After being criticized for emphasizing points of agreement on Social Security during Wednesday night’s debate, President Barack Obama’s re-election campaign delivered an email to supporters clarifying their response, which left a number of key details unanswered and retained a degree of flexibility for the President over his choices for the program.

Deputy campaign manager Stephanie Cutter sent the email Friday night under the campaign’s “Truth Team” aegis, attempting to clear up the Social Security portion of the debate. The President said then that he believed he and Mitt Romney share a “somewhat similar position” on the topic. Cutter expanded on these remarks, pointing out areas of agreement and disagreement:

President Obama and Romney agree that we need to make gradual changes to make sure Social Security stays solvent over the long term. The disagreement is over how to do it — and that’s where President Obama and Romney have fundamentally different ideas.

President Obama will under no circumstances agree to put your retirement at risk by privatizing Social Security, and he will reject any plan that slashes Social Security benefits. Because Romney opposes any effort to raise a single penny in new revenue, his Social Security plan is forced to rely solely on big benefit cuts to maintain solvency — analysis of a similar plan showed current workers would see cuts of up to 40 percent that would badly hurt their financial security.

Romney and Ryan also supported the Bush privatization plan that would have had exposed Social Security benefits to the financial crisis that devastated many pension funds and retirement accounts.

Cutter also sent readers to a page at BarackObama.com for more clarification. That site refers to a Bloomberg piece from Peter Diamond and Peter Orszag, which analyzes Mitt Romney’s Social Security plans. Those plans have been remarkably consistent over the course of the campaign – he wants to slowly raise the retirement age, and engage in “progressive price indexing,” where higher income earners see their benefit rates grow more slowly than those at the lower end of the scale. As Diamond and Orszag show, you would have to set the bar of “higher income earners” at the top 60% of earners in the country in order to derive any meaningful revenue from progressive price indexing. And raising the retirement age would impact all workers, regardless of income. Here’s how that all plays out.

These two steps would eliminate the long-term deficit in Social Security, according to the official analysis of the plan done by the Office of the Chief Actuary at Social Security. But they would do so by substantially reducing benefits, even for middle earners. According to the analysis, a medium earner (someone bringing in about $45,000 a year today) retiring in 2050 at age 65 would receive 32 percent less in annual benefits than under the current formula. By 2080, the reduction would amount to almost 40 percent.

A high earner (someone with income of about $70,000 currently) retiring in 2050 would get 40 percent less and, by 2080, almost 50 percent.

But Diamond and Orszag, in substitution, offer their plan which they claim would have that same middle-income earner receive 10% less in benefits over their lifespan. “The Romney-type approach would reduce [benefits] by about $7,500 a year. Under our plan, it would be only about $2,500 lower,” Diamond and Orszag write.

At the Truth Team page, you see Obama’s principles on Social Security reform laid out. And it matches what Obama has been saying on this matter for a while, full of vague statements and undefined concepts:

• Any reform should strengthen Social Security for future generations and restore long-term solvency.
• The administration will oppose any measures that privatize or weaken the Social Security system.
• While all measures to strengthen solvency should be on the table, the administration will not accept an approach that slashes benefits for future generations.
• No current beneficiaries should see their basic benefits reduced.
• Reforms should strengthen retirement security for the most vulnerable, including low-income seniors.
• Reform should maintain robust disability and survivors’ benefits.

The only hard line here is on privatization. I don’t know what “slashes” benefits means relative to simply reducing them. I don’t know what “basic” benefits means relative to the benefits people receive. And while later, Romney gets criticized for “proposing to close Social Security shortfalls through benefit cuts alone,” there’s no indication of any revenue increases Obama would support.

In other words, this set of principles was constructed to give Obama maximum wiggle room on Social Security, so that all people can read into it whatever they want. You can see someone who supports no benefit cuts, or modest benefit cuts, or revenue increases through changing the payroll tax cap, or no increases. President Obama won’t privatize Social Security. As for what else he would do, it’s not clear.

There’s no definitive rejection of raising the retirement age, for example. He doesn’t dismiss progressive price indexing out of hand. There’s no description of changing the cost of living adjustment calculation by moving to chained CPI, which is a net benefit cut. You just have an offhand reference to a column criticizing Romney’s Social Security approach, written by two guys whose plan for Social Security includes straight benefit reductions and an increase in the payroll tax rate without changing the payroll tax cap.

I think this “clarification” creates more questions than resolutions.

St. Mary's Cathedral in San Francisco (with its very nice basement)

When Pope Benedict announced he was appointing Oakland Bishop Salvatore Cordileone to be the new archbishop of San Francisco, it generated a lot of reaction in both the religious and secular media. RC churchwatcher Rocco Palma said the appointment was “either the most the most courageously bold — or stunningly brazen — American appointment in the seven-year reign of Pope Benedict XVI.”

After what happened Thursday at Cordileone’s installation, put me down for “stunningly brazen.”

As is common for such occasions, many special guests are invited from outside the church. Leaders of other faith communities are often asked to attend, as a sign that these other leaders welcome a new leader to their community.

Three days before the installation, Marc Andrus, the bishop of the local diocese of the Episcopal church, wrote an open letter to the parishes and members of his diocese. Knowing a number of priests and laypeople in his diocese, I am sure he was getting pressure not to attend, but he felt that failing to attend would not be the best way to (a) express dissatisfaction at the appointment of one of the religious leaders of the Prop 8 battle to head up the Catholic church in San Francisco, and (b) get off to a good start with the new archbishop in ecumenical relations. Thus, he wrote his letter explaining his intention to attend, despite their differences, saying, “Bishop Cordileone was an active supporter of Proposition 8, which I and the other Episcopal bishops throughout California opposed. Despite this difference of opinion and support, I look forward to working with Archbishop-designate Cordileone when and how we can, remembering as the Apostle Paul writes that we are one body, united by one Lord, one faith, and one baptism.”

He went on from there in more detail:

Archbishop-designate Codelione [sic] and I share concerns for the treatment of immigrants to this country and reforming the United States’s [sic] immigration policies. Working to alleviate global poverty and change systems that disenfranchise all people are the concerns of those who follow our brother Christ, and that work is not limited to the work of bishops.

In working together with the Archdiocese of San Francisco, however, I will not change my course with regard to the full inclusion of all people in the full life of the church. I hope that public disagreements can be handled respectfully and that criticisms of public statements may be met with mutual respect. Some Catholics may find themselves less at home with Salvatore Cordileone’s installation and they may come to The Episcopal Church. We should welcome them as our sisters and brothers.

Even as we welcome those who may join us and look for ways to work with our Roman Catholic siblings in the faith, we will not be silenced in our proclamation of God’s inclusion. Our ecumenical partnership should be founded in our following Christ and shared service. It is our Christian duty to take stands in public or from our pulpits when others — especially those of our own faith — are in error and trying to suppress the rights of others who, too, have been created in God’s image.

I have a hunch that these paragraphs did not sit well with Cordileone, or perhaps with one of his assistants.

When Andrus showed up for the installation service on Thursday, he was escorted to the basement room where the ecumenical guests were assembling for the procession into the sanctuary. Others involved in the procession were gathering in other places (choir in this room, RC priests in that room, etc.), and each group of participants were brought to the narthex for the procession as their turn came.

Except Andrus:

Just sick – and California Scout Ryan Andresen’s main project was a “wall of tolerance.” (ABC):

His project, a “tolerance wall,” was inspired by the years of hazing he endured in middle school in Moraga, Calif., and later at Boy Scout summer camp, where his nicknames were “Tinkerbell” and “faggot.”

“I had I had no idea what gay was at that point,” said Andresen, who described hazing that included, among other rituals, having the word “fag” written in charcoal across his chest.

His mom, Karen Andresen, was so upset by the troops’ decision that she posted a petition on Change.org that has topped more than 22,000 signatures.

“It was not his idea, it was mine,” she said.

His mom will appear on “Ellen” to discuss what happened. Ryan came out publicly in July by sending a letter to his troop declaring his support for another bullied scout.

The Boy Scouts of America spokesman Deron Smith said in a statement: “The scout proactively notified his unit leadership and Eagle Scout consoler that he does not agree to the scouting’s principle of ‘duty to God’ and does not meet scouting’s membership standard on sexual orientation.”

Yes, and bullying does represent “duty to God.’