Sometimes politicians take on the wrong task at the wrong time. A case in point is President George Bush’s suddenly intense desire to remake Social Security, a long-talked about item that has become, it seems, the highlight of this administration’s domestic agenda for the next four years.

The president and others in his Cabinet have been setting the stage for this push in numerous speeches over the last month. In the upcoming State of Union address we can expect to hear President Bush perhaps go into more detail about his push to create personal retirement accounts.

It’s unclear exactly how these accounts would be set up, but in broad terms the president and many others support letting young workers divert some of their forced savings — Social Security payroll taxes — into the stock market. The money would then grow at a much faster rate. Governments in Europe and Australia have offered personal retirement accounts for years.

This idea is not a bad one. Private investments will no doubt do better than those held by the government. Seniors who make the right choices will be much more comfortable in their retirement. Investing money in stocks also stimulates the country’s economy and contributes to the overall wealth of the country.

There is, though, the awful reality that sometimes stocks tank. Twenty years of growth can be wiped away in a few months, weeks or even days. It’s a sobering reality that few who support these measures want to discuss.

The question that remains unanswered in this debate is why now? Nonpartisan budget experts say the Social Security Trust Fund will not run into serious problems in meeting its obligations until sometime after 2040. At this point there will be two or three workers for every retiree, and the money borrowed against the Trust Fund to keep current deficits low will be needed by senior citizens. A huge problem looms, but it is one that we have time to solve.

On the other hand, Medicaid, the medical safety net for the poor and disabled, is turning into a budget nightmare. The 52 million people who rely on it for health coverage are worried about rising costs for everything from prescriptions to primary care. States are facing huge increases in costs — including North Carolina, where Medicaid accounts for 13 percent of budget expenditures — and counties are also wondering how they will cope with their portion.

Medicare is the major medical coverage for 42 million senior citizens. While Social Security will be in trouble in 40 years, this trust fund is expected to become insolvent in about 15 years if nothing is done.

Health care costs and these two programs are threatening the well being of millions of Americans and strapping government budgets at every level. Throw into the equation the effects of high-priced medical insurance to American businesses and you have a volatile economic outlook that needs attention.

Now comes news that the president will seek another $80 billion or so for military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. That will bring the total spent in fighting terrorism since Sept. 11, 2001, to nearly $280 billion. And there is little evidence that this siphoning of the national treasury to fight global terrorism is nearing an end.

The president’s fixation on remaking Social Security — especially right now — reinforces a widely held belief that he hitches himself to an idea and rides it regardless of what the facts show. The safety net program for seniors needs some work, but there are much bigger problems with a shorter fuse that need our attention.