That would be a no

Matthew Hoy
By Matthew Hoy on May 29, 2011

And the hits just keep on coming. Debbie Wasserman Schultz was on CBS News’ “Face the Nation.” (via NRO) Do the Democrats have a plan to save Medicare?

Do the Democrats have a plan?

Smith: But the Trustees also said a couple of Fridays ago that this thing (Medicare) could be insolvent in the next decade. Doesn’t something really dramatic have to happen, and as the Congressman suggested, Republicans have a plan, do the Democrats have a plan? 

Wasserman Schultz: Like I said, the Republicans have a plan to end Medicare as we know it. What they would do is they would take the people who are younger than 55 years old today and tell them You know what? You’re on your own. Go and find private health insurance in the healthcare insurance market, we’re going to throw you to the wolves and allow insurance companies to deny you coverage and drop you for pre-existing conditions. We’re going to give you X amount of dollars and you figure it out.

I know the question you’re asking: Did Harry Smith follow-up and ask her to answer his question? Re-read the title of this post.

Yuval Levin notes that just about everything Wasserman Schultz said about the Ryan plan was false, including “the” and “and.”

None of this is true, and it’s especially important to understand that the latter parts are not true. The Ryan plan would not leave future seniors to find insurance on their own in the private market, and it wouldn’t allow insurance companies to deny coverage or drop people for pre-existing conditions. It would continue the very reasonable practice of treating senior citizens differently than younger Americans when it comes to health care—giving them guaranteed coverage subsidized by the government at a level that would make it affordable for them. Seniors would be given a menu of approved options to choose from, all of which would be required to accept all Medicare recipients, to offer a plan with at least the level of coverage required by the Federal Employee Health Benefit Plan, and to charge all seniors of the same age the same rates. The premium support benefit that seniors get would be adjusted based on their age, their health, and their wealth (and the lowest-income seniors would get an additional pre-funded Medical Savings Account to cover remaining out-of-pocket costs).

I think most young people would gladly take that over what we’re poised to get if things stay as they do right now, which is jack squat.

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