Paul Ryan's Disastrous Prescription For Medicare

First the good news: U.S. House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-WI) has made a serious proposal meant at reforming Medicare to keep it from going insolvent.

Now, the bad news: His idea would gut it to the point of irrelevance.

Ryan revealed a budget reform package totalling $4 trillion in spending cuts and turning Medicare into a voucher system. Seniors currently on Medicare would continue to have the coverage they have today, but future generations - say, mine - would have Medicare reduced to an annual stipend to buy insurance in the private marketplace. There, they would have a multitude of choices among insurance policies . . . but only two choices of coverage - cut-rate insurance that doesn't cover much or expensive insurance that a voucher could only pay for a fraction of. Beneficiaries would have to pay more of their own money for health insurance in a private system in which covering old people - who tend to get sick a lot - isn't very profitable. So do you think they could be guaranteed even half the coverage today's old folks get?

But wait - there's more! Ryan would also turn federal funding for Medicaid, the health insurance plan for the poor, into block grants for the states, which would choose how best to allocate the funds. Good idea, until you realize that while, say, New York or California might be amenable to continue the current level of Medicaid coverage, a state like, say, Mississippi - notorious for its miserly attitude toward the poor - might want to spread coverage rather thinly and spend as little money as possible.

Ryan, like most Republicans hell-bent on screwing the average American, doesn't believe there's not enough revenue - rather, there's too much spending - and he doesn't see the need for more taxation. Not even for corporations like General Electric, which paid no taxes last year despite $26 billion in profits. Ryan says his plan "saves" Medicare, reminding me of the U.S. army major (never accurately identified) in the Vietnam War who said, after the shelling of the village of Bến Tre to ferret out Viet Cong fighters, "It became necessary to destroy the village in order to save it."

Who is Ryan kidding with his proposed attack on Medicare? Apparently, only 23 percent of us - that's how many Americans would support a Medicare overhaul, according to a recent poll, while 76 percent strongly oppose it. (I wonder how much more information the remaining one percent need to make up their minds!) Nevertheless, I have a nasty feeling that Ryan's plan will pass in much of its original form. Why? Because Republicans always get what they want.

And they pay (and get paid) good money to get it.

Woman Of the House

It happened. Nancy Pelosi demonstrated today why she's the most powerful woman in Washington. (Sorry, Hillary.) She hauled the House of Representatives back into session in the middle of their inexplicably month-long summer vacation to pass a $26 billion spending bill that saves teachers' jobs and funds Medicaid payments. House Republican leader John Boehner decried the bill, declaring that it raises taxes and helps only special interests.

Boehner - whose tanning salon bills must really shock George Hamilton - is right on both counts. What he doesn't mention in promoting the former point is that the tax increase is a closed loophole that allowed American businesses not to pay taxes on their foreign operations. As for the latter point, well, teachers and poor people are of special interest . . . to the Democrats who represent them. The bill, which allows money allocated earlier to be spent on law enforcement, is of no special interest to Boehner, who represents people who can afford to send their kids to private school, have good health insurance, and probably live in gated communities with private security officers. There's nothing in it for them.

Gerald McEntee, president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, was on Ed Schultz's show to talk about the bill, and he declared that his union for one, will definitely work hard to elect more Democrats to Congress. This bill isn't going to turn the tide for Democrats and change the dynamic of the midterms, but it will give them a much-needed boost. :-)

That's Right, The Women Are Smarter

Some major breakthroughs in Congress - none of which have anything to do with gay marriage (I'll comment on that later) - took place today.

The Senate approved a $26 billion bill to pay for Medicaid reimbursements and save the jobs of 130000 teachers nationwide after Senator Olympia Snowe (R-ME) joined Democrats in breaking a Republican filibuster.

At that news, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi declared her intention to call the House back into session during the August recess so her chamber could pass the same bill and send it to President Obama for his signature. She made it clear that she wanted to get this done.

Meanwhile, Senator Deborah Stabenow (D-MI) introduced a bill in the Senate that could be a game changer for Democrats in the midterms. Senator Stabenow's bill would extend unemployment benefits by twenty weeks and also provide with tax breaks to businesses to encourage them to hire the long-term unemployed. Activists are already working on a plan to hit Republicans with e-mails, faxes and phone calls to get the support of at least two senators to help her bill pass.

If you want something done in Congress, get a woman to do it. :-)

The American Meddling Association

The American Medical Association recently came out against any form of public medical insurance out of fear that government health mandates would adversely the private practices of their doctors, not to mention their ability to make a buck. Although the AMA represents only about a quarter of the nation's doctors, they are a powerful lobbying group, and President Obama has acknowledged their clout by taking them on in a speech to an AMA convention this coming Monday.

Interestingly, the AMA fought - and delayed - the implementation of Medicare and Medicaid in the sixties, yet despite their bigger membership and formidable clout, they failed because the public wanted those programs. A public insurance option is still in doubt with regards to today's health care proposals, and a single-payer program itself is off the table, but Obama has support from the public for reform - especially from us uninsured Americans - just as President Kennedy and President Johnson had for Medicare and Medicaid.

Obama is willing to give up some of his own ideas to make health care reform a reality today, and he's willing to meet the AMA halfway. Maybe the AMA should heed the maxim Obama has already chosen to follow: You can't get everything you want.

Unless, of course, you're Madonna, who just won the right to adopt a second child from Malawi in spite of the obvious case against her after the Malawian government tried to block her. :-O