Mitt Romney Trying to Muddy the Issue on Medicare

Count me as one Republican who has had it with the lies from the RNC Chair Priebus, Mitt Romney and now Paul Ryan when it comes to Medicare.  Obama has not 'stolen' $700B from Medicare which is an outright lie being spouted by those three:

Of course, Mitt Romney is trying to muddy the issue. On the day he announced Ryan as his running mate, Romney accused President Obama of using the reform law to cut $700 billion from the Medicare program. That’s not true. In reality, that figure is what the Congressional Budget Office estimates will be saved over the next several years as a result of changes in the way Medicare pays doctors, hospitals and drug companies—changes that doctors, hospitals and drug companies endorsed. 

The real truth but we are not allowed to believe the 'real' truth in Republican circles because anything that doesn't come from Fox News or conservative pundits like Rush, Hannity and others along with conservative sites cannot be true.  Do you know how dumb that sounds but that is what they want out of today's Republicans. We are supposed to follow what they say like mind numbed robots to remain in good standing in the Republican Party.  Why would I care if I remain in good standing in the Republican Party when the Chair and the candidates for the White House are lying?  The attackers don't know me or they would know they are wasting their time and causing me to do more research to prove them wrong.  My stand on wanting truth out about Romney has caused me to lose some friends and gain some others.  What is important to me is that my three grown children are standing with me on what I have to say about this Republican Party.

The dishonesty of this whole deal shows a campaign that is losing big when you have to resort to using LIES to make your campaign look good.   They have gone from using innuendos some time ago to using outright lies using Rush Limbaugh and Fox News as their consultants.  Some days I think when I see a clip of Limbaugh, he is going to have a heart attack as he gets so worked up and mad unless it is an act.  Rush is hemorrhaging sponsors and costing his syndicator millions since he went on his rant against Fluke and women who dare to want access to contraceptives plus the Romney campaign as a whole.  The Rush hatred for Obama is so far over the top you have wonder why because he becomes unhinged when talking about Obama.  Surely he aware that a lot of what he spouts is not true and are lies being repeated against Obama.

Rush and Fox speaks and then these three parrots say exactly what they are instructed along with the parrot from the Romney campaign John Sununu who if you remember was fired by then George W. Bush for his father because he kept using government resources to play golf  like using helicopter transportation for starters.  Now he has latched on to Romney.  Bush 41 should have dumped Sununu long before he finally did and maybe he wouldn't have lost.

Last night I listened to Wendall Potter speak out and came away with confirmation on what I had found when resourcing what had happened with Obama and Medicare.  Turns Obama didn't steal a penny from seniors but this is a savings which will happen because in the Medicare program, he is cutting cost by the insurers, including the  and making the program more efficient.  Those private healthcare companies allowed by Medicare to serve Medicare recipients have driven up costs while some of them have provided poor service.  Having dealt with one for my Mom before she died, I would say whoever came up with that idea didn't know what they were doing.  That is what Obama is cutting.  That experience taught me you don't want anything to do with vouchers for Medicare.  The companies talked a good act to seniors but when it came to delivering, I never had as much trouble as I had with them and their charges to Medicare were out of sight.

Seniors have not seen nor will they see a degradation of their benefits under the Affordable Healthcare Act but why let the truth stand in the way of a lie from Priebus, Romney, and now Ryan who knows better as he used the money savings from Obama in his budget plan.  Now he trashes it like he doesn't know a thing about it.

From ABC:

The Obama campaign wasted no time before rolling out an attack ad featuring Floridian seniors voicing concerns about how Medicare cuts under Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney and his running mate Rep. Paul Ryan will affect them. But the ads raise questions about whether the Republican duo will really be “ending Medicare care as we know it” and increasing “seniors’ health costs by $6,350 a year.” 

So ABCNews.com fact-checked the claims for you, and found that they’re generally accurate given the information we have – assuming Romney embraces a plan that’s similar to Ryan’s budget proposal, that is.

 Been hearing from different people that the reason the insurance industry likes Romney is that they are going to get wealthier.  BTW, why did the Federal Governor allow insurance companies to become investment companies?

The Gramm–Leach–Bliley Act (GLB), also known as the Financial Services Modernization Act of 1999, (Pub.L. 106-102, 113 Stat. 1338, enacted November 12, 1999) is an act of the 106th United States Congress (1999–2001). It repealed part of the Glass–Steagall Act of 1933, removing barriers in the market among banking companies, securities companies and insurance companies that prohibited any one institution from acting as any combination of an investment bank, a commercial bank, and an insurance company. With the passage of the Gramm–Leach–Bliley Act, commercial banks, investment banks, securities firms, and insurance companies were allowed to consolidate. The legislation was signed into law by President Bill Clinton.

Anyone notice how some of the rich became richer after this and our health insurance premiums have gone out of sight?  Now if Romney/Ryan were elected the insurance companies and their investors could be making more money:

Wendell Potter: Ryan is a 'dream come true' for health insurance industry 

Tue Aug 14, 2012 10:55 AM EDT 

As someone who worked nearly two decades as a health insurance executive, I know that Mitt Romney’s selection of Rep. Paul Ryan as his running-mate is a dream come true for my former colleagues—and a potential nightmare for just about everyone else in America under the age of 55.

For years, the insurance industry has contributed generously to candidates who want to hand over the Medicare program to private insurance companies. That’s exactly what Ryan’s so-called “Path to Prosperity” would do. It would end the Medicare program as it has existed for almost half a century—a program that guarantees access to affordable care for senior citizens—and replace it with a scheme in which beneficiaries would be given “premium support” to help them buy coverage on the private market. Yes, the traditional Medicare program would continue to be a choice under the 2012 version of Ryan’s plan, but it would have to compete with private insurance companies. And because, under Ryan's plan, insurers would be able to cherry-pick the healthiest seniors, the traditional Medicare program would likely be unable to survive over the long haul. Perhaps it should come as no surprise that Ryan's wife is a former lobbyist for the health insurance industry. 

As the head of corporate communications for Cigna—charged, among other tasks, with disseminating financial information to the news media—I came to understand the lengths insurers routinely go to to satisfy shareholders and analysts. During congressional testimony in 2009, I explained how they make promises they have no intention of keeping, how they flout regulations designed to protect consumers, and how they make it nearly impossible to understand—or even obtain—information consumers need. I described how the big for-profit insurance corporations, in their quest to meet Wall Street’s profit expectations, often cancel the coverage of policyholders who get sick and how they implement “medical management” practices that often result in policyholders being denied coverage for care their doctors recommend.

The Affordable Care Act outlaws many of the most egregious practices of the insurance industry, such as refusing to sell coverage to people with preexisting conditions and charging older people many times more than what they charge younger people for the same coverage. Ryan proposes not only to privatize Medicare but also to scrap those consumer protections, by repealing the reform law. 

(snip)

They endorsed it because they understand the importance of providing coverage to the millions of people who are currently uninsured. The uninsured all too often show up at the emergency room to get care when they get sick or injured, and all too often they can’t pay their bills. Hospitals call this uncompensated care, but somebody has to pay for it, and that somebody is everybody with private insurance. Family premiums now cost more than $1,000 extra to help cover that uncompensated care. That’s what cost shifting is all about. 

Romney’s misleading talking point about that $700 billion reminded me of the work my former colleagues in the insurance industry and I used to do to scare people into believing things that were not true, such as calling the Affordable Care Act a “government takeover of health care.” It wasn't hard to get our friends in politics and the media to take our spin and run with it.
And given what a boon Ryan's plan would be for the industry, it looks like health insurers just got a very well-placed friend indeed.   

Read More at Lean Forward 

Now we are learning that Romney lied about Senator Wyden (D-OR) 'co-leading a piece of legislation' with Paul Ryan.  Will let Wyden explain:

But according to Wyden, Romney's telling of events is misleading and inaccurate.“Governor Romney is talking nonsense," Wyden said in an emailed statement Saturday night. "Bipartisanship requires that you not make up the facts. I did not ‘co-lead a piece of legislation.' I wrote a policy paper on options for Medicare."

Wyden noted he had spoken and voted against the Medicare provisions in the Ryan budget. "Governor Romney needs to learn you don't protect seniors by makings things up, and his comments sure won't help promote real bipartisanship,” he added. 

Wyden and Ryan did collaborate on a policy paper in December, proposing that seniors be given a choice between traditional Medicare coverage and an alternative private plan. Wyden's decision to team up with Ryan resulted in a fair amount of criticism from fellow Democrats, prompting him to defend the collaboration in a 2,380-word op-ed published on The Huffington Post. 

In the opinion piece, the Oregon senator clearly stated that the Wyden-Ryan approach was “simply a policy paper intended to start a conversation about how Democrats and Republicans might work together to uphold the Medicare Guarantee" and made it clear the proposal would in no way eliminate the traditional Medicare plan. 

Wyden also took issue with Romney in the March op-ed, stating, "Mitt Romney, for example, claims to have helped write Wyden-Ryan even though I have never spoken to him about Medicare reform and have yet to hear him declare that there should always be a role for traditional government-run Medicare." 

Wyden added that even if House Republicans incorporated the joint Medicare proposal in their budget, he couldn't "imagine a scenario" in which he would support that budget as a whole. 

Regardless of Wyden's push back, Republicans will likely continue to seize on the Wyden-Ryan plan to counter Democratic attacks on Ryan's original 2011 budget proposal. President Barack Obama has repeatedly targeted Romney for embracing the Ryan budget and calling it "marvelous," even though Romney has maintained that it is not the plan he would put forward if elected president. 

Even though Wyden set the record straight, Romney/Ryan continue to lie about what was involved.  It might be easier to keep track of when Romney tells the truth.

Just when the poor thought they had a shot at getting health insurance, five Republican Governors come along and pull the rug out from under them.  Will someone please tell me how someone doesn't qualify for Medicaid when they make only $5,000 a year in Texas or Louisiana, $8,000 in MS, $11,000 in FL, and $16,900 in South Carolina?  Now the Governors of those five states rejected Medicaid Expansion which will still not allow these people to get Medicaid.

People without any healthcare clog up emergency rooms and costing those of us with insurance a lot of money as our insurance premiums rise to compensate for the uninsured.  What part of that do the Governors not understand?  Maybe if they spent less time and money in their legislatures on bills about abortion, personhood, and gay marriage, there would be money to cover more people.  When you talk about lack of empathy, these five Republican Governors qualify for those badges:  Rick Perry (TX), Bobby Jindal (LA), Phil Bryant (MS), Rick Scott (FL), and Nikki Haley (SC).

Know some of those on the right will say these are bleeding heart stories, but these are real people with jobs not just sitting at home waiting for a welfare check like Romney declared.  Millionaire Governors declaring that poor will not get Medicaid in their state is beyond disgusting:

Medicaid Expansion Rejected By Governors Who Say Earning $11,000 Is Too Much

By CARLA K. JOHNSON and KELLI KENNEDY 08/14/12 06:57 PM ET  

 MIAMI — Sandra Pico is poor, but not poor enough.

She makes about $15,000 a year, supporting her daughter and unemployed husband. She thought she'd be able to get health insurance after the Supreme Court upheld President Barack Obama's health care law. 

Then she heard that her own governor won't agree to the federal plan to extend Medicaid coverage to people like her in two years. So she expects to remain uninsured, struggling to pay for her blood pressure medicine. 

"You fall through the cracks and there's nothing you can do about it," said the 52-year-old home health aide. "It makes me feel like garbage, like the American dream, my dream in my homeland is not being accomplished." 

Many working parents like Pico are below the federal poverty line but don't qualify for Medicaid, a decades-old state-federal insurance program. That's especially true in states where conservative governors say they'll reject the Medicaid expansion under Obama's health law.
In South Carolina, a yearly income of $16,900 is too much for Medicaid for a family of three. In Florida, $11,000 a year is too much. In Mississippi, $8,200 a year is too much. In Louisiana and Texas, earning more than just $5,000 a year makes you ineligible for Medicaid. 

Governors in those five states have said they'll reject the Medicaid expansion underpinning Obama's health law after the Supreme Court's decision gave states that option. They favor small government and say they can't afford the added cost to their states even if it's delayed by several years. Some states estimate the expansion could ultimately cost them a billion dollars a year or more. 

Many of the people affected by the decision are working parents who are poor – but not poor enough – to qualify for Medicaid. 

Republican Mitt Romney's new running mate, conservative Wisconsin congressman Paul Ryan, has a budget plan that would turn Medicaid over to the states and sharply limit federal dollars. Romney hasn't specifically said where he stands on Ryan's idea, but has expressed broad support for his vice presidential pick's proposals. 

(snip) 

The political rhetoric during a presidential campaign focuses on the middle class and leaves the uninsured working poor largely invisible, said Rand Corp. researcher Dr. Art Kellermann. 

"We hear a lot of talk about unemployment and the aspirations of middle-class Americans. But we don't hear about the consequences of unemployment and the consequences of the collapsing middle class," Kellermann said. Losing health insurance is one of those consequences. 

"It's like the public just doesn't want to believe anything else until it hits home," he said, "Until it's their own child, brother or parent that got laid off when they were 58, until then, it's not real."   

Excerpt:  Read More at Huffington Post

Today President George W Bush who is trashed roundly by the far right for his 'compassionate conservatism' makes me very proud to have supported him and now realize that his worst enemies came from within the Republican Party's huge donors and far right.  He understood the plight of the poor and seniors doing all he could to help them because he believed like many of us that is our obligation to help those less fortunate who are poor through no fault of their own.  These people hold jobs sometimes more than one and still cannot make ends meet as they have no benefits to go with those jobs.

Walmart and other places have made their owners very wealthy while their employees get the shaft by only allowing them to work so many hours so they qualify as a part-time employee.  Greed seems to have taken over in this Country now being led by today's Republicans along with the wealthy donors.  I have opposed unions for years but with what I am seeing, I am beginning to question a place like Walmart with no union representation.  My biggest gripe is with public service unions at the Federal Level but now with Romney/Ryan wanting to cut the DoD civilian workforce so drastically so their huge donor contractors can take over the jobs, I am even questioning my opposition to AFGE.  Maybe it is time to rejoin the National Active and Retired Federal Employees (NARFE) Association.

It is time for everyone to take an honest look at today's candidates and decide who to vote for instead of following the party blindly.  Surprising what taking off the blindfolds will do for you.  This Republican Party is nothing like the one I have supported for years.  It is a shame that Greed has infiltrated the RNC and campaigns of a lot of Republicans.  How many members of Congress were elected who made an above average living only to become millionaires by the time they left Congress?  Surely someone has done the research on that!