HHS Secretary Mike Leavitt said today that Medicare is essentially a "government-regulated price-fixing system."
If you're paying attention, you might notice that the Bush administration is still trying to sell us their policies. Even the ones we thought they'd abandoned in favor of making George W. a "War President" (War Presidents get 25% in the Presidential Library section of Home Depot). Even 5 years after their failed, illegal, unnecessary war has proven to be the result of deception.
At a briefing that should have been about making Social Security and Medicare provide, you know, benefits to all Americans, Mike Leavitt got up in front of the podium and essentially railed against the social safety net at a time when Americans are feeling the crunch of an oncoming Depression. And to make sure we were clear that yes, privatizing Social Security is back, AGAIN, our Social Security Commissioner ended his remarks by scolding us to make sure our scraping by and begging for tips in these lean years is supplemented by more aggressive personal savings. You aren't saving enough, see.
Watch the briefing yourself. The McBush administration is going to try to put Social Security and Medicare on the table, AGAIN. I don't know about you, but i've had to use ASSCAPS more times at the end of this administration than i did trying to prevent it from happening. How is it that we stop McBush by ignoring him and targeting Clinton, again?
I know it's really important that Hillary said that maybe she was born with it when, on the contrary, we have determined maybe it's Maybelline, but we still have an out-of-control President and an out-of-control Congress that can't be trusted to act on our priorities. What are we going to do about it?
Congressional Quarterly has provided a helpful observation to let us know that this report about the danger! to our entitlement programs is bullshit: there are supposed to be two non-kommisars on the board of trustees for Social Security and Medicare. Guess how many there are?
Come on, it's the McBush Admnistration. You guessed a number? Don't you realize that the Obstructionist Democrat Party is keeping the President's hands tied with pesky Senate business like the First, Fourth, Fifth, and Fourteenth amendments, and several other parts of the Constitution not described in Article II? They had no choice, they had to let contractorsbig government impartial administration officials bring your attention to this crisis. Crisis! The era of big government is over!
John McBush is going to try to put Social Security and Medicare on a platter--again--for the same investment banking industry that has just eaten $30 Billion of our tax dollars. Unless we spend more time criticizing him. And unless we write to our representatives in Congress, and the fourth estate, and tell them to stop peddling this "entitlement programs are in crisis" ill-na-na. The first two W. McBush administrations tried this and failed. Now they figure we'll either listen or ignore it when Social Security and Medicare become fearmongering fodder, again. Again.
Mike Leavitt said it himself (transcript):
Dire warnings have become a seasonal occurrence. I noted today in Washington, DC that they cherry blossoms are out. They started to bloom today; it's part of nature's rhythm. That's the way Spring is in Washington: we see the cherry blossoms and hear Medicare warnings, the cherry blossoms go away and nothing happens with Medicare. The Trustee Report illuminates with specificity the decisions that policymakers, no matter what their party, will face over the course of the next several years if we continue to travel the same course. Currently, Medicare is a centrally-planned, government-regulated system of price-fixing...
I think you know the rest. So, are we going to let them make this year like every other year, where the cherry blossoms come out and we get another terror alertentitlement program warning? Or are we going to call bullshit? Against John McCain, people. He's going to campaign on this. What are we going to do about it?
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Watch the video on C-Span (should be linked, above). Read the report yourself, and see if the news stories, if there are any, don't have exactly the same language as this Press Release about it: Medicare Trustees Report Shows Serious Financial Status of Medicare Program. You'd think John McCain would be in favor of Social Security and Medicare, but we forget: he's been getting tax-sponsored healthcare for years, and he'll keep getting it, unless we throw the bums out.