Medicare in Romney's Words

On August 18 Ryan said: “Medicare should not be used as a piggy bank for ObamaCare, Medicare should be the promise it made to our current seniors…” On September 21 at an AARP forum Ryan was booed when he said “The first step to a stronger Medicare is to repeal ObamaCare because it represents the worst of both worlds.” In the Romney September 23 CNN interview with Scott Pelley: There is a lot of rhetoric about Medicare. What do you intend to do? Romney: Well, I don't want any change to Medicare for current seniors or for those that are nearing retirement. So the plan stays exactly the same. The president's cutting $716 billion from current Medicare. I disagree with that. I'd put those dollars back into Medicare. Pelley: Mr. Ryan has proposed something similar, almost precisely the same number, 716. Romney: Yeah. He was going to use that money to reduce the budget deficit. I'm putting it back into Medicare and I'm the guy running for president, not him. So what I do in my Medicare plan for younger people coming along is say this, "We're going to have higher benefits for low income people and lower benefits for high income people. We're going to make it more means tested." I think if we do that, we'll make sure to preserve Medicare into the indefinite future. Pelley: The idea under your plan for future seniors would be that the federal government would write that senior a check, essentially, and say, "Now, you can go buy a private insurance plan or you can buy Medicare from the federal government." Is that essentially it? Romney: Yeah. That's essentially it. People would have a choice of either traditional, government-run, fee-for-service Medicare; or a private plan, which has to offer the same benefits.

On September 5 former President Clinton said “…Here’s what really happened, you be the judge…What the President did was to save money…cut unwarranted subsidies to providers and insurance companies that were not making people healthier and were not necessary to get the providers to provide the service and instead of raiding Medicare he used the savings to close the doughnut hole in the Medicare drug program…and add 8 years to the life of the Medicare Trust Fund so that it is solvent until 2024...Governor Romney…wants to repeal those savings and give the money back to the insurance company. He wants to go back to the old system which means we reopen the doughnut hole that forced seniors to pay more for drugs and we’ll reduce the life of the Medicare Trust Fund…if he’s elected and if he does what he promised to do, Medicare will now go broke in 2016…That means after all that we won’t have to wait until their voucher program kicks in-in 2023 to see the end of Medicare as we know it; they’re gonna do it to us sooner than we thought.” I believe Bill Clinton because he increased taxes on the rich to keep the deficit increase low and battled Republicans to maintain Medicare when he was in office. Subsidizing health care providers and insurance companies holds true with what Republicans have been doing for the last 30 years – taking from the poor to give to the rich.