Democrats Cut Seniors’ Medicare to Fund Their Spending Sprees

October 11, 2012

Democrats Cut Seniors’ Medicare to Fund Their Spending Sprees

Democrats Already Stole $716 Billion From Medicare to Pay for ObamaCare, And They Want to Let Medicare Go Bankrupt in 2024

Vice President Joe Biden will face a tall task tonight defending the Democrats’ failed policies, especially on Medicare. Under the Democrats’ plan, Medicare will go bankrupt in 2024, inducing either massive benefit cuts or tax hikes for beneficiaries.
Democrats have already ravaged Medicare by taking $716 billion out of the program to pay for ObamaCare, while empowering a board of unelected and unaccountable bureaucrats to gut Medicare even more.
While Democrats made brutal cuts to Medicare, they ballooned the debt to historic levels. Time after time, Democrats have proven that they will take the axe to seniors’ Medicare if it means funding their spending addiction.

Vice President Joe Biden will face a tall task tonight defending the Democrats’ failed policies, especially on Medicare. Under the Democrats’ plan, Medicare will go bankrupt in 2024, inducing either massive benefit cuts or tax hikes for beneficiaries:

WHEN MEDICARE’S TRUSTEES PREDICTED MEDICARE’S BANKRUPTCY LAST YEAR, NANCY PELOSI CLAIMED THAT MEDICARE’S FINANCES WERE “STRONG”: (“Pelosi Statement on Report of the Social Security and Medicare Board of Trustees,” Office of Rep. Nancy Pelosi, 5/13/2011)

MEDICARE TRUSTEES SAY MEDICARE WILL GO BANKRUPT IN 2024: “The Medicare Trustees Report released today shows that the Hospital Insurance (HI) Trust Fund is expected to remain solvent until 2024, the same as last year’s estimate, but action is needed to secure its long-term future. In 2011, the HI Trust Fund expenditures were lower than expected.” (Press Release, “Medicare Stable, But Requires Strengthening,” Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services, 4/23/2012)

SENIORS COULD SUFFER 26% BENEFIT CUTS OR 47% TAX INCREASES UNDER DEMS’ MEDICARE PLAN: ”Lawmakers could address the long-range financial imbalance in several different ways. In theory, they could immediately increase the standard 2.90-percent payroll tax by the amount of the actuarial deficit to 4.25 percent, or they could reduce expenditures by a corresponding amount. Note, however, that these changes would require an immediate 47-percent increase in the standard tax rate or an immediate 26-percent reduction in expenditures.” (p. 32-33, “2012 Annual Report of the Board of Trustees of Federal Hospital Insurance and Federal Supplementary Medical Insurance Trust Funds,” The Boards of Trustees of the Federal Hospital Insurance and Federal Supplementary Medical Insurance Trust Funds, 4/23/2012)

Democrats have already ravaged Medicare by taking $716 billion out of the program to pay for ObamaCare, while empowering a board of unelected and unaccountable bureaucrats to gut Medicare even more:

DEMOCRATS ALREADY CUT $716 BILLION FROM MEDICARE TO PAY FOR OBAMACARE: (Douglas Elmendorf, “Letter to the Honorable John Boehner,”Congressional Budget Office, 7/24/2012)

“OBAMA BUDGET WANTS MORE TEETH” FOR MEDICARE-GUTTING BOARD: (Phillip Klein, “Obama Budget Wants More Teeth for Medicare Board,” The Washington Examiner, 2/13/2012)

OBAMA BUDGET: “GIVE IPAB ADDITIONAL TOOLS LIKE THE ABILITY TO CONSIDER VALUE-BASED BENEFIT DESIGN” (READ: BENEFIT CUTS): (“Living Within Our Means and Investing in the Future,” Office of Management and Budget, September 2011)

“VALUE-BASED BENEFIT DEISGN” WOULD ALLOW IPAB TO EFFECTIVELY RATION HEALTHCARE SERVICES, INTERFERING WITH DOCTORS’ OWN PREFERRED TREATMENTS: “Value-based benefit design may enable IPAB to more effectively target cost sharing for those services that are most likely produce positive patient outcomes while reducing payments for services with less effective outcomes, explained Cori Uccello, the senior health fellow for the American Academy of Actuaries.” (Margaret Dick Tocknell, “IPAB to Kick in Early to Ease Impact of Medicare Cuts,” Health Leaders Media, 9/21/2011)

OBAMA FY2013 BUDGET ALSO VOWS TO BOOST IPAB’S POWER: “In addition, it strengthens the Independent Payment Advisory Board to reduce long-term drivers of Medicare cost growth.” (“Department of Health and Human Services,” The White House, February 2012)

THE ROAD TO RATIONING: DEMOCRATS’ PLAN ALL ALONG:

OBAMA IN 2009: GOVERNMENT SHOULD BE “ASSESSING AND EVALUATING TREATMENT OPTIONS,” ESPECIALLY “WHEN IT COMES TO MEDICARE AND MEDICAID”: “And part of what I think government can do effectively is to be an honest broker in assessing and evaluating treatment options. And certainly that’s true when it comes to Medicare and Medicaid, where the taxpayers are footing the bill and we have an obligation to get those costs under control.” (David Leonhardt, “After the Great Recession,” The New York Times, 4/28/2009)

“IT IS AN ATTEMPT TO SAY TO PATIENTS,” FACING A CHOICE BETWEEN A “RED PILL” AND A “BLUE PILL,” “YOU MIGHT WANT TO GO AHEAD AND GET THE BLUE ONE”: “So when Peter Orszag and I talk about the importance of using comparative-effectiveness studies (9) as a way of reining in costs, that’s not an attempt to micromanage the doctor-patient relationship. It is an attempt to say to patients, you know what, we’ve looked at some objective studies out here, people who know about this stuff, concluding that the blue pill, which costs half as much as the red pill, is just as effective, and you might want to go ahead and get the blue one. And if a provider is pushing the red one on you, then you should at least ask some important questions.” (David Leonhardt, “After the Great Recession,” The New York Times, 4/28/2009)

While Democrats made brutal cuts to Medicare, they ballooned the debt to historic levels. Time after time, Democrats have proven that they will take the axe to seniors’ Medicare if it means funding their spending addiction:

$5.54 TRILLION INCREASE IN NATIONAL DEBT SINCE OBAMA TOOK OFFICE: (“The Daily History of the Debt Results,” Bureau of the Public Debt, Accessed 10/10/2012)

NATIONAL DEBT CURRENTLY STANDS AT $16.17 TRILLION; SIZE OF NATION’S ECONOMY AT $15.59 TRILLION: (“The Daily History of the Debt Results,” Bureau of the Public Debt, Accessed 10/10/2012; Bureau of Economic Analysis, Accessed 9/18/2012)

POLITIFACT SAID LAST YEAR THAT OBAMA WAS THE “UNDISPUTED DEBT KING OF THE LAST FIVE PRESIDENTS”: “Obama is the undisputed debt king of the last five presidents, rather than the guy who added a piddling mount to the debt.” (Louis Jacobson, “Nancy Pelosi Posts Questionable Chart on Debt Accumulation by Barack Obama, Predecessors,” Politifact, 5/19/2011)

THREE YEARS AND TWO MONTHS OF OBAMA WAS MORE DEBT THAN EIGHT YEARS OF PREDECESSOR: “The National Debt has now increased more during President Obama’s three years and two months in office than it did during 8 years of the George W. Bush presidency. The Debt rose $4.899 trillion during the two terms of the Bush presidency. It has now gone up $4.939 trillion since President Obama took office.” (Mark Knoller, “National Debt Has Increased More Under Obama than Under Bush,” CBS News, 3/19/2012)

OBAMA RECORD “THE MOST RAPID INCREASE IN THE DEBT UNDER ANY U.S. PRESIDENT”: (Mark Knoller, “National debt has increased $4 trillion under Obama,” CBS News’ Political Hotsheet Blog, 8/22/2011)

CHINA OWNS $1.15 TRILLION IN U.S. DEBT: (“Major Foreign Holders of Treasury Securities,” U.S. Department of the Treasury, 9/18/2012)

Democrats Cut Seniors’ Medicare to Fund Their Spending Sprees http://ow.ly/enDYA#iwantrepeal