Recently the AARP has been running an ad warning seniors that there are plans afoot to cut Medicare “and even Social Security” benefits. It’s a misleading message at the very least and just one more reason I decided not to renew my membership this year.
The 30-second spot criticizes certain federally funded projects such as “poetry at zoos” and “treadmills for shrimp,” and suggests they, not Medicare benefits, should be cut. The Washington Post Fact Checker obligingly poked a few holes in the ad’s premise.
I don’t know about the zoo poetry, but those shrimp treadmills offer a lot of entertainment value, something a nation facing hard times could use now:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cMO8Pyi3UpY&feature=player_embedded#!]
The Post article at the link you provided is excellent. It’s the same message I have been promoting for a year, i.e. the need for entitlement reform. However, organizations like AARP obviously feel the need not only to fulfill their members’ expectations for defending their benefits but to assuage any guilt feelings over doing so. I, and Anson Burlingame as well, belong to the Military Officers Association of America, another organization which does the same thing. Despite having the best medical care system in the world where we pay only $5 for a 90-day generic prescription, the MOAA is going into full Congressional-battle mode over discussions about increasing the prices and co-pays. We are a nation of constituencies that are fighting not for survival but supremacy – as we circle the financial drain.
Good post.
MOAA better be fighting. No sooner had Obamacare passed than my Medicare plan premiums and some of my co-pays went up. That law may have promised to close the doughnut hole; no one never mentioned we’d be paying anyway, one way or another. But don’t we always? As for entitlement reform, I see plenty of room for reform without actually “cutting benefits,” but it sure makes a good scare tactic.
I’m guessing that entitlement reform will happen when it’s cheaper to line garbage cans with dollars than with newspapers.