ITTSBURGH - Wherever he goes, union organizer Martin Berger travels with a videotape and a VCR in the back seat of his Ford Crown Victoria as he tells Pennsylvania's senior citizens about US Senator Rick Santorum's plan to raise the retirement age for Social Security benefits and to privatize the program.
The shadowy videotape, shot in 1994, shows Santorum talking to a group of students at LaSalle University in Philadelphia. Before an unsteady camera, Santorum says he believes that Social Security should not be paid out until workers hit the age of 70.
''It is ridiculous that we have a retirement age in this country of age 65 today,'' Santorum says emphatically, noting that many people receive benefits for two decades before dying.
''Push it back to at least age 70,'' continues the senator, who is seeking reelection this year. ''I'd go even farther if I could, but I don't think I could pass it.''
As Texas Governor George W. Bush and Vice President Al Gore give competing speeches today on their philosophies for Social Security, the contentious issue is spilling over into House and Senate races around the country.
The Democratic Party, for example, vows to hang Bush's plan to partially privatize Social Security around the necks of every GOP candidate in the land, whether they embrace his proposal or not.
''It's going to be a major issue throughout the country,'' said Mark Mellman, a Democratic pollster who is surveying Pennsylvania voters for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee. ''Congressional Republicans are deathly afraid of the giant mistake George Bush is about to make.''
But Santorum and the Republican National Committee are defiant in the face of the Democratic threats to link Republicans to the Bush plan.
''I hope they tie it around our neck and parade it around every American in the country,'' said committee spokesman Chris Taulitz. ''It is the most courageous, boldest proposal ever made in an election year. If Al Gore and the congressional Democratic leadership are going to try this, they're going to end up hanging themselves.''
Santorum has backed away from raising the retirement age, but he's in the forefront on pushing for younger workers to be allowed to invest part of their payroll taxes themselves. He says it is their money and they have a right to try for better returns than the program currently provides.
''I'm making it a big issue in my campaign,'' Santorum said. ''We're on the offense, not the defense.''
In today's speech in Ontario, Calif., Bush is expected to propose allowing workers to invest 2 percent of the earnings that would go to Social Security taxes in the stock market for use when they retire. In addition, aides said, he may discuss the need to raise the Social Security retirement age for those who are not currently near retirement.
Gore, who speaks in Ambler, Pa., has said he would preserve the structure of the current system and shore it up using interest savings from paying down the national debt.
The Gore campaign, has eagerly awaited the Bush speech, and plans to paint the Bush approach as irresponsible and to cast the governor as a risky choice for retirees. The Bush campaign says Gore is spreading misinformation and needlessly scaring seniors.
Here in the Keystone State, by all accounts a crucial battleground in the presidential race, there are proportionately more senior citizens - 2.5 million people in a state of 12 million - than any other state except Florida. Of these, some 250,000 are union retirees, many of whom are gearing up to fight changes in the Social Security benefit structure.
Franklin Delano Roosevelt created the Social Security program in 1934 to support Americans in their later years with modest, regular payments. Workers pay into the program to support current retirees, and in turn, rely on future workers to pay for their retirement benefits. The growing concern is that, as the massive baby boom generation retires, there won't be enough workers paying in to keep the system solvent.
According to the recent annual report by Social Security trustees, there is enough money to fund the program through 2037, up from last year's estimate of 2034. At that point, payroll tax revenues will cover just 72 percent of the benefits promised under current law.
Ron Klink, the Democratic congressman who is challenging Santorum for his Senate seat, calls Social Security ''a sacred bond between the generations.'' As vehemently as Santorum wants to change the program, Klink wants to maintain it in its current form.
''Now all of a sudden, Rick Santorum and many others are saying what I pay in is my money,'' Klink said. ''Instead of bridging and uniting the generations and having them take care of each other, it's dividing the generations.''
As Klink and Santorum and Bush and Gore argue about what to do, each is accusing the other of scaring seniors to secure votes.
Santorum, for example, said the program is in grave danger of going bankrupt and if the future insolvency is not addressed now, it will be much more difficult to deal with later.
''There's an absolute certainty that Social Security will run out of money and benefits will be cut and taxes will go up,'' said Santorum, who ridicules Democrats for refusing to act. ''They're ignoring the fact that Social Security is in trouble, they're just saying, `Oh, this is a risky scheme.'''
Klink, on the other hand, points out that the program is expected to be solvent for the next 37 years. At most, he believes there are ''some slight changes that can be made,'' but wants nothing that would alter the current structure.
He views Santorum's proposals as needless and risky. If the bull market becomes a bear, Klink says, the federal government would be left with no choice but to make up for people's investment shortfalls rather than to leave seniors destitute.
''We do not need the drastic kinds of changes that will destroy the system that the senator and others are proposing,'' Klink said.
Although Klink and Gore denounce privatization plans, the idea has gained currency in recent years. President Clinton suggested a form of it in his last two budgets, and Gore even flirted with the concept before backing off. In the Senate, Democrats Bob Kerrey of Nebraska, Daniel Patrick Moynihan of New York, and John Breaux of Louisiana are staunch advocates, as the Bush campaign regularly points out.
In fact, the Bush campaign is fond of touting the privatization of Social Security as a bipartisan effort, which leaves Kerrey feeling uneasy.
''I'm uncomfortable getting drug in as political cover,'' said Kerrey, who serves as cochair of Gore's presidential campaign in Nebraska. And he says he disagrees with Bush officials that Gore's criticisms amount to a scare tactic.
What he hopes will happen this election year is that the candidates will thoroughly debate the pros and cons of the various Social Security proposals.
''You can end the campaign with a mandate,'' Kerrey said.
Berger, the union organizer who is president of the Pennsylvania State Council of Senior Citizens, is working to make sure that the next president and the Congress are given just such a mandate. But he wants a mandate to preserve Social Security the way it is now.
''Why mess with this system?'' asked Berger. ''It's good till'' 2037 ''if we don't do anything.''
As he travels the state, talking to retired carpenters, steelworkers, autoworkers, and others, Berger tells seniors that the nation can't afford the trillion-plus dollars that it would cost to switch to Santorum and Bush's plan, and he reminds them that the people who stand to benefit most are the ones earning commissions from the investments.
''This is a false issue, and all the lobbyists are being paid big money by Wall Street to get this done,'' Berger said. ''It would be a bonanza for them.''
