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Bush Signs $400 Billion Prescription Drug Program Into Law: Bush Is A BIG GOVERNMENT Republican
December.8,2003

Posted on 12/08/2003 8:47:55 AM PST by Reagan Man

President Bush has made it official. By signing into law the new Medicare Prescription Drug Program, the President has given his approval to the largest increase in spending by the federal government since Medicare itself was created and signed into law by the liberal Democrat, President Johnson in 1965. The President has given his okay to raise government expenditures by $400 billion over the next ten years. We all know spending on this Medicare PDP, will not stop at $400 billion. As with all government entitlement programs, the costs to run this new addition to the federal bureaucracy will double or triple over the next ten years.

Bush does win on the politics, but its not a political victory for conservatives or for the GOP in the long term. Medicare is not on the road to privatization.

Throwing money at problems is the way liberal Democrats solved things throughout the 1960`s and 1970`s. That's how the governments entitlement programs grew to over 60% of the current budgetary expenditures. Most traditional conservatives don't oppose assisting the elderly poor, the seriously handicapped or America's military veterans. However, this addition to Medicare, is a boondoggle for government, the drug companies and financially secure seniors.

In the 2000 election campaign, candidate Bush ran on reforming Medicare. His plan called for $158 billion program that assisted the elderly poor, while injecting a much needed modernization phase into the system. What the President signed into law today, was not what he ran on in 2000. President Bush has proven, he is a BIG GOVERNMENT Republican.

The Hertitage Foundation did a solid analysis on the new Mediacre-PDP. You can find it here, Why Medicare Expansion Threatens the Bush Tax Cuts and Undermines Fundamental Tax Reform . Robert Samualson wrote a good piece on the subject. Medicare as Pork Barrel. Here's another good article, Analysts: Medicare Drug Costs Will Rise.

A snippet from the Heritage Foundation analysis.

The Medicare prescription drug proposal is bad health policy, exacerbating the flaws in a system that has almost no market-based incentives to improve service and control costs. But the House and Senate bills also will undermine sound tax and economic policy in several ways. Specifically:

The size of government will expand

A new entitlement will take America even faster down the road that has caused so much economic damage in Europe's welfare states. Indeed, the unfunded Medicare expansion is essentially a huge future tax increase since the population of Medicare recipients will nearly double once the baby-boom generation retires. Ironically, just when some European countries are waking up to the problem and restraining unfunded entitlements, America will be creating an enormous new entitlement.

President Bush's recently enacted tax cut and tax reform package will likely be the first casualty

Because of arcane budget rules, the bulk of the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts expire at the end of 2008 and the end of 2010. Extending these tax cuts or making them permanent will be enormously difficult in an environment of skyrocketing spending for government-provided health care. Indeed, the creation of a prescription drug entitlement may be akin to repealing the Bush tax cuts.

By adding to the deficit, the huge new unfunded liability will likely be the death knell of further tax relief and fundamental tax reform

A prescription drug benefit means bigger deficits--a problem that will intensify as the baby boomers start to retire in the next decade. Once these demographic and fiscal variables become part of the budget forecast, lawmakers seeking to cut taxes and create a simple and fair tax code, such as the flat tax, in all probability will face insurmountable political obstacles.


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Constitution/Conservatism; Culture/Society; Government; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections; Your Opinion/Questions
KEYWORDS: healthcare; medicare; prescriptionswindle
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To: Dane
and to my ear Dane, this reaction is a lot like all the others in that no one is commenting on what DUBYA said.

fun how every day Dubya is misunderestimated.
key here in allowing new age drugs is the preventative
costs as are now and that being invasive surgery.
Here that benefit is two fold by less surgerys and less
cost fixin the blame problem

next missed is the premium's investment...that little
sucker can accrue the in the door and out the pharmacy
costs outta pocket........like Dubya said......

dollors to donuts, if this plan was never bastardized in Hillary's el al's future.....this is excellent work
imho.
21 posted on 12/08/2003 9:11:39 AM PST by cars for sale
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To: PhiKapMom
"This will allow a lot of very poor people to have access to drugs,"

Very poor people already have access to drugs. Pharma companies all have indigent patient programs. They all donate product to be distributed to poor people.

That oft-repeated line is pure nonsense, spoken by politicians out of ignorance or downright duplicity.

22 posted on 12/08/2003 9:12:34 AM PST by NittanyLion
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To: Trust but Verify
I'll crawl through broken glass to make sure a Democrat doesn't get elected next year.

Sorry but I have to disagree. It's legislation like this that made me want to keep democRATS out of office. This is nothing more than socialized medicine. I am very disapointed in the Republican congress and President.

23 posted on 12/08/2003 9:17:33 AM PST by phil1750 (Love like you've never been hurt;Dance like nobody's watching;PRAY like it's your last prayer)
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To: xrp
too bad we can't find a judicial court, period
24 posted on 12/08/2003 9:18:09 AM PST by thoughtomator (The U.N. is a terrorist organization)
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To: Wait4Truth
your attention is the bigger point and echo'd by
Mouskatter Kaschinich who screams we have to take
profit outta health care. can you imagine the
"dumbed down doctor" in this scenerio and would
you wanna be sliced open by an unmotivated doc ?

sorry to take liberties but one better hope the
doc is religious.
25 posted on 12/08/2003 9:18:46 AM PST by cars for sale
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To: PhiKapMom
This will allow a lot of very poor people to have access to drugs

Misleading remark. For very poor seniors, drug companies already give out drugs at negligible prices.

26 posted on 12/08/2003 9:21:06 AM PST by FirstPrinciple
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To: PhiKapMom
"This will allow a lot of very poor people to have access to drugs," Inhofe said. "I felt it was a good vote, and I'm not ashamed of it."

Well, that settles it then. To whom do I send my wallet? I have no further use for it. The length's some will go to to shill for these people is amazing. Blackbird.

27 posted on 12/08/2003 9:22:45 AM PST by BlackbirdSST
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To: Wait4Truth; Reagan Man
I am proud of President Bush for keeping the promise he made when he was campaigning for the presidency. Promise made, promise kept. Everyone knew in 2000 that he would fight for this and he did.

This bill, or a much more conservative variant? Reagan Man does a nice job of addressing that topic in his initial post.

28 posted on 12/08/2003 9:23:07 AM PST by NittanyLion
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To: SunStar
A lot of conservatives think that Bush was just saying those things to get elected. I knew the whole compassionate conservative message meant more socialism. Fool me once...
29 posted on 12/08/2003 9:23:07 AM PST by FirstPrinciple
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To: lelio
I was pulling out Christmas decorations and missed it!
30 posted on 12/08/2003 9:23:44 AM PST by Howlin
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To: Reagan Man
The net result of this bill will be a PRIVATIZATION of the drug benny. WHY?

The insurance industry will rush in to offer MediGap policies that make it cheaper for seasoned citizens to buy those policies rather than accept the Mediscare plan. After all, you can't have BOTH MediGap AND the Mediscare drug plan. The insurance folks would rather come up with a more attractive but less profitable MediGap drug plan than sell no policies at all. The Medicare drug plan will end up covering only those who are completely uninsurable. All the rest will find private insurance more affordable. The bottom line will likely be LESS money spent on prescription drug benefits by Mediscare.

It's actually a good approach. Which is why Teddy Kennedy is so rabidly against it.

Michael

31 posted on 12/08/2003 9:24:30 AM PST by Wright is right! (Never get excited about ANYTHING by the way it looks from behind.)
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To: Trust but Verify
Agreed.
32 posted on 12/08/2003 9:24:31 AM PST by Howlin
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To: PhiKapMom
There are better ways to keep rural hospitals in business. Privatize them. Charge a premium for health care close to home. Healthcare is just like anything else. It is a cost that people must consider, just like food, housing, etc. The job of govt should not be providing everything that people want. Then it becomes a bribe system.
33 posted on 12/08/2003 9:26:31 AM PST by FirstPrinciple
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To: cars for sale
Seniors are already drugged up. That is not preventing them from going to surgery or other expensive medical service. But your point is well taken. Wait till the next miracle drug comes out. Then all hell will break loose, and will force the govt to increase the no-cost limit. This is a lose-lose situation that sadly Republicans have passed on to the next generation.
34 posted on 12/08/2003 9:29:35 AM PST by FirstPrinciple
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To: BlackbirdSST
Why just stop with health coverage? Why not also provide car insurance, home owners insurance, theft insurance, and every other kind of insurance to the poor as well? Insure them from things they don't even own. GOP is now officially the cradle(No Child Left Behind) to grave(prescription drugs) party.
35 posted on 12/08/2003 9:32:26 AM PST by FirstPrinciple
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To: Wright is right!
Interesting take. That's the first realistic scenario I've seen whereby this bill might lead to privatization. (The bill's privatization component itself is virtually nonexistant, and the parts that do exist are weak)
36 posted on 12/08/2003 9:33:43 AM PST by NittanyLion
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To: FirstPrinciple
not if in 04 we get more senators and impliment real competition and frankly I think that is the plan
37 posted on 12/08/2003 9:37:09 AM PST by cars for sale
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To: Trust but Verify
Grow up. There's no difference between them. (Except for Hillary; that's pure evil.)
38 posted on 12/08/2003 9:39:11 AM PST by warchild9
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To: cars for sale
What competition? It doesn't start until 2010 and only in 6 metropolitan areas. Other places in the country are not good enough. And, Congress has a really good track-record of dismantling competitive programs in Medicare. Check out a good thorough history of it here, http://www.heritage.org/Research/HealthCare/BG1708.cfm
39 posted on 12/08/2003 9:42:02 AM PST by FirstPrinciple
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To: cars for sale
Socialized medicine like this was what HillaryCare was all about. With W's name on it, it's from heaven. If that witch's name was on the identical plan, you'd be screaming like a wounded ape.

People's reaction to this bit of socialism proves personality cults erase rationality.
40 posted on 12/08/2003 9:42:31 AM PST by warchild9
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