Last week, Rep. Paul Ryan presented the alternate Republican budget plan. It included privatization of Social Security and Medicare vouchers and would supposedly close the U.S. debt in 50 years. Republican leaders were fairly ambivalent about the budget since they spent all summer saying “we love Medicare.”
A Democratic leadership source told TPMDC they are considering options for putting the Ryan plan on the floor, forcing Republicans to vote for or against a plan they don’t want to talk about. This appears to be the Ryan bill, with seven GOP co-sponsors.
While conservative groups love the plan – which cuts Social Security and Medicare benefits before effectively privatizing the entitlement programs – and Ryan says he’s willing to lose his job over presenting new policy ideas, GOP leaders are backing away.
We told you Friday the Democrats plan to force a vote on a resolution that “expresses the will of House Democrats to preserve Social Security and reaffirms our commitment to working in a bipartisan way to make common sense adjustments to strengthen the program for generations to come.”
The resolution is a way to expose fissures among House Republicans and the first real indication the Democrats plan to play hardball leading up to the 2010 midterm elections.
Some Republicans have been very enthusiastic about the plan, like GOP thinkers Rep. Marsha Blackburn and Rep. Michele Bachmann. One thing these Budget Peacocks won’t tell you is that preserving benefits for people 55+ while privatizing the rest of the system costs money. A lot of money that blows a whole in the deficit. That’s why it takes 50 years to fix the hole. Meanwhile, lifting the income cap on SS taxes completely covers the current budget hole and ensures that we don’t have to gamble with our retirement on the stock market. The voucher plan for Medicare is also inadequate because the vouchers start at $11,000 in 10 years, which is probably inadequate to buy insurance in our broken system and the indexing is very stingy. It also taxes employer health benefits, so yes, he’s raising taxes on the middle class.
The GOP budget plan is to balance the budget on the backs of the poor and middle class in order to preserve tax breaks for the rich and corporations. And now they’ll have to get up in public and vote on it. I wonder how Mike Castle will vote?