Disposable Americans

I have a lot of clients that are Medicare or nearly Medicare age.

Paul Ryan’s plan would put half of them into poverty and greatly diminish the standard of living of another third.

My sample size is about 1500.

Add on Pete Peterson’s plan for Social Security and it will literally kill millions of seniors. Many by choice.

Poll after poll shows what seniors number one fear is:

67%: Running out of money.

33%: Dying.

It really is unbelievable how this can be on the table in the first place. When in reality, as Thom Hartmann said, it is extremely easy to solve the problem. (More see on today’s Daily Planet Vol. 50 – ( –oh, Happy Birthday!–):

(…) A budget shouldn’t just focus on spending cuts directed at the poor and middle-class — it should also include revenue raisers like closing corporate loopholes and asking millionaires and billionaires to cough up a few extra bucks a year. Let’s cut some wasteful spending, but let’s also raise a few taxes. But this common sense narrative has been lost inside the main stream corporate media — where there’s only one question that’s being asked today, and that is “how much spending needs to be cut?”
Not, “why aren’t some of the most profitable corporations in the history of the world skating by paying zero taxes?”
Not, “why are the wealthiest Americans enjoying historically low tax rates during a historically high budget deficit?”
Did you know that corporate taxes used to account for roughly 30% of revenue collected by the government — and today that number is only 7%? Probably not, because the corporate media, which would prefer not to pay its taxes and only wants us to focus on just how much Republicans and Democrats can cut out of the budget?
So why is the media ignoring these calls? (…)

(…) The solutions to our budget problems are simple — you wouldn’t BELIEVE how simple they are. I can tell you the solution using only 6 words…ROLL — BACK — THE — REAGAN — TAX — CUTS. Heck — roll back the Bush tax cuts, go back to Clinton levels where the wealthiest Americans paid an extra 3% — just 3% — three measly percentage points, and we’d take a huge chunk out of our deficit, just like that.
Remember how the Clinton budget passed without a single Republican vote in the House and gave us not only a balanced budget but a surplus? And if we rolled back the Reagan tax cuts, and made billionaires pay at least 74%, like they did for more than half of the 20th century, when our nation prospered and the middle class grew — then we’d have a budget SURPLUS!
A budget surplus? Can you imagine how different life in America would be with a budget surplus?! We’d be paying down our debt year-to-year. And we’d be able to use that extra cash to do things that our nation hasn’t done in generations since Reagan started “starving the beast. (…)

(…) So call your congressman and tell him to vote for the simple solution, the right solution, and roll back the Reagan tax cuts. (…)

A voucher system. For seniors.

Even I would have a problem with a voucher system and choosing amongst private for profit insurance companies.

They are insane. The operative modifier is “for profit”. Death panels indeed. The only thing I can say that’s positive is they are pushing the envelop so far that it will eventually lead to revolt. I’m not saying anything insightful but it gets to the point where truth just becomes a repeatable cliché.