What I told the AARP

The AARP (American Association of Retired People) has a website (AARP.com) which posts all sorts of articles and allows readers to comment (you don't have to be a member; I am).

Today they had a news item about the Republican budget being debated in the House. I posted the following comment.

The Republican budget plan is the biggest threat to middle class and poor seniors in our generation. It will not just eliminate Medicare "as we know it", it will effectively eliminate Medicare. The reason is simple: it will force seniors to use government "vouchers" to purchase health care on the open (private) market. However, as anyone can imagine, the cost of an insurance plan for someone over 65, especially if you have a pre-existing condition (as most of us do) will be astronomical. The most expensive care for most people occurs during their later years; we know that and surely the insurance companies know that. They will either refuse to issue policies, or the policies will be so expensive that the "voucher" will be effectively worthless.

The Republicans are "saving money" simply by eliminating a program and asking us as individuals to pay. This reasoning could also apply to Social Security, highway building, meat inspection and even national defense. In fact, except for the military, that's exactly what the Party for The Rich = PTR (formerly GOP) is planning to do.

The Republicans have always been, and still are, the party of wealth. Ask anyone who grew up during the FDR era, for example. That's exactly why they are pushing tax cuts for the rich. -- it's what they always do. If these cuts were really producers of jobs, how come we've done nothing but lose jobs ever since they were enacted by George Bush?

If AARP doesn't fight this Republican attack on the middle class, and especially this attack on seniors, with every means at its disposal, it will be letting down every single one of its members except those few who are very wealthy.

Write to AARP about this, and read my blog for more independent political commentary:
http://thatmansscope.blogspot.com/

I suggest that you write similar letters to AARP and any other organization whose members will be hurt by the Republican budget. This piece of legislation is so terrible that we must do everything we can to defeat it and to make sure that people know why it's so bad and to make sure that it is thoroughly identified with the Republicans, the Party of The Rich.