist pointed out the government was so rapidly increasing the Social Security trust fund surpluses that it could have a negative impact on the economy. Reagan’s hope was that giant surpluses would take us through the baby boomer retirement years. But this same economist, in a Letter to the Editor published in the New York Times, found significant problems with that plan. Even at their inflated level, it was almost certain the surpluses would be drained by 2035. In the meantime, the giant surpluses were part of the overall federal budget, and could well be misused to make our debt and spending picture look reasonable. Sure, we owe trillions of dollars, but look what we have over there!
So here we are, eight years away from draining the surpluses (as of 2026 the projected date is 2034), and we’ve just cut taxes, borrowed more, and increased spending. AARP states that the surpluses began declining in 2021, which means we’re 6 years into their shrinking, and our economic outlook is dependent on the surpluses remaining robust.
I may be an unknown, but I’m a smart, educated, and thoughtful one. Two Administrations needed to deal with the prospect of upcoming Social Security shortfalls. So far, they’ve both failed, and what they most have in common is Project 2025. You don’t have to be an “expert” to see a connection there. I rest my case.
Tennise Broeck Morse 