Ryan Defends Reduction to Cost-of-Living Adjustments for Early Military Retirees

weeklystandard.com ^ | 12/15/13 | john mccormack

[ColdOne]

"I think the pressure of divided government has come full force, and I think the specter of one or two more government shutdowns concentrated our minds to make this divided government work," Paul Ryan said on Saturday afternoon, speaking with THE WEEKLY STANDARD by phone from his hometown of Janesville. "It's very clear that without this deal two things would happen: The military would have borne the full force of these cuts starting in January. And we would have at least one more government shutdown drama.”

“We think that's bad,” Ryan said during a break between games at his son's basketball tournament. “We think that's not in our interest. We want 2014 to be a year where we don't keep cutting the military, and we focus on Obamacare, we focus on the conservative reforms we want to roll out, and we win the next election so we can start saving this country."

[PALIN SMITH]

Double the retirement benefits for veterans. Take it from welfare, food stamps and cut the salaries of any government official back to $150,000 or less.

[GailA]

Another rich RINO who has no compassion for the Military who work for less than min wage. Are over deployed in 27 countries now and risk their lives daily. They are already raising their Tricare Prime rates 3 fold for next fiscal yr, increasing their drug co-pays and no COLA raises because it is not an election year. Half of which goes to Medicare any way.

I think they should give up their body guards, their gov’t cars, their yearly big pay raises, their tax payer Platinum health care, and their CCW permits. And stop putting in stupid items in 5 pmh paqrking lot speed bumps @ $7K a piece. Then there is the new computerized commissary price tags, have know idea what those useless suckers cost, and theyt are takking about eliminating the Commissaries any way, so why did they waste that money? dumba..’s!

[3Fingas]

Yup. They will get to that very soon.

They always cut the military first because:
1. We are a smaller constituency than the welfare block
2. They think we will just quietly accept it because we are loyal Americans

Time to vote out every representative that voted for this measure.

If they want sacrifice, they need to start with their own salaries and benefits first.

[Regulator]

$100 billion a year for illegal aliens and Ryan defends cutting military pensions?

FUPR.

[SkyPilot]

"We give them a slightly smaller adjustment for inflation because they're still in their working years and in most cases earning another paycheck,” Ryan said. "Our goal here is to make sure that no other country comes close to matching the U.S. military, and the stress on the budget in the future brings that whole entire notion into question. We still have a Pentagon budget that is not where it needs to be."

Paul Ryan is a disgusting human being.

He admits in this statement that he is balancing the Pentagon's Sequester deficit on the backs of the very men and women who serve and have served under the most difficult and murderous conditions.

He also throws out a Communist mantra: i.e., since some military retirees may still have a few precious working years left in their bodies, let them fend for themselves and let's take what they earned, so that we can give it to the Government.

I do not understand how one true Conservative can accept this outrage.

Paul Ryan's name needs to be forever tarred with the label of "traitor." Because to our military men and women, and our retired veterans, that is what he plainly is.

[SkyPilot]

I absolutely loth him now. I hope he gets kicked to the curb in 2014.

Count me in on that statement as well.

[GunsareOK]

We had a majority under Bush but it wasn’t a majority of conservatives.

[GunsareOK]

...We also need fresh minds;...
McConnell, Boehner, CAN’Tor, and Goodlatte need to go (among many others).

[GeronL]

exactly

[GeronL]

me too, but I would spell it “loathe”

[SkyPilot]

Our constitution REQUIRES that we have a fully-funded military. It should NEVER have been allowed to be sequestered! There is a lot of waste and fraud in the military budget, I know, but to cut ONLY the military, when there are several agencies who operate WITHOUT Congressional oversight, is downright outrageous!

It was Ryan who negotiated the 2010 Budget Control Act in the first place that generated the forumula which has hollowed out the military: it is 17% of the budget yet it has to "pay for" 50% of the Sequester cuts - and Entitlements that are the real cause of our debt and deficits are exempt!

And now, we have military spouses who are in tears, not only worrying about their loved ones deployed into harm's way, but as they struggle alone (again) to bring their children a Christmas without their mom or dad, they can watch Paul Ryan and Patty Murray on television breaking their arms patting themselves on the back because they are stealing pension money from the military.

Screw this guy, and screw Boehner who is propping him up as some sort of quasi-savior. I hope this completely unjust monstrosity destroys both of their political careers.

[Jet Jaguar]

Active Duty/Retiree ping.

[VRWC For Truth]

Ryan is as big an A-Hole as Soetoro.

[lodi90]

The donors and appropriators wanted the sequester gone. So Ryan is happy to throw vets under the bus to make the deal happen. This is cold blooded stuff by Ryan and the beltway GOP.

[GeronL]

I don’t think the Republicans want to win. 2014 was handed to them on a silver platter and they are doing their best to throw it away with this stuff and attacks on conservatives