Obama's "Sneak Attack" on Senior Citizens

Forbes ^ | February 24, 2012 | John Mariotti

[opentalk]

Agree,
Foreign aid/bailout cuts are never even considered, instead we are told we have to sacrifice in our daily lives, as more wealth is redistributed globally, or sent to Crony Solyndra like scams.

[ErnBatavia]

Wifey and I are 8 days apart, and both turn 65 in a couple of months.....one of the good things about Kalifornia is periodic two hour seminars on Medicare from our 'department of aging' or some such. We went and got ALL our questions and any confusions addressed.

We're signed up with the Plan F supplemental, mainly because it's the top of the line plan - and the whole ball of wax (A, B, D, F) will cost us around $7000 less per year than the current gouging we're experiencing.

During the years when we were caregivers for my late parents (who had a Plan F), I never wrote one check for any medical expense; and those were constant in their case.

[Cyber Liberty]

You seriously overestimate the intelligence and patriotism of the vast American electorate.

[oh8eleven]

We're signed up with the Plan F supplemental
Well done! Expensive, about 60% higher than plan N, but as you noted, covers everything.
But even as "costly" as it seems - it's far less per month than what too many pay while also trying to raise families.

[hinckley buzzard]

I still can't understand why the house helped pass payroll cuts to social security

It doesn't matter. Payroll tax is no longer related to SS and hasn't been for years. It's all just money now, the fed just dumps it into one pot and then spends it. There is no Social Security account with your name on it, there is no lockbox except a file cabinet in West Virginia with a bunch of IOU's in it.

[haircutter]

unfortunately in my zip code there is only ONE plan and it is an HMO..we now have Mutual of Omaha and last year they raised our premiums twice..
It is embarrassing what Medicare pays of your bill and the Doctors are forced to accept..

SAD that your zip code is what determines what Insurance you can have...we live in a rural area of Southwestern Pennsylvania and have been told there are six companies we can choose from...isn't that just great???

[lentulusgracchus]

(red pill)

What is this "red pill/blue pill" stuff? I've seen more than one FReeper refer to "the blue pill", and now "the red pill".

What is the source and significance of this locution?

[lentulusgracchus]

LBJ declared his "War on Poverty" and opened the SS "lockbox"

All tied up in LBJ's demand for self-glorification and renown, and in the opening of the Vietnamese War.

LBJ's "Guns + Butter" (the "butter" was his domestic self-monumental legislation) choice led him to open the SS "lockbox" to help fund the deficits he was running.

He was afraid that the Republicans would be able to force him to choose between funding the war and funding his monuments, so he broke the lock and ran deficits, and then sent McNamara back to Congress to demand deficit appropriations in the name of "troops in the field" -- deficits then amounting to about 12% of the budget, if I recall.

[BIGLOOK]

NB

[Cyber Liberty]

It's a reference to "The Matrix" movie: Wiki Linky

[USAF80]

I asked my buddy that(retired AF) and he sent me a lenghty email about there are only some abusers of the system. He said I was hostile to OB and welfare recipients. I told him I was charitable and all but don’t like to be forced to support anyone.

No reply so far.

[Gator113]

I feel like the rubber band just keeps tightening. It will snap, I just don’t know when.

[opentalk]

This is from a time when Obama was out selling Obamacare, with doctors props in white coats.

this video is Obama, claiming seniors may be better off with a pain pill in lieu of surgery

also from Dr. Obama’s Tonsillectomy -wsj 2009

.. Those greedy doctors.

(Obama) “You come in and you’ve got a bad sore throat, or your child has a bad sore throat or has repeated sore throats,” President Obama explained at Wednesday’s press conference. “The doctor may look at the reimbursement system and say to himself, ‘You know what? I make a lot more money if I take this kid’s tonsils out.’”

If that’s what he really thinks is wrong with U.S. health care—and with the medical profession—then ObamaCare is going to be even worse than we thought. The point Mr. Obama oversimplified is that the way the U.S. pays for medical services can encourage some physicians to prescribe unnecessary tests or treatments, especially in Medicare. But his implication is that doctors aren’t acting in the best interests of their patients in order, basically, to rob them.

... .Mr. Obama seems to think that such judgments are easy.

“If there’s a blue pill and a red pill and the blue pill is half the price of the red pill and works just as well,” he asked, “why not pay half price for the thing that’s going to make you well?” But usually the red and blue treatments are available—as well as the green, yellow, etc.—because of the variability of disease, human biology and patient preference. And the really hard cases, especially when government is paying for health care, are those for which there’s only a red pill and it happens to be very expensive.

[lentulusgracchus]

Thanks, guys, for the explanations and the links. And yes, Sarah had it right, and Betsy McCaughey before her (Betsy called out Obama on the 'end-of-life' counseling issue, on Fred Thompson's show -- I happened to be listening that night and caught it all -- in 2009), about the "death panels".

The liberals have lied, are lying, will lie. To be liberal is to live a lie, and be a lie, and eat, sleep, and breathe lies.

It's for the children, you see.

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks opentalk.

[jennings2004]

The basis for all this is clearly stated in Dr. Ezekiel Immanuel’s (yes, Rahm’s brother) article in the January 29, 2009 issue of Lancet. Copies or the article are a lot harder to get now than earlier. But, the essence of the message in the ~20+ page diatribe is included in the only graphic in the article: spend health care money on the “working, productive” part of the population.....the very young and the old and infirm...uuuhhhh, not so much, since they are not “useful” participants in the economy of this society. It will chill you to the bone and at the time this article was published, the great humanitarian, Dr. Immanuel, was Dear Leader’s primary medical advisor. Surprised?

[jacob allen]

Coming soon, Odumbo’s “Cash For Codgers.”