In his Jan. 4 column, New York Times columnist/economist Paul Krugman wrote this:

In the next few weeks, I'll explain why privatization will fatally undermine Social Security, and suggest steps to strengthen the program.

Since then, he has written 10 columns, and the only "steps to strengthen the program," that Krugman has suggested was later in the same column.

The long-term cost of the Bush tax cuts is five times the budget office's estimate of Social Security's deficit over the next 75 years. The botched prescription drug bill passed in 2003 does more, all by itself, to increase the long-run budget deficit than the projected rise in Social Security expenses.

That doesn't mean nothing should be done to improve Social Security's finances.

Those are some suggestions, but you'd hope that since Krugman is so dead set against any form of privatization, he'd take one column to lay out some sort of plan that makes the program solvent in perpetuity -- and that requires something more than higher taxes.