Violence goes the other way too.....
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GBhdXfCdaA8&feature=player_embedded
71 year old man wrestled to the ground at a Paul Ryan event. Paul Ryan had asserted that programs like social security programs and medicare were entitlement programs and the man went ballistic, rightfully so, I might add.
While these programs badly need reform, people who paid into them and are 71 or more are hardly in a position to go back to work.
Sadly, Paul Ryan treats it as a joke rather than answer the question.
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Then/when are they going to stop collecting the taxes we have been forced to pay for these so called entitlements? What about the retired Military’s Tricare medical it is also an ENTITLEMENT!
The Military on TRICARE LIFE are over 65, put in their 20+ years for sub par pay, long deployments and risk of life and limb, it was part of their benefits for those items being so bad.
CUT CONGRESS’ PLATINUM PAY and entitlements before you begin on seniors who are at the bottom of the barrel. Stop giving ILLEGAL INVADERS FREE HEALTH CARE and WELFARE! DEPORT THEM!
I am tired of being demonized because I got OLD and sick.
First of all, the guy had no right to 'go ballistic'. In a crowd, that is extremely dangerous and an invitation to get yourself restrained.
Second, SS and Medicare ARE entitlements because you are not receiving your own money back and nobody has for years. That money is long gone, stolen by Congress.
Finally, anybody over the age of 55 is going to see no changes. That's been made clear over and over again.
If nothing is done to this unsustainable program, it will go bust and you will get NOTHING. People don't always think clearly when it's their ox that the left is lying about. But if you don't calm down and get the facts, you are part of the problem.
The risk to those currently receiving S.S. benefits - whether retirees, disabled or survivors - is that the system collapses. This risk is currently remote. But, the risk is growing with each passing year. The risk would be removed completely if we put the federal budget onto a glide path to balance and reform the entitlement programs so as to make them actuarially sound.
Nobody is blaming those who receive S.S. benefits, federal retirees, civil servants at the state and local level, or those who have fallen into the social safety net. But, the country is in the fifth year of depressed economic conditions, the federal government is operating deeply in the red, and many of our state and local governments are in dire financial condition. During the past ten years, the average family has lost 10 percent of its income after adjustment for inflation, and the number of people below the poverty line is now the highest it has been since we starting tabulating the statistic.
The President’s answer is to raise taxes on the rich. The tax increase he refers to would, under static assumptions, cover about one-fifth of the current federal deficit. In the meantime, he proposes about a trillion a year in new spending initiatives, so that the federal deficit, already very high, would greatly increase. That is not the answer. It would put us on a glide path to Greece, when the young people as well as the wealthy are fleeing the country.
I am not happy with either the Ryan budget or the Romney economic plan. But, those are the alternatives we have at this time, to the Obama budget and economic plan.
Perhaps that 71-year old - who is certainly old enough to know better - needs to stop listening to liberal propaganda and discover what Ryan actually proposed.
The following is taken from American Thinker
(Ryan's proposed program) begins no earlier than January 2021 affecting only those aged 55 and younger today. The plan has the following major elements:
Part A and Part B trust funds are combined to create one unified trust fund. The new Medicare Program and the existing program continue to be financed by trust fund revenues, Medicare payroll taxes, and general revenue contributions as done now.
By January 2021, insurance companies must establish competing healthcare coverage plans with specified benefits and limitations. Some would provide only high-deductible catastrophic coverage. Others could provide more liberalized coverage. Medicare would establish categories of generalized coverage. All plans which met specified requirements would become "Medicare certified" and eligible for premium payment cost sharing.
Each patient would select from the approved list a plan best matching his or her expected healthcare needs for the coming year. Medicare would reimburse the health plan a fixed amount of money for each enrollee for premium payment support. If the Medicare-provided assistance exceeded the premium required for the selected plan, that excess would be credited to a "Medical Savings Account" (MSA) for the beneficiary's future use.
Ryan currently estimates the reimbursement amount at an average $11,000 -- with further adjustment determined by income level. Higher-income patients would receive less premium assistance. Beneficiaries with annual incomes below $80,000 ($160,000 for couples) would receive full standard payment amounts; beneficiaries with annual incomes between $80,000 and $200,000 ($160,000 to $400,000 for couples) would receive 50 percent of the standard; and beneficiaries with incomes above $200,000 ($400,000 for couples) would receive 30 percent.
After enrollment in a plan, all beneficiaries could, at their option, undergo an annual health "risk adjustment" examination. Results of this exam would be submitted to Medicare and become eligible for a higher risk-adjusted premium payment.
To further assist those individuals with incomes near or below the poverty level, Ryan proposes additional payments above just premium support. While any enrollee, regardless of income level, would be able to set up a tax-free MSA if desired, the new Medicare Program would specifically establish and fund an MSA for low-income beneficiaries to help them with deductible payments required for care procedures. The amount paid to those below the government-established poverty level would be equal to the deductible for the average Medicare high-deductible health plan. Those with incomes at or 50 percent above the poverty level would receive 75 percent of the full deposit.
Recognizing that Americans are becoming healthier than ever before and living much longer, Ryan further proposes that a phase-in of the start of the new Medicare program would, after 2021, be raised in a slow incremental fashion from the current age 65 to 69 years 6 months.
Hope this is helpful.
“While these programs badly need reform, people who paid into them and are 71 or more are hardly in a position to go back to work.
Sadly, Paul Ryan treats it as a joke rather than answer the question”.
Gail, in theory based on the Ryan plan, no one over the age of 55 is going to see any changes to medicare or SS.
The 71 year old ought to know that. Paul Ryan is not the kind of man to treat anything related to our out of control Federal budget as a joke.
...and finally, if the Republic is truly broke, and that is reality when you consider the debt, deficit, and present spending orgy, everyone needs to be on board with whatever is necessary to bring about sanity in govt.
I say that as a military retiree, on SS. We better get used to whatever suffering is going to be necessary or pass the troubles onto the succeeding generations. A scenario inconsistent with American values, IMHO.
I’m betting you of all people as a graduate of the FR class of ‘98 fully understand the consequences if we of this generation fail in our efforts to spare the next generation what we are responsible for. It is our votes and selections in Congress and allowing it to continue to this point, that is the problem.
The man was yelling and screaming and disrupting the event. That is why police were forced to subdue him.
Paul Ryan's proposals don't effect current recipients at all. They are attempts to save a program that is fiscally insolvent and certain to go bankrupt in the future.
Nobody is demonizing the elderly or telling them to go back to work.
Why do you fall for it time and again??????
But the current system is a monster. People are getting many more dollars back than they put in.
Why didn't older folks today; campaign 30 or 40 years when there money was being stolen by Tip O'Neil and Ted Kennedy?
That money invested in the most safe; low return investments; would return you 3 or 4 times more than SS is paying you.
The liberals don't want that. They want to CONTROL you and YOUR money.
SS is a Ponzi scheme.
The Kool-Aid
Stop drinking it
I read your rant. Now here’s the reality and truth.
SSI and Medicare are ENTITLEMENTS. So said the United States Supreme Court. You are not legally OWED a damned thing. Sure you paid in like everyone else that worked.
Your elected “leaders” decided to borrow that money to use on everything from food stamps to Robert Byrd’s Train Museums and the Iowa Roads to nowhere.
What you fail to recognize is that your tantrum only reiforces the mindset that it is okay for you to have Multiple bypasses and hip surgeries and a monthly check with yearly cost of living increases. All at the expense of someone who at the current age of 25 will pay a higher tax for both SSI and Medicare then you ever did, ALONG with paying for your perscription drug coverage that All that were retired before GW Bush signed the law NEVER paid a dime into. They can also look forward to paying into that system only to have it go belly up in another 7-10 years. All while watching the Richest Generation alive (you) live with your multiple homes, large investments and fancy cars bitch about having to pay a dime more for anything.
Some of us have had our jobs disappear, those that still have them have had to put in 60 hour weeks to keep them and no increases in 4-5 years or our hourly rates cut.
So please either revisit your “Facts” or side quietly while others pay your way. I myself at the age of 50 am getting damned tired of it AND your generations mindset your you are OWED something.