Republican hypocrisy reigns supreme as they plan to dismantle Medicare

Even as they denounce modest democratic proposals to rein in Medicare’s rising costs, the Republicans, themselves, are seeking to dismantle the whole program. Dismantling would begin with spending cuts of about $650 billion over the next decade.

Rep. Paul Ryan, the ranking Republican member of the House Budget Committee, recently released a budget plan called the “Roadmap for America’s Future”.

What emerges from this scheme is an economic agenda that hasn’t changed one bit in response to the economic failures of the Bush years. In addition to a plan for Social Security privatization,  a twin to the Bush proposal of five years ago, Rep. Ryan offers a plan to dismantle Medicare.

In the Republican plan, nobody currently under the age of 55 would be covered by Medicare as it now exists. Instead, people would receive vouchers and be forced to buy their own insurance. This new privatized version of Medicare would erode over time because the value of these vouchers would likely lag ever further behind the actual cost of health insurance. By the time Americans now in their 20s or 30s reached the age of eligibility, there wouldn’t be much of a Medicare program left.

Of those who already are covered by Medicare, or who will enter the program over the next decade, they will still be eligible for traditional Medicare. However the Congressional Budget Office has determined that the Republican plan would force higher-income enrollees to pay higher premiums, and payments to Medicare programs would be reduced.  In short, there would be significant cuts to Medicare and higher fees as proposed by the Republicans.

Just as the republicans have waged war against health reform with utter hypocrisy, they plan the same for Medicare. 

Republicans, who hate Medicare and tried to cut off funding for it in the past, and still aim to dismantle the program over time, have been scoring political points by denouncing democratic proposals for modest cost savings; savings that are substantially smaller than the $650 billion in spending cuts concealed in their own republican proposals.

If Democrats don’t get their act together, this shameless act of stunning republican hypocrisy will succeed.