Ugh. They're back. Sens. Joe Lieberman and Tom Coburn are trying to put the catfood in the Catfood Commission II, pressing the Super Congress
punish seniors.
Sens. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) and Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) are pressing the deficit-reduction supercommittee to consider their proposal to cut more than $500 billion in Medicare spending over ten years.[...]
They urged the panel to review the Medicare reform plan they released in June.
It would increase the share that beneficiaries pay into the program to account for 35 percent, instead of 25 percent, of Medicare revenues. It would also require higher income earners to pay a greater share of Medicare Part B, which covers doctors' visits, and Part D, which covers prescription drugs.
Lieberman and Coburn would require people 65 and older who make more than $150,000 annually to pay the full cost of Part B coverage and full premium costs for Part D.
The plan was roundly rejected by Democrats when it was introduced in June, though one of the most controversial elements of it—raising the eligibility age for Medicare—got some traction when the White House put it on the table during debt-ceiling negotiations with Speaker John Boehner.
So here we go again, shifting the costs of Medicare onto the people it's supposed to be benefiting. The idea that there's tremendous savings to be had by making wealthy seniors pay more is something of a fallacy, because only a small percentage, about five percent, of seniors actually make more than $85,000.
It was a bad idea in June, and it's a bad idea now. But Ramesh Ponnuru likes it (he says who needs tax increases when you can slash Medicare?), so that's something going for the dastardly duo.