[JohnMaltczevitch]

What makes you think that Mitt Romney earning money didn't improve the community and help society? I would wager that it did quite a bit more than "community organizing" did...

If you truly believe that making yourself a huge pile of money magically helps communities then you're beyond help.

You've frequently trashed Ryan's plan and never given any evidence that you've understood it at all. Like, do you realize that the plan primarily does nothing other than provide an actual cost cap? Like, just says, "hey, it turns out we don't have unlimited resources to throw at healthcare, and this is about as much as we can afford." Just acknowledging that simple truth apparently is "****ing the poor"? How about the fact that it finally does means-testing so that rich people don't get government bucks. Seriously, what do you actually KNOW about it other than what you read in liberal trash rags?

I actually bothered to research it when it was first announced. It turns Medicare into a ****ing voucher system that is going to completely **** millions of people, especially as the value of the vouchers falls over time.

Oh and the best part to Ryans plans? They don't actually save money overall anyway, unless you believe his magical 'tax loopholes' argument which he's never bothered to actually specify.

Bizarrely though (and obviously to the complete surprise of everyone) the Ryan plan will involve rich people paying less taxes. Who saw that one coming?

[medifastwoman]

So explain to me why people would willingly pay him if he wasn't being helpful? This is a key point in economics, you would do well to understand it.

Don't be stupid. If I go out and sell crack on the street corner I will make a huge pile of money but society will not be improved as a result. Same if I sell high sugar sodas or shitty TV shows. Yes, jobs are created making the product, but not all products have a positive afffect on society, and sometimes the negatives far outweigh the positives. If you don't understand that then you're the one who needs to start understanding how economics works as a part of the larger world, instead of seeing it as a standalone system.

How is it going to **** millions of people?

What do you think those poor people are going to do when the cost of their medical treatment overruns the value of the voucher?

And what makes you think the value of the vouchers will fall over time?

Because its tied to consumer index inflation not healthcare inflation which is higher in practice.

This is false. It's going to mean you don't need an army of lawyers to get your proper tax rate. The plan is, cut overall rates, eliminate the swiss-cheese exemptions that rich people take advantage of to pay very little in taxes. You obviously don't understand a bit of it.

How is it going to do that? Which tax loopholes is he going to fix? Please provide some evidence to support what you just said other than 'duh, it makes common sense'.

[LxtdK9i4]

How is it going to do that? Which tax loopholes is he going to fix?

All of them. Seriously, ALL of them. The way Reagan did in the 80s.

[emingeRek]

All of them. Seriously, ALL of them. The way Reagan did in the 80s.

As I thought, you've got nothing.

[Styparty]

That he wants to reform both programs in order to save them from collapse?

If the maintainance costs on a building are too expensive, one way to lower them would be to set the building on fire. This is not necessarily the best outcome for the people living there.

I'm still not seeing any reason to believe you researched anything wrt this issue given the fact you're essentially parroting the talking points from 2011's Lie of The Year.

I'm still not seeing any reason to care what you believe. As for that 'lie of the year' bullshit, lets look at the reasons why they called it that:

• They ignored the fact that the Ryan plan would not affect people currently in Medicare -- or even the people 55 to 65 who would join the program in the next 10 years.

• They used harsh terms such as "end" and "kill" when the program would still exist, although in a privatized system.

• They used pictures and video of elderly people who clearly were too old to be affected by the Ryan plan. The DCCC video that aired four days after the vote featured an elderly man who had to take a job as a stripper to pay his medical bills.

So let's recap: it changes Medicare into a privatized voucher system, but because there would still be a system called Medicare, it doesn't count as killing it, and it only ****s people 55 and younger. Wow, definitely lie of the year..

[FelikTen]

Words

I'm still waiting to see the results of this "research" into the plan you claimed to have done before deciding you were against it.

[Enjoymms]

Incidentally the answer to keeping the system solvent is extremely simple, adopt universal healthcare. That's like fixing a crack addiction by shooting heroin.

[Mearticbaibre]

It's amazing how you lot are so quick to sneer at someone who instead of using his education to just get as rich as possible decided to invest his time and energy into improving the community and helping society. The point is that he could afford to do these things because his family had the money and he didn't need to go out and work to earn money like the plebians.

conservatives who were traditionally huge supporters of communities working together to improve their lives. Most of us do it on our own time. We don't suck back 6 large for it.

Provide some evidence to support that please, or else it will be added to your already huge list of blatent lies. Madelyn (that white ***** Obama tossed under the bus just before she died) was VP of the Bank of Hawaii for 16+ years. Yep, Barry O was raised on the streets of Harlem.

Ryans extremist '**** the poor' plan is a perfect example of a right wing college kid sitting talking about how a world he's never really experienced should be run. Sort of like Obama, who went to all the best schools and never paid a dime. I see.

[f29sXS07]

Most of us do it on our own time. We don't suck back 6 large for it.

Sure, you're a real community spirited type, that must be why you spray hatred for the world with every sentence.

Madelyn (that white ***** Obama tossed under the bus just before she died) was VP of the Bank of Hawaii for 16+ years. Yep, Barry O was raised on the streets of Harlem.

You really are a deeply unpleasant person, aren't you.

Sort of like Obama, who went to all the best schools and never paid a dime. I see.

Sure, they give scholarships to the super rich now.

[tutkarussia]

I asked you a very simple question earlier, and you still haven't answered it:

"What do you think those poor people are going to do when the cost of their medical treatment overruns the value of the voucher?"

Incidentally the answer to keeping the system solvent is extremely simple, adopt universal healthcare.

Either pay the difference themselves, or recognize that we can't give everyone as much healthcare as they need. There isn't enough money.

Either way, someone is going to limit the healthcare that they get. It will either be prices, or the government mandating some treatments to be unavailable. I'd rather it be prices than the government. That lets people try to decide whether it's worth it or not.

[Assungusa]

I simply lack the words to fully express how little I give a **** what you think.

I wasn't the one claiming to have done research into the plan before deciding he was against it. I simply found the statement curious since you don't seem to understand basic facts of the plan.

[WaydayNef]

You should care because not only is he smarter than you, he's asking the questions that need to be asked.

There are many people in the world who are smarter than me. There are considerably more who are not. I can sleep quite comfortable knowing exactly where you and DinoDoc sit in that scale.

The answer for when health care overruns vouchers is obviously that people will have to pick up the tab. That is because this country has limited resources and the whole point of money is that it is an allocation of resources. Some people have more resources than others and that is a consequence of their work. If that weren't the case nobody would work. I don't know why I have to explain this to a so-called "conservative."

Conservatives don't leave people to die when there's absolutely no need for this to be the case. The word you are looking for is sociopath, and you fit that description perfectly.

What we have now is infinite resources for people who ask for it, but those infinite resources don't exist, so the country is going bankrupt. That needs to be fixed. There is no way around this; the only way to prevent the bankruptcy of the country is to limit entitlements.

I long for the day when the Republican party is taken back by people who aren't so retardedly stupid as to believe nonsense like that. You live in a world where universal healthcare has been in operation for three quarters of a century and has been proven in country after country to save money and save lives. Instead you'd rather leave poor people to die, and spend vast fortunes on futuristic military projects that are completely unnecessary and that are often obsolete before they are ever used.

I try and make allowances when talking to college students because often things that seem blindingly obvious to a child can quickly change when you get older and actually have to deal with the real world. It's commonly called growing up, and by the sounds of it you should probably try it.

[immelawealecy]

Apparently if we don't adopt a voucher system we'll have no choice but to keep increasing spending on Medicare at a faster rate than the GDP grows forever and ever.

What do you expect Obama would say, and Kentonio would say, if we stopped doing just that? We'd be "cutting medicare" and "****ing the poor".

[gactanync]

Why don't we start with the actual facts:

Medicare: Starting in 2022, the proposal would end the current Medicare program for all Americans born after 1956 and replace it with a new program (still called Medicare) which uses a voucher (which increases by general inflation, not healthcare inflation) and would increase the age of eligibility for Medicare:

Starting in 2022, the age of eligibility for Medicare would increase by two months per year until it reached 67 in 2033.

After 2022, the current Medicare program ends for all people who have not already enrolled. People already enrolled in the current Medicare program prior to 2022 would continue to receive the program. New enrollees after 2022 would be entitled to a voucher to help them purchase private health insurance.

Beneficiaries of the voucher payments would choose among competing private insurance plans operating in a newly established Medicare exchange. Plans would have to insure all eligible people who apply and would have to charge the same premiums for enrollees of the same age. The voucher payments would go directly from the government to the private insurance companies that people selected.

The voucher payments would vary with the health status of the beneficiary. For the average 65-year-old, payment in 2022 is specified to be $8,000, which is approximately the same dollar amount as projected net federal spending per capita for 65-year-olds in traditional Medicare in that year.

Each year, the voucher payments would increase to reflect increases in the consumer price index (average inflation) and the fact that enrollees in Medicare tend to be less healthy and require more costly health care as they age. They would not increase by the higher, healthcare inflation rate.

The voucher payments to enrollees would also vary with the income of the beneficiary. The wealthiest 2% of enrollees would receive 30 percent of the premium support amount described above; the next 6% would receive 50 percent of the amount described above; and people in the remaining 92% the income distribution would receive the full premium support amount described above.

Eligibility for the traditional Medicare program would not change for people who are age 55 or older by the end of 2011 or for people who receive Medicare benefits through the

Disability Insurance program prior to 2022. People covered under traditional Medicare would, beginning in 2022, have the option of switching to the voucher system. Just a suggestion.

[Tij84ye]

Looks like Gallup thinks the Apolyton poll isn't going to cut it and decided to do one of their own. tl;dr version: his positives are somewhere south of Dan Quayle, but nobody cares about the VP pick anyway.

http://www.gallup.com/poll/156545/Re...torically.aspx

Four in 10 Americans rate Mitt Romney's selection of Rep. Paul Ryan to be his running mate as either "excellent" or "pretty good," while 42% call the choice "only fair" or "poor." This even division is among the least positive reactions to a vice presidential choice Gallup has recorded in recent elections. Only George H.W. Bush's selection of Dan Quayle in 1988 generated a higher negative response, although it also generated higher positives.