Fact-Checking the GOP on Medicare. (orig. 6/15/2011)

We're a year-and-a-half from a presidential election, and the political "silly season" is about to kick off. Folks on both sides will be making statements about "hot button" issues such as Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. Monday's GOP debate is a good example. 

Mitt Romney said: "Obamacare takes $500 billion out of Medicare and funds Obamacare."

Michelle Backmann expanded on that theme: "Senior citizens get this more than any other segment of our population, because they know in Obamacare the president of the United States took away $500 billion -- a half-trillion dollars -- out of Medicare, shifted it to Obamacare to pay for younger people. And it's senior citizens who have the most to lose in Obamacare."

Each of these statements took only a few seconds to utter. Perfect for inclusion in a TV ad. After the debate, the Washington Post fact-checked these statements and reached the following conclusions:

"Romney’s statement... fall(s) in the category of technically correct but misleading. It’s rather rich for Republicans to complain about $500 billion in supposed cuts to Medicare that they themselves would retain, even under the cover of helping Medicare."

" Bachmann’s statement is further off the mark because of her assertion that seniors would suffer at the hands of the youth. The Medicare savings in the health care law are aimed at providers, not seniors; meanwhile seniors stand to benefit from aspects of the health care law that Republicans want to repeal. On top of that, people younger than 55 might face significantly higher premiums under the GOP plan for Medicare."

Now here's the reason for this message. Before reaching the above conclusions, it took 20 paragraphs of explanation! You can read whole thing at this link:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/fact-checker/post/fact-checking-the-gop-debate-500-billion-in-cuts-to-medicare/2011/06/14/AGsnGAVH_blog.html?hpid=z2

If you're the opposing party, try to boil that explanation down into a 30-second sound bite for a TV ad!

Let's not just pick on the Republicans. Politicians of all parties will do the same thing. Unfortunately, most voters do not follow politics or stay informed on the issues. 

Most retirees are tuned in to the importance of Medicare and Social Security for our financial well-being. Retirees are also coming to recognize that Medicaid is a program which directly touches their lives since about one-half of Medicaid dollars go to pay for nursing home care.

I'll try to keep my ear to the ground on these issues, and others important to retirees, so that we can take advantage of the folks who do the hard work of fact-checking on both sides.