Is Paul Ryan a Strong VP Pick?

Where is Obama's? Oh that right he took Millions FROM Medicare!!

Obama running against outdated version of Ryan Medicare plan


The Obama campaign would like voters to believe that Paul Ryan's Medicare plan would "end Medicare as we know it" -- privatizing the whole system and costing seniors more than $6,000 extra a year.

But the campaign, even before Ryan was selected as Mitt Romney's running mate, has effectively been running against the wrong Ryan plan.

The president's accusations largely refer to Ryan's 2011 plan, ignoring the fact that the House Budget Committee chairman rolled out a different version in 2012 -- taking into account Democratic critiques. Though the 2012 plan is more moderate, Obama and his surrogates have all but ignored the newer version as they amp up their accusations against the Romney-Ryan ticket.

Most glaringly, the campaign has omitted a key point.

While Ryan's 2011 plan proposes to give seniors a government payment to buy private insurance, his 2012 plan offers seniors a choice.

Under the blueprint, seniors could use the payment to buy private insurance or stay in traditional Medicare.

This distinction rarely comes up at Obama campaign events.

Last week in Davenport, Iowa, Obama again accused Romney-Ryan of wanting to "voucherize the Medicare system."

"They want to turn Medicare into a voucher system," he said. "That means seniors would no longer have the guarantee of Medicare -- they'd get a voucher to buy private insurance. And if it doesn't keep up with costs, well, that's the seniors' problem."

Obama neglected to mention the traditional Medicare option. Under the plan, the two-tiered system would kick in a decade from now.

An Obama campaign official, though, defended the language being used, since the latest Ryan plan would still require seniors to use a "voucher" to purchase either private plans or traditional Medicare. "It's eliminating the guarantee that seniors have today," the official said.

Another distinction the campaign has chosen not to make is over the average cost to seniors. For months, Obama has cited an estimate that the Republican budget plan would cost Medicare seniors $6,400.

The campaign repeated that claim in a new TV ad released Friday called "Fact."

The ad says: "And experts say his voucher plan could raise future retirees' costs more than $6,000. ... Get the facts."

But that estimate is from early 2011, and refers to Ryan's outdated plan from the same year. Sharp-eyed viewers would see in the latest Obama ad the fine print that attributes the estimate to "Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, 4/8/11."

The liberal-leaning Center on Budget and Policy Priorities indeed estimated the old plan could cost seniors $6,400. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office reached a similar conclusion.

However, the CBO this year said it "does not have the capability" to estimate the individual impact of the latest Ryan plan, though it cautioned "beneficiaries might face higher costs."

The Obama campaign official said the campaign would be "happy" to use 2012 numbers -- if only Republicans would provide a plan that included enough specifics to be scored.

"We're using the most recent data that's available," the official said, calling the approach "within bounds."

Obama has continued to campaign off the $6,400 figure.

"Somebody did the analysis -- not us, somebody else," Obama declared Saturday in New Hampshire. "And they estimate that this could force seniors to pay as much as an extra $6,400 a year for their health care."

The Medicare guarantee issue has led to exaggeration on both sides. Fact-check site Politifact rated the oft-repeated claim that Republicans voted to "end Medicare" as the "Lie of the Year" for 2011.

The same site, though, rebuked Romney for trying to use the same line against Obama. The Romney campaign has accused Obama of trying to dismantle Medicare by using billions in cuts to fund the federal health care overhaul. This, wrote Politifact, "takes some shreds of truth and combines them with worst-case-scenario speculations, then deploys overheated language."

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/politi...

I'm not undecided. He and Romney are two shyster peas in a pod in cahoots with the current Fraud-In-Chief. This question is a joke because our elections are a sham. There is no such thing as a strong VP pick because "we the people" have nothing, whatsoever, to do with the so-called choices given to us. A vote for either the Romney or Obama tickets spells the continued derailment upon which this public has allowed our government to drive us and most definitely yet another four years of this public scratching their heads in wonderment at how so much could possibly have gone wrong(yet again).

So many claim this country to be the land of the brave. It would be nice, for a change, for this public to live up to the too-long fabled mantra. A good start would be to quit allowing ourselves to be duped by our government and the sellouts spewing the same propaganda only branded differently to those gullible enough to believe there is such a thing as either liberalism or conservatism on Capitol Hill.

Making the necessary changes in order to save this country from years of corruption and deviation is not going to be easy(nothing worthwhile ever is). It is time for those who claim to love this country to actually walk the walk instead of playing armchair politicos and refrain from playing the smoke and mirrors game set up by our Pravda-style government. It is time to stand straight and let our government know we are on to them and their sellout candidates and goings-on. Be a TRUE American, a patriot, and REFUSE to be further sucked in by the deception and cast your votes for ANYBODY but Obama OR Romney.

(I wouldn't have been quite so long-winded, but as I am no more a Romneybot than an Obamabot, I expect I'll be blocked too.)