Rep. Rob Woodall’s “Good Luck with All That” Medicare Plan

Hey, are you a senior citizen who worked and paid taxes all your life but could use some help paying for your insulin? If he had his way, GOP Representative Rob Woodall of Georgia would wish you well with your diabetes.

“Hear yourself, ma’am. Hear yourself. You want the government to take care of you, because your employer decided not to take care of you. My question is, ‘When do I decide I’m going to take care of me?'”

He has huge cojones to say this to his constituent. He works for the government. The government is taking care of him. His future pension and health plan ensures he will never have to worry about having to choose between food and medicine.

On the clip, people were cheering when he said that. Pretty easy when you’re younger and can still work. I wonder how they’ll feel when they’re older and on a fixed income.

Watch the clip, and you’ll also hear this gem:

“If you want a socialized health care program, there are lots of places to find that. But, for your children’s sake, I beg you: There aren’t many places to find the freedom to succeed by the sweat of your brow like we have here.”

Not only would he wish you well, you can move if you don’t like how things work here. What a guy.

Vodpod videos no longer available.

Woodall Grilled Over GOP Medicare Reform Plan, posted with vodpod

Sean Duffy Talks to Constituents Who Live in the Real World

Representative Sean Duffy was a cast member in Real World Boston, when that show was still interesting. Back then, Sean was the Midwestern boy who could beat any one of his roommates in competitive log rolling. Now, he’s GOP Representative Duffy of Wisconsin’s 7th congressional district.

But Sean still doesn’t live in the Real World. He got flak for bitching about his $174K/year salary. He can barely get by, you know. He is still paying off student loan debt, driving a used minivan, and is the sole breadwinner. Sorry, I misplaced my tiny violin.

He ran into people who live in the Real World at a Town Hall in Shell Lake, WI. Here is one exchange between Sean and a constituent:

CONSTITUENT: They count the cost to seniors if it goes into a voucher program, it’s going to be trillions of dollars for those young men like this guy in front.

DUFFY: It’s a premium support it’s not a voucher. The bottom line is if we do nothing, if we do nothing, you can all say this is all fine and dandy, you can get it and I know any young people here you can all get this program.

CONSTITUENT: I agree that if we do nothing we’re in trouble, that’s why we have to raise taxes on the rich, and raise taxes on the corporations who have never been richer than they have now. And you guys just cut their taxes again.

Watch Sean talk to real Real World people, not his GOP buddies in Congress. Enjoy! 🙂

Vodpod videos no longer available.

Town Hall Constituents Face Off With Sean Duffy…, posted with vodpod

Why Ya Cryin’, Paul Ryan?

Ryan on Obama Budget Plan: The President is ‘Poisoning the Wells’

You really thought you could come up with a plan to replace Medicare with some sort of privatized voucher system and not piss off a Democrat president? I know he’s made many concessions, but you had to have known that this wouldn’t fly. The Affordable Care Act was his baby. You didn’t want to build around the baby. You wanted to kill it, slash its teddy bear (Medicaid), and throw its older sibling (Medicare) to the wolves.

I nearly choked on my cranberry juice when I heard this gem:

“We are looking for bipartisan solutions not partisan rhetoric.”

Your leader, Boehner said that raising taxes was “unacceptable and a nonstarter” before the speech. If that isn’t partisan rhetoric, I don’t know what is.

Obama allowing everything on the table to be cut is one half of a bipartisan solution. The other half has to come from your party. Raising taxes. I know it hurts, but you don’t think what he offered didn’t? That’s how things will get done – compromise. And enduring pain for the greater good.

Dry your beautiful blue eyes. Considering your plan, you’re lucky he didn’t impale you with that olive branch. Beating you with it should not have been a surprise.

A Twofer: Schools and the Poor

Why just screw the schools when you can screw the poor too?

Wisconsin Governor Proposes Deep Cuts for Schools

I wasn’t shocked since we had that spoiler yesterday. Yeah, it’s that bad. ~9% almost $900M. Hmm. I know a lot of people (myself included) believe throwing money at a problem doesn’t work. Taking away money isn’t going to solve it either, though. The teachers lose their bargaining rights, and the entire state’s school system loses almost $1B in funding. Teachers are a resilient lot, though. They practically live by the making do with less mantra. Wave bye bye to music and art classes. They’re usually the first to go.

He also wants to cut $500M from Medicaid. He would achieve this by including increasing co-pays and deductibles and requiring Seniors to be enrolled in Medicare Part D. The latter makes sense if they can be covered anyway. But increasing co-pays and deductibles? Hello. They’re poor. That’s why they’re on Medicaid. Where are they going to get the extra money for co-pays and deductibles? Pick and choose meds time. And there’s always the ER where you can run up a bill, not pay, and discharge it in bankruptcy. Problem solved.

OK, now I don’t want to be completely negative. Just mostly. There are things I do like in his budget.

• Exclusion of capital gains on investments in Wisconsin-based businesses

Very nice. More attractive if you don’t have to pay both federal and state capital gains taxes.

• Elimination of positions vacant for more than a year

It might suck, but it seems the department stayed afloat without that position filled.

• Truth-in-sentencing

I like this in theory. How they intend to pay for all those prisoners is another story.

So there you have it. A few lonely buoys of good in a sea of bad and ugly. Good luck, Wisconsinites.