A letter to the editor published in the Herald Journal of North Logan, Utah by one Al Snyder of Mendon, Utah, says it better than anything else I've read recently:
To the editor:
I have the greatest health-care program in the United States. It is called Medicare.
I can go anywhere in the country, at any time, and receive state of the art medical care from facilities such as Mayo Clinic, MD Anderson and Sloan Kettering. It costs me only $96/month out of Social Security and $142/month for full coverage supplemental. I can tell you that when I moved to Utah before I received Social Security, I had an unexpected medical event that cost me $15,000 out of pocket because I could not obtain health insurance in-state and I did not qualify for the Utah high risk pool insurance. Since then I have had two cancer events that would have bankrupted me and probably led to death without Medicare.
The choice is clear. Do you want to be able to have affordable, transportable health care enabling you to receive the best care available anywhere or do you want the insurance industry to tell you where and what care you can receive within their system?
The idea that the U.S. cannot afford Medicare for its citizens is pure poppycock. We are spending trillions on two wars that were never financed while we cut taxes twice, especially for the rich and corporate America. Exxon Mobil, Bank of America, General Electric, Chevron, Goldman Sachs, Citigroup and ConocoPhillips paid no taxes while recording billions in profits. All this lost money could easily support Medicare. Medicare works, which does not mean that it can’t be improved from within to control costs and criminal misuse. Sen. Hatch, Sen. Lee, Rep. Chaffetz and Rep. Bishop, who want to disembowel Medicare, are in reality the grim reapers of death and bankruptcy.
Al Snyder
The grim reapers of death and bankruptcy.
This guy has a way with words! Perhaps the Democratic party could sign him up as their offical Medicare spokesperson for the 2012 elections? It would sure beat Steny Hoyer and Dick Durbin bleating about how Medicare is 'on the table', no?
One of the scariest things that I can think of -- for anyone who has ever had to deal with a private health insurance company or anyone who has read the horror stories -- is to think ahead to when you will be 75 or 80 years old and contemplate that you might have to battle with one of them about a claim or referral denial while your life hangs in the balance.
Yet such is Paul Ryan's plan -- to provide future Medicare recipients with vouchers which they will then use as partial payment towards their own, private, insurance policies, leaving them at the mercy of those same insurance companies.
That scares the bejesus out of me; if you have any sense it should scare the beyahweh out of you; and I suspect it scares the bezeus out of most people.
If it's not broken, don't throw it away. A lesson in common sense and frugality that Paul Ryan never seems to have quite gotten. Perhaps the voters will see to it that he gets that message in November, 2012.
9:12 AM PT: Coincidentally, I just got this email from Credo Action:
Tell Republican extremists in the Senate: Stop attacking Medicare.
