How do you know you're gettin' a little cocky (pardon the impending pun)?
When, despite a deficit and a health care crisis, you propose something like this to make sure that, you know, if you lose all your money and social security in a market crash, at least you can get it up, courtesy of Uncle Sam:
The Bush administration, so vocally obsessing about the imperative to reduce deficits, announces that beginning in 2006, under the Medicare prescription drug law, the U.S. government will cover erectile dysfunction drugs for senior citizens.
More...
From Mark Shields...
http://www.cnn.com/2005/ALLPOLITICS/02/14/viagra.falls/index.html
Not that I like the touch of moralizing but there ARE some rational Republicans out there...
"How can we urge young people, with raging hormones, to ideally abstain until they are married, but tell them they should work and pay taxes so that they can pay for senior citizens' Viagra? This represents a real-time intergenerational transfer of wealth," argues King.
And of course, from our side:
"Rep. Jim Moran, D-Virginia, a co-sponsor of the King bill, agrees: "Soon we'll have 61 million people on Medicare. There is a fierce competition for scarce dollars for medically necessary treatments of heart disease, cancer and kidney failure. It's unconscionable to require our grandkids to pay for our erectile dysfunction."
So... they wanna talk values? Let's frame this the Dirty Old Man Amendment and then let's see which Dirty Old Men are voting for it...