AMA committee endorses Ryan-esque Medicare reform

Hotair ^ | ED MORRISSEY | OCTOBER 16, 2012

[Snuph]

Video at link,--The exchange on Medicare may have been the most substantive and interesting part of the Vice President debate last Thursday night. Paul Ryan explained that the Obama administration’s robbing of Medicare Advantage to pay for Medicaid expansion would accelerate the bankruptcy of Medicare, while Joe Biden in one of his calmer moments attacked Ryan for proposing a “voucher” program. Biden claimed to have the support of the AMA in opposing free-market-based reforms such as Ryan’s proposal uses, and dramatically asked, “Who [will] you believe, the AMA, me?”

Like so much of what Biden had to say — when he was actually saying something, rather than just grinning, laughing, and grunting into his microphone — this turns out to be false. Avik Roy at Forbes reports that a key committee of the American Medical Association just endorsed the use of “defined contribution” plans as a reform path for Medicare — the very same mechanism contained in Paul Ryan’s plan, the one derided by Biden as a “voucher” plan:

[buffyt]

The whole deal about the federal goobermint controlling my health care is so scary. I will be 65 soon, in a couple of years, and will be forced into Medicare. I asked my own doc about ObamaCare. He is normally serious, and doesn’t make comments about current events, etc. This time, though, he threw his arms up into the air, and said “mamma mia, God help me!” I said WHAT? He repeated, “Mamma Mia, God Help Me!” He said “I have patients sitting out there in the waiting room right now, I KNOW what they NEED, to treat them. But I have to check with the federal government everytime before I can treat them.” This is so scary. Plus the IRS, USPS, DMV, etc. all run by the federales and all are so horrible!

[Mrs. B.S. Roberts]

we were just discussing this...