Karl Rove urges GOP to campaign on eliminating Medicare

[Donnachaidh]

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2011/2/4/941023/-Karl-Rove-urges-GOP-to-campaign-on-eliminating-Medicare?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+dailykos%2Findex+%28Daily+Kos%29&utm_content=Twitter

Bush's Brain in the Wall Street Journal:

What the country most needs—and what the GOP must now advocate—is a fundamentally new approach to containing health-care costs.

The most promising model for Medicare comes from Clinton Budget Director Alice Rivlin and House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R., Wis.). Under their plan, starting in 2021 those turning 65 and going on Medicare would get a fixed contribution to use to purchase insurance, allowing them in many instances to keep their existing coverage. Consumers will be in charge.

Annual support would grow at the same yearly rate as the economy plus 1%. Medicare payments would be adjusted by income, geography and health risk. Poor seniors would get extra help for out-of-pocket expenses.

Under Rove's plan, Medicare as we know it would be eliminated and the benefits provided by its replacement would be dramatically curtailed.

Instead of automatically being covered by Medicare, seniors would be given a subsidy for purchasing private coverage on a health insurance exchange. If that sounds familiar, it's because that's the way health care reform delivers insurance in individual market. The difference is while health care reform delivers universal coverage to a market that doesn't currently have it, eliminating Medicare and replacing it with private insurance would actually cause costs to skyrocket because private insurance costs rise much more quickly than Medicare.

More at the link --

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

1. And the insurance companies will be clamoring to provide coverage

to millions of old sick people. How much would those vouchers be worth, I wonder?

[midnight]

2. K&R

[barbtries]

3. tell me again

why this FUCK is not in prison?

[Marblehead]

4. karl rove is

scum of the earth

[Gman]

5. Health insurance industry bail out

[leftstreet]

12. I wish they'd just skip to the bailout, instead of torturing us first n/t

[dkf]

6. Lol. They can do that if they support single payer instead

[groundloop]

7. The scary thing is that in a twisted way Rove makes this sound like a good idea

We all know that private insurance would be tremendously more expensive than Medicare or Single Payer, but I suspect the majority of people don't understand that. Further, by claiming that they'll be able to keep the same private insurance they currently have they'll stay with what's familiar to them. I pray our Democratic leaders have a good way to answer this and educate the general public.

As much as we all detest Rove, we need to understand that he's very bright and cunning (after all, he did manage to put Bush in the White House for 8 years).

[Jokinomx]

8. More insurance is not the answer.... We need to get rid of the insurance industry PERIOD!!

They dictate to doctors who will get coverage and who will not... they add ZERO to the bottom line...

If ANYONE can give me one GOOD thing health insurance brings to the table to make health care better... I would like to hear it....

just ONE thing...there isn't anything that couldn't be done without them.

All they do is deny ...deny ...and deny needed coverage to those that need it.

All families will eventually see this as they all will be screwed over at one time or another.

It's time to eliminate all health insurance companies and give control back to the doctors who provide the care.

[arbusto_baboso]

9. So much for Rove being a scary political evil genius.

If that's really the strategy he's proposing, then he's dumb as a box of hair.

Honestly, the seniors who swept so many teabagggers into power will just vote them right back out again in 2012 if they mention doing away with Medicare.

Geez. Rove and his allies are completely shameless and believe they're utterly untouchable.

[Ikonoklast]

13. If the GOP ever breathed a hint of this 'plan', they'd get the crap knocked out of them.

By little gray-haired ladies that carried signs at the Tea Bagger meet-ups that said "Say No To Socialized Medicine, And Keep Your Hands Off My Medicare".


They want to keep what government health care they have, they don't want anyone else to get it.

[NYC Liberal]

15. Rove has never been a political genius

Bush lost by over 500,000 votes in 2000 and only barely won in 2004 even after having a 92% approval rating only a few years before.

[arbusto_baboso]

16. Precisely. But even so, many here on DU...

still build him up into some unstoppable political colossus.

Truth is, like every other rightie, he's a delusional fuckbag.

[NYC Liberal]

18. He's alright at dirty tricks, but you don't need to be a genius

to bug your own office or litter a town with invitations to a strip club with your opponent's name on them.

[TacticalPeek]

10. Very, very disturbing.

He ain't kidding, and he got a turnip elected president twice.

[Thav]

11. "Annual support would grow at the same yearly rate as the economy plus 1%."

And annual premiums will grow at a much faster yearly rate.

[Volaris]

22. ahhhhhahahah no kidding lol....

If the cost of healthcare had gone DOWN after the bottom was stomped out of Wall Street, I might consider buying this bullshit....too bad for Rove that the price of HC went UP as the economy showed us what negative growth looks like..
the only people who will think this is remotely a good idea are the INS. and Pharma. companies and the people they pay to have bussed to wherever Glenn Beck is making a public appearance....

[spanone]

14. you go karl, the boomers will kick your fucking ass at the pols

[SoCalDem]

17. Know why?

Boomers were/are the REASON why so many companies started selling medical "insurance".

as millions of us "age-out" every year & enter medicare, their "suckercustomer" base is shrinking.

The people coming along behind us, are stuck in lower paid service jobs with little access (financially) to insurance and employers reluctant to offer it.

They see the handwriting on the wall, so of course the ONLY solution is to 86- medicare so we will have to got to THEM for coverage..

[Jefferson23]

19. He seems incapable of appreciating human life. K&R

[LiberalAndProud]

20. Seems like a platform sure to lose.

Folks who depend on Medicare who have consistently voted Republican in the past won't be counted on to do the same if they do this. Either Rove has lost his mind, finally, or he wants the Cons to keep their rightful place as the minority party. I have to admit, they do rule with an iron fist when they are in the minority.

[Vinca]

21. Letting Grandma die from being screwed over by big insurance . . .

great idea, Karl! It sounds like a winning platform.:banghead: