WINDHAM, N.H. — When President Obama visits Windham and Rochester on Saturday, he will, aides say, raise the specter of a sweeping Medicare change proposed by Representative Paul D. Ryan, the presumptive Republican pick for vice president.
Ryan argues that spiraling Medicare costs can be curbed through a voucher system that would pay seniors a fixed amount for medical care. But Democrats counter that cash-strapped elders would face thousands of dollars in extra costs and lower-quality care.
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Shameless political commentary disguised as journalism. Is the truth too much for the Globe?
Good old Yolan Carter. I got mine, screw everyone else.
President Obama's plan is to cut money from Hospitals, doctors, home health care to reign in costs, how does he think that's going to work, some hospitals will go out, doctors will s top taking medicare patients, and less seniors will get help at home, that result will not be good.
The newest version of the Ryan plan says that if you wish to stay with the current system when you turn 65 you can, or go with the voucher system and buy from insurance companies. Companies will offer varying packages. If you choose the cheaper package you get less coverage. Guess what poorer people will choose? When they incur larger bills that are not completely covered, they are stuck with the bill. Remember, insurance companies are all about profit, the government is not. If it is true that people will be able to stay with the current system, why on earth would anyone choose a voucher system? Therefore, there is no savings to Medicare. The Ryan plan as it currently stands is a slippery slope for future seniors.
Coupons for care? Don't think so.
WASTE and INSURANCE companies. You forgot those.
Goodie... another Globie does a nobly heightened "story" about a Barry the O event before the event, so Barry the O fans can wax enthusiastic while waiting for their leader to come wax philosophical warnings about those terrible Romney and Ryan proposals that so countermand Barry's hyperexpensive programs. Barry will surely promise and promise and promise, like any astute left-listed pol would do, and some of the O fans will acctually fall into line. Now the question will be, does anybody think Barry the O will benefit from a few questionable votes like the ones that Lizzy Warren's daughter's favorite leftish organization maybe will secure from folks who have no citizenship right to do such a thing as vote in the U.S.?
versus his plan?
http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2012/08/17/400-Independent-Economists-Support-Romney-s-Bold-Economic-Plan-For-America Five Nobel laureates (Gary Becker, Robert Lucas, Robert Mundell, Edward Prescott, and Myron Scholes) signed the statement which, in part, reads, "We enthusiastically endorse Governor Mitt Romney's economic plan to create jobs and restore economic growth while returning America to its tradition of economic freedom." The economists note that Obama has: Relied on short-term "stimulus" programs, which provided little sustainable lift to the economy, and enacted and proposed significant tax increases for all Americans. Offered no plan to reduce federal spending and stop the growth of the debt-to-GDP ratio. Failed to propose Social Security reform and offered a Medicare proposal that relies on a panel of bureaucrats to set prices, quantities, and qualities of healthcare services. Favored a large expansion of economic regulation across many sectors, with little regard for proper cost-benefit analysis and with a disturbing degree of favoritism toward special interests. Enacted health care legislation that centralizes health care decisions and increases the power of the federal bureaucracy to impose one-size-fits-all solutions on patients and doctors, and creates greater incentives for waste. Favored expansion of one-size-fits-all federal rulemaking, with an erosion of the ability of state and local governments to make decisions appropriate for their particular circumstances.
I have yet to see a viable plan from the Obama campaign. Track waste and fraud seems to be the only thing they come up with. A good idea, why hasn't it been done before? When the Dems come up with an actual plan, I will actually listen.
Right now, it's not some fuzzy plan, it's actually the law. Health care reform saves billions that would have gone to insurance companies. Healthcare dollars should go for actual health care, not to insurance company CEOs.
@numeral President Obama's health care law of 2010 reduces spending on Medicare by $716 billion over 10 years by slowing the increase in payments to providers, not diminished benefits for seniors. A linchpin in this plan is a new, 15-member panel known as the Independent Payment Advisory Board. Beginning in 2014, the advisory board will have the authority to lower health care providers' reimbursement rates to ensure savings, if the program misses spending-reduction targets. Obama's 2010 health reform law also calls for pilot programs in which doctors and hospitals working together as "accountable care organizations" receive bundled payments for treating a patient through an entire illness and not fees for every service. Advocates of such alternatives to fee for service believe they would reduce costly over-treatment of patients and provide higher-quality care. Another feature of the 2010 law affecting Medicare is a reduction, already in effect, in the amount seniors pay for prescription drugs.
While we're on the subject of medicine, isn't it time a little medicine was applied to this pathetic comments section? Has anything improved since October? Not that I've noticed. Click the reply, like or dislike buttons and nothing happens until you click the refresh button a few times. And when it does work (not often) you're sent to the top of the page. (You're also sent to the top of the page when it doesn't work.) When you write a comment, sometimes it appears after posting and sometimes not. So back to the refresh button we go. Bush league. Want a new paragraph? Good luck with that. I wonder if the Globe techies are even aware of how bad they look. I mean, a bunch of junior high school tech wannabees could do a better job. It's been ten months!
death panels
@Kate correctly notes that '@numeral President Obama's health care law of 2010 reduces spending on Medicare by $716 billion over 10 years by slowing the increase in payments to providers, not diminished benefits for seniors. A linchpin in this plan is a new, 15-member panel known as the Independent Payment Advisory Board"---- HOWEVER, why should any provider PUT UP with a) Much lower payments, and b) Massive BUREAURCACY from the "Independent Payment Advisory Board" and finally, c) even if the provider does, this new "Independent payment Advisory Board" has the power to SUE doctors for more than they are worth. Also this "Independent payment advisory board" WILL find ways to ration care, a.k.a. "Death Panels". ----Just remember when Barack Obama (when off the teleprompter) suggested that a woman's 100 year old mother should "take a pain pill" rather than burden the rest of us with an expensive pacemaker. --Also just remember that Donald Berwick of Harvard, when asked his opinion of the British rationing panels, said "I LOVE IT".--And the DICTATORIAL "Independent payment Advisory Board", just like Kathleen Sibelius, can make regulations on the fly, with NO Congressional oversight or court remedies allowed. ---That's what the Law stipulates.--Just READ the law.--------If you are on Medicare, maybe you can keep your doctor, BUT your doctor CANNOT AFFORD to keep YOU. ----And by the way, a major reason why ObamaCare will save some money is...The law, as written says that States do not have to set up the Medicaid Exchanges to implement the law! --Again, READ THE actual law (at healthcare.gov), before you say what it will or will not do.