Tuesday, August 14, 2012

Would Romney veto the Ryan plan over Medicare cuts?

In an effort to take the offensive on Medicare, an issue which was returned to prominence by the Ryan nomination, the Romney campaign has been relentlessly attacking Obama over the "cuts" to Medicare discussed yesterday.  Romney's attack on Obama over the "cuts" in Medicare ring hollow because he has never mentioned the $700 billion as a critique of the Ryan budget.  He frequently states his intention to repeal these cuts.  But he also often speaks highly of Paul Ryan's budget, which fails to restore the pre-Obamacare funding.  This is, by his own accounting, a $700 billion difference between the Ryan budget and where he thinks we should be, judging based on his attacks on Obama.  This difference isn't worth a veto, apparently, or even mentioning.

As recently as Sunday, a top Romney surrogate said Romney would have signed the Ryan budget if it were on his desk as President.  Someone needs to ask him if he would have insisted on restoring the money before signing the plan, and if not, why should we take his attacks seriously?

ADDENDUM: After posting, came upon this report of Romney's statements today on differences between himself and Paul Ryan.  Let's look at a couple quotes:

-“We haven’t gone through piece by piece and said, ‘Oh, here’s a place where there’s a difference', but my plan for Medicare is very similar to his plan."

So Romney is claiming that he just hasn't had time to look closely enough at the differences between himself and his own running mate to form an opinion on the $700 billion disagreement.  He's either lying or utterly incompetent, and there's no in-between.

Romney continues:

-...but my plan for Medicare is very similar to his plan, which is ‘Do not change the program for current retirees or near-retirees but do not do what the president has done and that is to cut $700 billion out of the current program.'

That is clearly not true.  The budget that Romney, Ryan and 200+ House Republicans approved of did not have to include reversing those cuts to get their support.  So I guess that shows how much Romney really cares about the issue.

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