Best Clint Eastwood tweet ~

[jillan]

Matt Yglesias ‏@mattyglesias
Clint Eastwood demonstrating that seniors may not be prepared to navigate a menu of subsidized private insurance plans.

[MariaM83]

1. ahahahahah!!!

[jillan]

2. And a new twitter feed - InvisibleObama

http://twitter.com/InvisibleObama

[Lucy Goosey]

3. Latest tweet:

When Mitt Romney says "Mr. Chairman", do you think he's referring to me?

[JenniferJuniper]

18. Another

Invisible Obama‏@InvisibleObama

One nation! Under God! Invisible!

[RKP5637]

4. Wow, that is good !!!

[tomm2thumbs]

5. all the benefits of a union member, free health care, hypocrite Clint

oh, and old fuddy-duddy now that I've seen the tape

fitting

[MrMickeysMom]

6. thumbs up...

[dogknob]

7. Bob Newhart tweets:

Bob Newhart @BobNewhart

I heard that Clint Eastwood was channeling me at the RNC. My lawyers and I are drafting our lawsuit... #RNC #ClintEastwood #rnc2012

[Overseas]

10. Good one!

[LittleGirl]

46. OMG, that's hysterical.

Hope he got a lot of faves for that one. Who ever wrote it.

[kracer20]

8. Ed Schultz - edshow

The future of the country is at stake, and Republicans are on stage talking to furniture #msnbc2012

[luv_mykatz]

12. Bwahahahahahahaha!

[jillan]

14. hahahahahaha!!!! Good one Ed!!!!

[uponit7771]

24. +1

[Brigid]

37. This one is my favorite!

This is why we love you, Ed.

[annabanana]

44. good one..

Welcome to DU

[Overseas]

9. Sad to admit it but that is spot on.

[Cha]

11. FanFreakingTastic!

Eastwood makes my Day.

[Bigredhunk]

13. Ha!

It's hilarious that they wanted Eastwood. 8 months ago they hated him for doing the Chrysler spot during the Super Bowl.

[name not needed]

15. Mike Polk Jr. @mikepolkjr

Clint Eastwood is still continuing that speech backstage to a water cooler. #RNC

[Blanks]

41. LOL

[flamingdem]

16. brilliant nt

[JenniferJuniper]

17. Chris Rock's tweet:

Chris Rock@chrisrockoz


Clint Eastwood on the phone with Obama now: "It all went according to plan,sir." #RNC #GOP2012

[WheelWalker]

19. +1

[Coexist]

20. FastLaugh ‏@FastLaugh #Eastwooding Give Clint Eastwood a break... The RNC asked him to speak about

FastLaugh ‏@FastLaugh
#Eastwooding Give Clint Eastwood a break... The RNC asked him to speak about ObamaCare and he thought they said ObamaChair...

[Coexist]

21. Ben White ‏@morningmoneyben Clint Eastwood is in my bathroom right now yelling crazy stuff

Ben White ‏@morningmoneyben
Clint Eastwood is in my bathroom right now yelling crazy stuff at my toilet

[Bernardo de La Paz]

22. Four more chairs!

[genxlib]

23. Damn good point

This hits on one of my primary questions about the Ryan Medicare plan.

It is all well and good for a healthy 66 year old to properly analyze and select a private insurance plan.

But how the fuck is an 85 year old dimentia patient supposed to manage that.

[BlueStreak]

26. The same way that patient is going to come up with the extra $6000/year

In other words, it ain't gonna happen.

That is the thing that is so frustrating to me. The Ryan/Romney plan will take 15,000,000 seniors who have coverage today and will leave them with nothing but a worthless voucher. The voucher has no value unless you can scratch together the REST of the premium payment. Now this won't happen the first year, but that is absolutely inevitable if we followed their plan.

What are we going to do with 15,000,000 uninsured seniors? How come nobody is asking that question?

[genxlib]

32. Same answer to both

I think the answer to both of our questions is the same.

Medicare as it exists right now will remain for everyone who doesn't escape into the private market.

Which means (once again) that the private market will siphon off all of the relatively young and healthy (ie the profitable one) and leave the government to take care of the rest.

Which means of course that the system will get even more expensive.

It is the same problem on a larger scale that we have today. Private for the relatively young and well off but government for the elderly and poor. There proposal just makes it worse.

As an aside to your point, I don't believe it will really happen that way anyhow. Everybody knows that unhappy seniors are the most powerful voting block there is. Any gap between insurance cost and voucher value will get covered by scared politicians. Which means that the savings are mythical because the Congress won't have the guts to maintain the cost shifting that the plan relies on.

[BlueStreak]

33. You have to look 10 years down the road

These guys have been trying to kill Medicare continuously since it started. This is just another tactic.

Pretty Boy Ryan got his ass handed to him when he came out with the plan that put everybody on vouchers. So now he is back with a more disingenuous plan that is less financially sound. But it still ends up at the same place. It just takes 10 years to get there, but once they put that first step in place, they know they will have started the dominoes falling in a way that cannot be stopped.

Let's set aside the near term things. You are correct in the siphoning argument, but that is hard for non-accountants to understand, and therefore is not the point we should be emphasizing.

The thing that is easier to understand is the thing that NOBODY is talking about. If Ryan's plan were in effect today, 55-year-olds would have the chance to opt out of Medicare. And it would be in their short-term financial interest to do so. By opting out, they would end up with more take-home pay today. So the people who are going to opt out are mostly people who will not have the savings to pay for their private insurance when they are 65.

Now look down the road 10 years. What happens when these opt-out people can no longer work. They can't buy insurance. They have a worthless voucher in hand. Medicare does not exist as far as they are concerned.

The first year, maybe there are just a half million. But then the next year, it is a million, then 2 million. Eventually it becomes 15-25 million seniors who have no coverage -- and it all started with this Ryan plan.

Again I ask the most basic question. What do we do with 15,000,000 very expensive seniors with no health insurance? You know they will all end up on the ERs. How do we deal with that?

[genxlib]

34. Not my Understanding

I am not familiar with the specifics but I never thought there would be an opt out of the tax. After all, the vouchers still cost money so everybody still has to pay in like they always have been.

As I understand it, the only opt-out happens at 65 when you either take the voucher or stay in.

Which is really what makes it so insidious. We still have to continue paying in but our benefits or no longer guaranteed.

What you are describing seems to more accurately to descibe the privatizing Social Security where the current payee taxes would be diverted to private accounts. That would leave the system woefully underfunded to support current retirees.

In any event, even my more generous understanding of things is economically disastrous. If your version is really the case, it just makes it worse.

[BlueStreak]

38. I'm not sure there ARE any details

Last edited Fri Aug 31, 2012, 02:59 PM - Edit history (1)

I am just going based on the various things I have heard Romney and Ryan say.

If you pay the same amount all along, and then have the choice at age 65, why would anybody choose against full coverage in favor of a voucher worth part of the coverage? That would make no sense. And in that case, what would be the point of saying 55-year-olds are treated differently from 65-year-olds? If that was the plan, then they could start it tomorrow because they would be able to say "You can keep your Medicare as always with no changes, but you can choose to go with the glorious benefits of the free enterprise for-profit health insurance system."

And if the choice doesn't happen until 55-years-olds reach 65, then there would be no siphoning off of money today.

So I repeat. Why is nobody asking them these questions directly? Why are we wasting our time on an 82-year-old has-been actor with a sad case of dementia when there are issues of vital importance to all of us?

[genxlib]

39. We are on the same page

We are on the same page. It doesn't work no matter how you look at it so someone should be asking them these questions.

Peace, its been fun

[tclambert]

47. Salesmen for private insurance companies will help the 85 yo dementia patients,

without bias, without any personal agendas of their own, and without taking any advantage of the senior citizens. Because that would be dishonest and salesmen are never dishonest.

http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=&imgrefurl=http://mittromneycentral.com/category/special-occasions/page/2/&h=216&w=170&sz=13&tbnid=w6Z4760btI6j3M:&tbnh=93&tbnw=73&prev=/search%3Fq%3Dphoto%2Bof%2B%2Bromney%2Blaughing%26tbm%3Disch%26tbo%3Du&zoom=1&q=photo+of++romney+laughing&usg=__3pUR0IYKCVpDWIeNNo7K1GTlNhY=&sa=X&ei=aFxBUO6XGIPSqQHFsIHgCQ&ved=0CEAQ9QEwCQ&dur=732

[formercia]

25. Clint proves once again that Seniors

are more susceptible to fraud and abuse.

[beveeheart]

28. Funny, but true

[salinen]

27. I think joking about seniors mental capabilities

is dangerous ground.

[kickysnana]

29. It's OK. Irony then humor is the first to go...those of us who still can laugh are. n/t

[Alameda]

31. Yes, it's ageism and not cool at all. We all get there sometime, unless we die trying.

[JDPriestly]

36. I'm a senior and the problem is often exaggerated, but Alzheimers and senility

are facts of life. For many, they are a part of aging.

The Republicans' proposals for Medicare, retirement savings accounts and Social Security ignore that reality.

I suppose if you are rich, lawyers and watchful heirs help you pass through the hazy years. But if you are poor, you just starve without government assistance.

What the Republicans ignore with their "you're on your own, grandma" philosophy is how frightened and confused an elderly person cqn feel once she no longer understands the world or the choices she has to make.

Thanks to Social Security and Medicare, indigent seniors are not so common now. Change those programs. Cut them back, and you are going to see some really horrifying things.

(Unless you are a brutal, cold-hearted Republican.)

[aquart]

40. As a senior...LEMME TELL YA

I can't move the way I used to. Simple things have gotten unbearably tougher. Wading through the distraction of constant pain to made idiot hair fine choices about which insurance company makes a profit off me? I HATE IT. The paperwork is driving me insane.

[whathehell]

42. Agreed -- As my college professor said "It's stupid to laught at a group you're going to join".

[XemaSab]

43. My grandmother has only the vaguest idea what the internet is

and I don't think she's used a computer before in her life without one of her children or grandchildren there telling her what to do.

This is good, because if she was on the internet she would give all her money away to Nigerian scammers and shady evangelists.

I know that's not all old people, but there's a nugget of truth in the OP that's hard to argue with.

[Drum]

30. In pictures:

[JDPriestly]

35. Excellent observation because it is absolutely true.

As a lot of the children of the seniors will discover when the doctors and hospitals come to mom and dad to collect the unpaid bills that Medicare no longer pays.

[mountain grammy]

45. I'm with Chris Rock, it looked bad

and it was all an act of sabotage. Wonder if Clint has donated to Rmoney?

[jobycom]

48. This is the perfect representation of the campaign: an old white guy arguing with an imaginary Obama

Jamelle Boiue.

[abolugi]

49. My favorite Clint tweet..

Bill Maher ‏@billmaher:
Wow. Who knew Clint Eastwood was such a down the line rightwing asshole?

Frances Fisher ‏@Frances_Fisher
I did!



(Of course Frances Fisher was Clints ex)