I’m watching the replay, and trying not to repeat things my colleagues have said. I thought both Romney and Thompson outlined reasonable positions on Social Security. Thompson wants benefit levels to keep up with prices, so that the middle-income retiree in 2040 gets the same benefit as the middle-income retiree today, adjusted for inflation. Romney wants to do the same thing for higher-income people, but let lower-income people’s benefits rise more than that. Romney’s position–called “progressive price indexing”–is also Bush’s, and I think it would be easier to enact than Thompson’s, although both would be hard. Chris Wallace seemed out of his depth on this issue, relying on a months-old misdescription of Thompson’s plan. Contra Wallace, Thompson’s plan would allow benefits to keep up with prices–just not rise any more than that.