Sunday, February 20, 2011

Palin on the Issues: Entitlement Reform

Earlier today, Pablo wrote about the need for more discussion about entitlement reform in the Republican party. I couldn't agree more with his assertion. However, I have to disagree with him on the following statement.
As far as I can tell, there are four Republicans who have publicly admitted that Medicare needs to be cut: Romney, Daniels, Christie, and Ryan.
A quick search uncovered the following:

Sarah Palin: Why I Support the Ryan Road Map
...In my view, a better plan is the Roadmap for America's Future produced by Rep. Paul Ryan (R., Wisc.). The Roadmap offers a reliable path to long-term solvency for our entitlement programs, and it does so by encouraging personal responsibility and independence.

(...)

Beyond that, Rep. Ryan proposes fundamental reform of Medicare for those under 55 by turning the current benefit into a voucher with which people can purchase their own care.

On Social Security, as with Medicare, the Roadmap honors our commitments to those who are already receiving benefits by guaranteeing all existing rights to people over the age of 55. Those below that age are offered a choice: They can remain in the traditional government-run system or direct a portion of their payroll taxes to personal accounts, owned by them, managed by the Social Security Administration and guaranteed by the federal government. Under the Roadmap's proposals, they can pass these savings onto their heirs. The current Medicaid system, the majority of which is paid for by the federal government but administered by the states, would be replaced by a block-grant system that would reward economizing states....
Sarah Palin: Obama and the Bureaucratization of Health Care
...Instead of poll-driven “solutions,” let’s talk about real health-care reform: market-oriented, patient-centered, and result-driven. As the Cato Institute’s Michael Cannon and others have argued, such policies include giving all individuals the same tax benefits received by those who get coverage through their employers; providing Medicare recipients with vouchers that allow them to purchase their own coverage; reforming tort laws to potentially save billions each year in wasteful spending; and changing costly state regulations to allow people to buy insurance across state lines. Rather than another top-down government plan, let’s give Americans control over their own health care....
Sarah Palin: An Open Letter to Republican Freshmen Members of Congress
...In order to avert a fiscal disaster, we will also need to check the growth of spending on our entitlement programs. That will be a huge challenge, but it must be confronted head on. We must do it in a humane way that honors the government’s current commitments to our fellow Americans while also keeping faith with future generations. We cannot rob from our children and grandchildren’s tomorrow to pay for our unchecked spending today...
In addition, she has discussed entitlement programs in several interviews. In fact, it came up in her recent appearance at the Long Island Association's annual meeting.

In fairness to Pablo, I follow Palin much more closely than he does. However, I didn't need to reference her books to figure out where she stands on entitlement reform. It only took me about 2 minutes to compile the articles for this blog post.

20 comments:

Pablo said...

"I didn't need to reference her books to figure out where she stands on entitlement reform."

That is probably because public policy is nowhere to be found in her books. But I digress.

I would take Palin a little more seriously if...

1. ...she didn't accuse President Obama of having "death panels" in his plan. The only people left on earth who still believe Palin's claim are her supporters.

2. After lambasting Obama for rationing health care, she goes on to support Ryan's plan, which rations health care. In fact, Ryan's plan rations health care at a greater rate, since the vouchers that Seniors would receive would grow at a much slower rate than health care costs. Not only that, as Ezra Klein notes, "Medicare currently pays providers less and works more efficiently than private insurers, so seniors trying to purchase a plan equivalent to Medicare would pay more for it on the private market."

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ezra-klein/2010/02/rep_paul_ryans_daring_budget_p.html

Again, I applaud Paul Ryan. I am not sure if I completely agree with him, but I have an immense respect for his plan. His plan leads to a great deal of rationing, but it is not a death panel. I guess from Palin's perspective, rationing is only a death panel if Obama does it.

3. As far as I can tell, before Ryan's plan, Palin supported government vouchers to Seniors, which makes up a part of Ryan's Roadmap. I give her a point for the effort of thinking about it, but, for the most part, her "ideas" regarding Medicare are borrowed from Ryan. Romney's ideas about how to calculate Medicare costs come from his experience in MA.

In short, if Palin wants to grab on to Ryan's coattails then I am all for it. She has tremendous influence among the Tea Party folks. And only Sarah Palin could convince the Seniors in the Tea Party that partially privatizing Medicare is a good thing.

Pablo said...

"Earlier today, Pablo wrote about the need for more discussion about entitlement reform in the Republican party. I couldn't agree more with his assertion."

I am glad to see that you agree with a liberal, Ahmadinejad supporting RINO. You better run and take a shower now or sprinkle yourself with holy water.

Right Wingnut said...

Pablo, So you disagree with Ryan's Roadmap, but give him credit for trying....but don't give credit to Palin for advocating his reforms....

Palin suggested Medicare vouchers long before Ryan came up with his Roadmap. The second linked article in my post is from September, 2009. Perhaps Ryan "borrowed" it from Palin.

I'm not even going to get into a discussion about death panels with you. It would be a complete waste of time, but many non-Palin supporting journalists have since agreed with her on that point.

The bottom line is that your assertion that Romney, Christie, Ryan and Daniels are the only Republicans who have publically advocated for entitlement reform is false and misleading. You know as well as I do that many others have as well. Google "Pawlenty Medicare reform," Rand Paul Medicare reform," "Demint Medicare reform," "Bachmann Medicare reform." Get the picture?

Bill589 said...

Great post RWN -

Sarah Palin has an in depth understanding of the important issues concerning our nation and clearly voices her opinions in her writings as well as in interviews and speeches.

The LSM would rather attack her for writing on her hand or wearing leopard heels. Many people don’t know of Sarah’s accomplishments, capabilities, and commonsense, popular stances on issues.

IMO - The campaign will display the truth to the voters. Sarah is especially good up close and personal; she’s great ‘off the cuff’. She is dynamite in debates.

The lies will be brought to light. That’s all she needs to be elected President.

Right Wingnut said...

I finally agree with you on something, and what do you do?...defend your position by quoting ultra-liberal Ezra Klein...

PhilipJames said...

Pablo Pablo Pablo... you dig a deep hole right off the bat. Complaining about "death panels"? Come on... if you can't even acknowledge that there are "death panels" and that you don't know what quotation marks are used for or mean, then why would anyone listen to anything you have to say? Even a good left wing wacko like Paul Krugman admitted on national tv on a Sunday political show that there are "death panels"... come on, wakey wakey.

Right Wingnut said...

Here's another from a few weeks back..

...On the crucial issue of entitlement reform, the President offered nothing. This is shocking, because as he himself explained back in April 2009, “if we want to get serious about fiscal discipline…we will have to get serious about entitlement reform.” Even though the Medicare Trust Fund will run out of funds a mere six years from now, and the Social Security Trust Fund is filled mainly with IOUs, the President opted to kick the can down the road yet again. And once again, he was disingenuous when he suggested that meaningful reform would automatically expose people’s Social Security savings to a possible stock market crash. As Rep. Paul Ryan showed in his proposed Roadmap, and others have explained, it’s possible to come up with meaningful reform proposals that tackle projected shortfalls and offer workers more options to invest our own savings while still guaranteeing invested funds so they won’t fall victim to sudden swings in the stock market....

http://www.facebook.com/notes/sarah-palin/obamas-message-to-america-the-era-of-big-government-is-back-now-help-me-pay-for-/494999858434

Pablo said...

"Pablo, So you disagree with Ryan's Roadmap, but give him credit for trying....but don't give credit to Palin for advocating his reforms...."

Yes, because she floats with the political winds. If Obama rations health care, it is death panel. If Ryan rations health care, it receives her support.

"I'm not even going to get into a discussion about death panels with you. It would be a complete waste of time, but many non-Palin supporting journalists have since agreed with her on that point."

Good, because there is no way you would win. And I would love to see some of those "journalists" who believe in Obamacare death panels.

"You know as well as I do that many others have as well. Google "Pawlenty Medicare reform," Rand Paul Medicare reform," "Demint Medicare reform," "Bachmann Medicare reform." Get the picture? "

Uh, Rand Paul I confident has been consistent. The others, no. In fact, here is what DeMint had to say not too long ago about Social Security.

"DEMINT: Well, again, I’ve introduced legislation that shows we can cut the cost of Social Security without all of these cuts that they’re talking about.

This is what we’ve done for years, Chris, is we’ve cut benefits and raised taxes on Social Security without changing it from a political slush fund, which is what it’s been for the last two decades, to a real savings program. So we need to look at real reform before we go straight to Social Security, which people have paid for, and start cutting things. There are other things that they did not consider, like repealing “Obamacare” and taking back money that — from — you know, privatizing Fannie Mae, privatizing General Motors. All of these things need to be on the table before we start cutting programs like Social Security that people have paid for."

DeMint wants to distract us with earmarks and the debt ceiling and bank bailouts instead of tackling real government spending like Social Security and Medicare. I don't doubt that DeMint believes that we need cut entitlement spending. I just think that he would prefer to do the politically expedient thing like demagogue about earmarks (around 1% of the federal budget).

Pablo said...

"Pablo Pablo Pablo... you dig a deep hole right off the bat. Complaining about "death panels"? Come on... if you can't even acknowledge that there are "death panels" and that you don't know what quotation marks are used for or mean, then why would anyone listen to anything you have to say?"

I don't see the quotation marks in the WSJ post by article that RW linked us to. It was not a figure of speech. She repeated it several times. And no, Krugman did not admit to death panels. I saw the video. He was repeating what another host had called Sarah Palin's death panels.

Pablo said...

"defend your position by quoting ultra-liberal Ezra Klein..."

Was there something about Klein's comments that you thought were wrong or do you just dismiss what people say on the basis of their ideological leanings?

Right Wingnut said...

Too much to bother responding too, except to say you are full of Sh*t. AGAIN, Palin advocated Medicare vouchers before Ryan's Roadmap was unveiled.

Your post was false and misleading, and you got busted for it. No amount of spin can change that.

Pablo said...

RW,

Because I tried to be fair and I am not attached the butt of a particular personality, I have posted a new piece, adding Palin to the 'wants entitlement reform group.'

However, you will have to excuse my lack of respect for Palin. She did spend the summer of 2009 doing everything she could to prevents cuts to Medicare.

Pablo said...

"Too much to bother responding too,"

That is always your response.

Right Wingnut said...

She never fought against cuts to medicare...she advocates free market solutions like Medicare vouchers, tort reform, etc.

Of course, it’s not just this one provision that presents a problem. My original comments concerned statements made by Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel, a health policy advisor to President Obama and the brother of the President’s chief of staff. Dr. Emanuel has written that some medical services should not be guaranteed to those “who are irreversibly prevented from being or becoming participating citizens....An obvious example is not guaranteeing health services to patients with dementia.” [10] Dr. Emanuel has also advocated basing medical decisions on a system which “produces a priority curve on which individuals aged between roughly 15 and 40 years get the most chance, whereas the youngest and oldest people get chances that are attenuated.” [11]

President Obama can try to gloss over the effects of government authorized end-of-life consultations, but the views of one of his top health care advisors are clear enough. It’s all just more evidence that the Democratic legislative proposals will lead to health care rationing, and more evidence that the top-down plans of government bureaucrats will never result in real health care reform.


http://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=116471698434

Anonymous said...

Geez, even I know the difference between healthcare rationing and Medicare vouchers.

When bureaucrats ration HEALTHCARE based on age, productivity or some other subjective measure, that is completely different from establishing a set amount for vouchers.

A voucher helps you purchase insurance on the open market. It doesn't rate your worth to society.

What Palin and any other red-blooded free marketer believes is that the problem with Obamacare is its overwhelming attempt to CONTROL and DICTATE the market.

Palin has said that current Medicare recipients have paid into the system. Hence her non support for the $500 billion CUT laid out in Obamacare.

Future Medicare recipients being able to purchase desired insurance on the open market would shift the risk from the Federal gov't to the individual and the private insurance co. Individuals would bear more responsibility for their own health.

OhioJOE said...

"What Palin and any other red-blooded free marketer believes is that the problem with Obamacare is its overwhelming attempt to CONTROL and DICTATE the market." BINGO!!! Yet another illustration of how Mrs. Palin gets it and the Romneyites do not.

It is also interesting how they are more interested in blaming the Tea Party for violence in Tuscon than they are in blaming the Teacher's for violence in WI. So much for their big tent.

Pablo said...

"When bureaucrats ration HEALTHCARE based on age, productivity or some other subjective measure, that is completely different from establishing a set amount for vouchers"

There was never something like that in Obamacare. There was rationing, but it was not based upon the age and productivity of the recipients. It was based upon whether the drugs were useful. Please go back and read the bill.

Under vouchers, recipients get government funds to purchase health insurance, but they will receive much less funds that what they would get under Medicare. That is rationing at a much greater extent than under Obamacare.

hamaca said...

"It is also interesting how they are more interested in blaming the Tea Party for violence in Tuscon than they are in blaming the Teacher's for violence in WI. So much for their big tent."

I'm having a hard time believing this is the case more broadly (of course one can always find a few exceptions/anecdotes).

Right Wingnut said...

Pablo, based on your last comment, it's evident that you believe government can manage cost better than the private sector. If that's the case, I suspect you would advocate for a single payer system.

Pablo said...

RW, this is not about costs in general, but about costs of the government. Under the current system, the Medicare Advisory Panel would decided whether a given medicine/treatment/operation was effective or not based upon research. If not, then that treatment would no longer be funded by the government. This means that the cost to the government of Medicare would decrease since it would get rid of waste.

Under a vouchers system, the government would give a set amount of funding for private citizens to buy their own insurance. Under Ryan's plan, that amount would be far lower than the estimated costs of health care in the future. This must be, because this is the only way to save money. Otherwise, the government would be spending the same amount of money that it would had it continued with the current system.

The costs of health care is a different subject. I am talking about how much the government is going to spending on health care for Senior Citizens. No matter how you slice it, there must be rationing if the government is going to spend less. That is one of the reasons why I applaud Ryan's plan, because it definitely does the difficult work of rationing.