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- iHaveNet.com: Politics
by Robyn Blumner
The
It was last month at the
Ryan is feeding seniors' fears over rationed government care but fails to fess-up to all the rationing he has in store.
First, let's sweep away misconceptions about the "
Here's how the board works: Fifteen experts in health care, including consumers and seniors -- not government bureaucrats -- appointed by the president but confirmed by the
Contrary to Ryan's claims, the board cannot ration care, raise taxes or premiums, or restrict benefits to bend
This studied approach preserves
Except no true fiscal conservative would vote to put two wars, tax cuts for the wealthy and the
So, while not a true fiscal conservative, he is opposed to government rationing care, right? Not really.
Ryan's budget blueprint, the one passed by the House in March, is a manifesto of government-rationed care, a modern-day Magna Carta Libertatum to Ryan's philosophy that freeing Americans from debilitating government aid is the only way their productive potential will be fully realized. Ryan introduced it by saying he doesn't want America's safety net programs to become "a hammock that lulls able-bodied people into lives of dependency and complacency, that drains them of their will and their incentive to make the most of their lives."
Ryan's freedom agenda includes "vouchercare" through which Americans who become
For middle-class seniors needing a nursing home placement paid for by
Poor families would have the freedom to either find decent paying jobs or go hungry, since their access to food stamps would be rationed. Ryan would block grant that program, too, and institute a time limit.
The man has taken as an injunction Janis Joplin's famous lyric that "freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose." Where FDR would grant us freedom from want, Ryan gives us freedom from help. But at least there will be no "unaccountable bureaucrats" subverting
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Paul Ryan Calling the Kettle Black with Medicare Scare Tactics | Politics
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