Reminder: The house passed the 2012 budget 12 weeks ago

[JRK]

No, no it wouldn't. It would change. Change and end are two entirely different things. Besides, you voted for "hope and change".

Given that this proposed change ultimately results in Medicare not existing anymore, change and end aren't two different things in this particular context.

Why the sensitivity to admitting this? I fully expected GOP politicians to tiptoe around the reality when they face angry constituents (as they have), but I've been surprised by the rightwing faithful's refusal to say out loud what they seek. You don't particularly care for the idea of a public health insurer (Medicare) paying doctors and hospitals to treat the elderly and offering a guaranteed benefit to beneficiaries. So you support eliminating the public health insurer and ditching the guaranteed benefit. But for some reason you're unable to acknowledge that this is ending Medicare.

It's very curious.

Greenbeard whats curious is you keep saying Medicare would not exist anymore and that is not true
It would change the way it serviced those who where under its umbrella. But it would not stop existing
Why do you keep saying that?
If you want to talk about ending it

e, back in 1965 we all entered into an agreement with Lyndon Johnson and his “great society.” We chip in three percent of our earnings into a trust fund and the government holds it for us until we retire, and then we can use it to help with our medical expenses. What a great idea!

A couple of years later, the Democrats realized they couldn’t really afford to pay for the Vietnam war, so they started dipping into the Medicare and Social Security trust funds to cover current governmental expenses. But, not to worry, the government left its IOUs for the little loans. Today, these two “trust funds” contain nothing but government IOUs.


(McAdam/PhotoShop)
With the baby boomer generation now beginning to go “over the hill,” they have begun asking for the Social Security and Medicare benefits they paid for. The government is now forced to pay these benefits out of current tax revenues. They would like to pay seniors with government IOUs, but have discovered that the seniors’ doctors, grocers, and landlords won’t accept any paper more worthless than greenbacks.

With the government once again in the control of the “a little something for everybody” Democrats, legislation is pending in the congress to extend health insurance benefits to a great number of persons—illegal immigrants included—who can’t afford it; or for some other reason failed to pay for it. Where can the government find the money to pay for this new “entitlement?”

Here’s an idea: “Why don’t we just swipe half of the current Medicare tax payments, and divert the funds over into ObamaCare? After all, the people didn’t squeal too much when we robbed their trust funds, back in the day.”


(animationlibrary.com)
Sure, the Republicans put up a fuss last Thursday. They proposed an amendment that would stave off Medicare cuts, and would have guaranteed coverage of mammograms and pap smears for women under ObamaCare. But the senators voted (pretty much along party lines) 58-42 to reject these ideas.

“Medicare is already in trouble. The program needs to be fixed, not raided to create another new government program,” said Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky.



Continue reading on Examiner.com ObamaCare stealing $500 billion from Medicare trust fund - Louisville Public Policy | Examiner.com ObamaCare stealing $500 billion from Medicare trust fund - Louisville Public Policy | Examiner.com

 

[Greenbeard]

Greenbeard whats curious is you keep saying Medicare would not exist anymore and that is not true
It would change the way it serviced those who where under its umbrella. But it would not stop existing
Why do you keep saying that?

Because I know what Medicare is. Medicare is a payer--a public health insurer. As you said above, under the Republican proposal the "difference was that private insurance firms would be dealing with the Drs and not the US govt." In other words, that public payer (Medicare) would no longer exist. Since paying for health services is what Medicare does (i.e. Medicare is a payer), you're describing a world without Medicare.

You've acknowledged the relevant facts, you're just feigning ignorance. Like I said, why the rightwing faithful feel the need to do so in casual conversation remains a bit of a mystery to me.

 

[Trajan]

What have the Dems proposed to fix Medicare . . other than just bashing any Republican plan?

They've gotten the ball rolling over the past few years with a series of Medicare reforms. For example:

• Value-based purchasing in Medicare.
• Building on quality measure advancement begun for children two years ago under CHIPRA by extending it to adults and expanding public reporting on quality.
• Incentives for accountable care.
• Upping AHRQ's in health care delivery system research and building technical assistance capacity to assist providers in implementing delivery system innovations.
• Launching one of the largest patient safety initiatives in recent memory, aimed at curbing unnecessary expenditures due to preventable errors and hospital-acquired conditions, is not a price control.
• Supporting community-based prevention efforts, particularly those aimed at chronic illness (one of the big cost drivers in our system).
• Offering financial incentives for Medicare and Medicaid providers who adopt electronic health records with clinical support tools and quality measurement capabilities.
• Seeding models of advanced primary care aimed specifically at high-utilization, high-cost beneficiaries.
• Payment reforms to discourage unnecessary spending.
• Improving care coordination, particularly for those needing the most complex and expensive care regimes (and thus likely to benefit the most from it).
• Transitioning enrollees from institution-based long-term care to community-based care where possible.
• Learning which treatments are the most effective and using that knowledge.
• Creating a body dedicated to testing payment and delivery system innovations to determine which ones improve quality an reduce costs, and a mechanism for using that knowledge.

I don't know if you count Obama as a Democrat but he's shown a willingness recently to go much further, adopting some of the Lieberman-Coburn reforms.

I see, the democrats own all of those ? I'd like to hear you say that , or that is write that......

 

[JRK]

Greenbeard whats curious is you keep saying Medicare would not exist anymore and that is not true
It would change the way it serviced those who where under its umbrella. But it would not stop existing
Why do you keep saying that?

Because I know what Medicare is. Medicare is a payer--a public health insurer. As you said above, under the Republican proposal the "difference was that private insurance firms would be dealing with the Drs and not the US govt." In other words, that public payer (Medicare) would no longer exist. Since paying for health services is what Medicare does (i.e. Medicare is a payer), you're describing a world without Medicare.

You've acknowledged the relevant facts, you're just feigning ignorance. Like I said, why the rightwing faithful feel the need to do so in casual conversation remains a bit of a mystery to me.

I have no idea what you are talking about
Medicare would go from paying the services to paying the insurance company money to pay for those same services

I am also somewhat interested in you not commenting on a real issue with Medicare that really happened
e, back in 1965 we all entered into an agreement with Lyndon Johnson and his “great society.” We chip in three percent of our earnings into a trust fund and the government holds it for us until we retire, and then we can use it to help with our medical expenses. What a great idea!

A couple of years later, the Democrats realized they couldn’t really afford to pay for the Vietnam war, so they started dipping into the Medicare and Social Security trust funds to cover current governmental expenses. But, not to worry, the government left its IOUs for the little loans. Today, these two “trust funds” contain nothing but government IOUs.


(McAdam/PhotoShop)
With the baby boomer generation now beginning to go “over the hill,” they have begun asking for the Social Security and Medicare benefits they paid for. The government is now forced to pay these benefits out of current tax revenues. They would like to pay seniors with government IOUs, but have discovered that the seniors’ doctors, grocers, and landlords won’t accept any paper more worthless than greenbacks.

With the government once again in the control of the “a little something for everybody” Democrats, legislation is pending in the congress to extend health insurance benefits to a great number of persons—illegal immigrants included—who can’t afford it; or for some other reason failed to pay for it. Where can the government find the money to pay for this new “entitlement?”

Here’s an idea: “Why don’t we just swipe half of the current Medicare tax payments, and divert the funds over into ObamaCare? After all, the people didn’t squeal too much when we robbed their trust funds, back in the day.”


(animationlibrary.com)
Sure, the Republicans put up a fuss last Thursday. They proposed an amendment that would stave off Medicare cuts, and would have guaranteed coverage of mammograms and pap smears for women under ObamaCare. But the senators voted (pretty much along party lines) 58-42 to reject these ideas.

“Medicare is already in trouble. The program needs to be fixed, not raided to create another new government program,” said Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky.



Continue reading on Examiner.com ObamaCare stealing $500 billion from Medicare trust fund - Louisville Public Policy | Examiner.com ObamaCare stealing $500 billion from Medicare trust fund - Louisville Public Policy | Examiner.com

 

[JRK]

One other item with the Ryan proposal
we will never know what the final product would have looked like because Harry Reid would not allow it to be debated on the floor of the US senate

I have little doubt there is a reason you keep saying the same thing over and over that has nothing to do with the subject matter
The GOP proposed a budget for 2012 and beyond that passed the house
It had alot of thought put into it
And yes it proposed changes to Medicare and at no time did it state it was going to remove 500 billion dollars from it to pay for something else, like Obama-care

This country needs resolve and people who are willing to put out that effort to get that resolve. we should have used the Ryan Budget as a place to start]
it has the will of the people behind it

 

[JRK]

Lets try this again

Where in this does it say that Medicare would end

B People who turn 65 in 2022 or later years and Disability Insurance beneficiaries
who become eligible for Medicare in 2022 or later would not enroll in the current
Medicare program but instead would be entitled to a premium support payment to
help them purchase private health insurance.
8
B Beneficiaries of the premium support payments would choose among competing
private insurance plans operating in a newly established Medicare exchange. Those
plans would have to comply with a standard for benefits set by the Office of
Personnel Management. Plans would have to issue insurance to all people eligible
for Medicare who applied and would have to charge the same premiums for all
enrollees of the same age. The premium support payments would go directly from
the government to the plans that people selected.
B The premium support payments would vary with the health status of the
beneficiary. In addition, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services would
collect fees from plans with healthier enrollees, on average, and convey the proceeds to plans with less healthy enrollees, on average, with the goal of appropriately
compensating plans for the health risks of their insured population. This riskadjustment mechanism would be known as the risk review audit and would be
budget-neutral.
B The payment for 65-year-olds in 2022 is specified to be $8,000, on average, which
is approximately the same dollar amount as projected net federal spending per capita for 65-year-olds in traditional Medicare (that is, the program’s outlays minus
receipts from the premiums enrollees pay for Part B and Part D, expressed on a per
capita basis) under current law in that year. People who become eligible for Medicare in 2023 and subsequent years would receive a payment that was larger than
$8,000 by an amount that reflected the increase in the consumer price index for all
urban consumers (CPI-U) and the age of the enrollee. The premium support payments would increase in each year after initial eligibility by an amount that
reflected both the increase in the CPI-U and the fact that enrollees in Medicare
tend to be less healthy and require more costly health care as they age. (For example, projected net federal spending per capita for all people age 65 and older in traditional Medicare would be about $15,000 in 2022, CBO estimates, in
comparison with about $8,000 for 65-year-olds.)
B The premium support payments would also vary with the income of the beneficiary. People in the top 2 percent of the annual income distribution of the
Medicare-eligible population would receive 30 percent of the premium support
amount described above; people in the next 6 percent of the distribution would
receive 50 percent of the amount described above; and people in the remaining
8. In 2022 or later, people who are newly diagnosed with end-stage renal disease or amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), commonly known as Lou Gehrig’s disease, would receive premium support
payments as well.Page 9
CBO
92 percent of the distribution would receive the full premium support amount
described above.
B Beginning in 2022, the federal government would establish a medical savings
account (MSA) for certain beneficiaries with low income. (An MSA is an account
that holds deposits that can be used for medical expenses.) Eligibility for MSA payments would be determined annually by the federal government on the basis of
income relative to the federal poverty thresholds. The amount of the contribution
in 2022 would be $7,800, and the annual amounts in subsequent years would
grow with the CPI-U.
B Eligibility for the traditional Medicare program would not change for people who
are age 55 or older by the end of 2011 or for people who receive Medicare benefits
through the Disability Insurance program prior to 2022. As a result, the average
age and average costs of enrollees remaining in the traditional Medicare program
would increase over time. However, enrollees’ premiums under traditional Medicare would be adjusted to equal what they would be under current law—a so-called
hold harmless provision. People covered under traditional Medicare would, beginning in 2022, have the option of switching to the premium support syst

 

[kwc57]

No, no it wouldn't. It would change. Change and end are two entirely different things. Besides, you voted for "hope and change".

Given that this proposed change ultimately results in Medicare not existing anymore, change and end aren't two different things in this particular context.

Why the sensitivity to admitting this? I fully expected GOP politicians to tiptoe around the reality when they face angry constituents (as they have), but I've been surprised by the rightwing faithful's refusal to say out loud what they seek. You don't particularly care for the idea of a public health insurer (Medicare) paying doctors and hospitals to treat the elderly and offering a guaranteed benefit to beneficiaries. So you support eliminating the public health insurer and ditching the guaranteed benefit. But for some reason you're unable to acknowledge that this is ending Medicare.

It's very curious.

Did television end or change when we went thru the analog to digital transition?

The Digital TV Transition: What You Need to Know About DTV

 

[Greenbeard]

I have no idea what you are talking about

That has become increasingly clear to me.

One other item with the Ryan proposal
we will never know what the final product would have looked like because Harry Reid would not allow it to be debated on the floor of the US senate

Reid brought it to the floor for a vote. It failed.

And yes it proposed changes to Medicare and at no time did it state it was going to remove 500 billion dollars from it to pay for something else, like Obama-care

WSJ:

Last fall, Republicans spent millions on TV ads attacking Democrats for cutting Medicare. Those cuts—which reduced reimbursements to drug companies, hospitals and insurance companies and totaled about $500 billion over 10 years—were made to pay for the new subsidies to younger, uninsured Americans. [...]

This week, Rep. Paul Ryan, chairman of the House Budget Committee, released his budget proposal. It included a major restructuring of the Medicare program, and repealed much of the Democratic health care law. But his plan keeps in place the Medicare reductions.​

The Republican budget doesn't start prohibiting new enrollment into Medicare until 2022. Thus, the only way for it to claim Medicare savings in the ten-year budget window is to retain the Medicare savings in the ACA. Which it does.

 

[Greenbeard]

Where in this does it say that Medicare would end

It would help if you could sketch out for me your understanding of what Medicare it is. It seems to me the conceptual problem here is simply that you're not familiar with what Medicare is, what it's for, and what it does.

 

[JRK]

Where in this does it say that Medicare would end

It would help if you could sketch out for me your understanding of what Medicare it is. It seems to me the conceptual problem here is simply that you're not familiar with what Medicare is, what it's for, and what it does.

I have an understanding that this thread was about the 2012 budget
i also understand that Medicare is a Govt program that pays for medical services for people who are for what ever reason with in that program as it is stated
It is my understanding that the Ryan proposal would shift that portion to the private sector while the Govt kept collecting the cash and with that cash as I see it, pay those companies to perform those functions

Now how much more complicated is this?

 

[8537]

"A couple of years later, the Democrats realized they couldn’t really afford to pay for the Vietnam war, so they started dipping into the Medicare and Social Security trust funds to cover current governmental expenses. But, not to worry, the government left its IOUs for the little loans. Today, these two “trust funds” contain nothing but government IOUs."

Let me ask ya something, JRK - where do you believe the excess revenues from SS / Medicare were kept before "Democrats...started dipping into the Medicare and SS trust funds to cover governmental expenses"?

I have always thought these programs should have been removed form the general pool

I'm not asking what you believe should be done with them, I'm asking what you think was done with those excesses prior to LBJ.

 

[JRK]

Let me ask ya something, JRK - where do you believe the excess revenues from SS / Medicare were kept before "Democrats...started dipping into the Medicare and SS trust funds to cover governmental expenses"?

I have always thought these programs should have been removed form the general pool

I'm not asking what you believe should be done with them, I'm asking what you think was done with those excesses prior to LBJ.

I do not know enough about those events to comment on that
SS, taking care of those who cannot take care of themselves as well as those who are retired deserve these programs
The govt has done a horrific job in the care and custody of these items

We should seperate them from the general pool and fund them accordingly

 

[JRK]

I also think that the Ryan bill is on the right track
you can debate the voucher program, but funding them as part of the GDP by a % of is the correct way
the system was broke by both parties

GWB tried to take the excess we had and allow us to invest it in the market
my 401k was not harmed that much and is back in good standing. This was due to having it in secure securities

I cannot say the same of the ones I day traded
I am back to even there
It took 33 months to do it

 

[Nic_Driver]

Do you have a link to back that up?
I sure cannot find it

You might try the actual budget resolution the House passed in April.

(5) DEBT SUBJECT TO LIMIT- Pursuant to section 301(a)(5) of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974, the appropriate levels of the public debt are as follows:

Fiscal year 2012: $16,204,000,000,000.

Fiscal year 2013: $17,177,000,000,000.

Fiscal year 2014: $17,951,000,000,000.

Fiscal year 2015: $18,697,000,000,000.

Fiscal year 2016: $19,503,000,000,000.

Fiscal year 2017: $20,245,000,000,000.

Fiscal year 2018: $20,968,000,000,000.

Fiscal year 2019: $21,699,000,000,000.

Fiscal year 2020: $22,408,000,000,000.

Fiscal year 2021: $23,102,000,000,000.

It's a very "liberal" thing to do to actually look at the legislation in question, I know. But if you opted to do that, you'd note that it allows for an additional $9 trillion in debt over the next decade (a >60% increase in the debt).

So let's not get too swept up in fantasies about the Republican budget. It doesn't produce a balanced budget for a few decades, and thus the debt continues to tick upwards.

I don't understand.

12 weeks ago it was understood by everyone that the debt limit would increase?

Is that how this quote reads?

 

[JRK]

Do you have a link to back that up?
I sure cannot find it

You might try the actual budget resolution the House passed in April.

(5) DEBT SUBJECT TO LIMIT- Pursuant to section 301(a)(5) of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974, the appropriate levels of the public debt are as follows:

Fiscal year 2012: $16,204,000,000,000.

Fiscal year 2013: $17,177,000,000,000.

Fiscal year 2014: $17,951,000,000,000.

Fiscal year 2015: $18,697,000,000,000.

Fiscal year 2016: $19,503,000,000,000.

Fiscal year 2017: $20,245,000,000,000.

Fiscal year 2018: $20,968,000,000,000.

Fiscal year 2019: $21,699,000,000,000.

Fiscal year 2020: $22,408,000,000,000.

Fiscal year 2021: $23,102,000,000,000.

It's a very "liberal" thing to do to actually look at the legislation in question, I know. But if you opted to do that, you'd note that it allows for an additional $9 trillion in debt over the next decade (a >60% increase in the debt).

So let's not get too swept up in fantasies about the Republican budget. It doesn't produce a balanced budget for a few decades, and thus the debt continues to tick upwards.

I don't understand.

12 weeks ago it was understood by everyone that the debt limit would increase?

Is that how this quote reads?

That quote by JRK (above here) is being took out of context
My god on this level A liberal would do that?
On a message board?
The question was about Medicare and the allegation that the Ryan budget would end Medicare
I still have not found that quote. i did find the place in which it would be changed

Back to the deficit
Clinton as president, Liberals do not add the interest
GWB add
Obama, do not
Ryan Budget
yes

Those numbers above do not reflect the yearly deficit
they are the as noted, the total debt

Policy and inherited debt are 2 very different things

 

[Nic_Driver]

You might try the actual budget resolution the House passed in April.



It's a very "liberal" thing to do to actually look at the legislation in question, I know. But if you opted to do that, you'd note that it allows for an additional $9 trillion in debt over the next decade (a >60% increase in the debt).

So let's not get too swept up in fantasies about the Republican budget. It doesn't produce a balanced budget for a few decades, and thus the debt continues to tick upwards.

I don't understand.

12 weeks ago it was understood by everyone that the debt limit would increase?

Is that how this quote reads?

That quote by JRK (above here) is being took out of context
(...) yes

So the answer is yes? The Republicans knew the debt limit would have to increase 12 weeks ago when they approved a budget that included this increase?


Now there's an issue with increasing the debt limit?


Wow, kind of puts the whole thing in perspective doesn't it?

 

[Quantum Windbag]

Er, the House Republican budget passed in April keeps increasing the debt. That's why it raises the debt ceiling from the current $14.294 trillion limit to $23.102 trillion by 2021.

How could we stop the raising of the debt ceiling as any bill that would make real cuts would not get through the senate and the president would veto it.

The House budget wasn't intended to be a realistic document. No budget ending Medicare was going to clear the Senate or be signed by Obama. This was the Republicans' blue sky statement budget. And it would continue to add to the debt.

Too bad no one ever passed a budget that ended Medicare.

Since you are in here attempting to defend the Senate, can you tell me the last time they passed a budget resolution? How many votes did Obama's budget for this year get in the Senate?

 

[Quantum Windbag]

End Medicare?

Yes. The Republicans set an arbitrary date after which no one will be allowed to enroll in Medicare. Those lucky enough to be grandfathered into the program will be gently coerced into abandoning Medicare (as Medicare's bargaining power relative to providers steadily erodes as the program is phased out of existence) and into looking for a private insurance plan. The goal is rather straightforward: phase Medicare out of existence so that eventually no one has it. That's what it means to end Medicare. And that's what House Republicans have passed.

That is a fucking lie.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

End Medicare?

Yes. The Republicans set an arbitrary date after which no one will be allowed to enroll in Medicare. Those lucky enough to be grandfathered into the program will be gently coerced into abandoning Medicare (as Medicare's bargaining power relative to providers steadily erodes as the program is phased out of existence) and into looking for a private insurance plan. The goal is rather straightforward: phase Medicare out of existence so that eventually no one has it. That's what it means to end Medicare. And that's what House Republicans have passed.

Do you have a link to a thread that will confirm that?
Its not what I recall Ryan stating

He does not have a link because it is a lie. He is a shill for the DNC.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

What budget have the Dems put forth again?

The problem isn't a shortage of budgets. Obama produced a budget, House Democrats introduced a budget, the House Progressive Caucus produced a budget, Kent Conrad produced a budget. The challenge, as we've seen, is finding the mix of these proposals that can pass.

Again, which budget the the Senate actually pass? When was the last time the Senate actually passed a budget resolution?