What's Important 51

Fifty-first in a series. (I'd thought about stopping this at fifty, but that's just a number.)

McCain has finally had to come clean about just how that "revenue-neutral" health-care plan is going to work. He's financing it by attacking Medicare. This is from the Wall Street Journal, Oct 6:

The Republican presidential nominee has said little about the proposed cuts, but they are needed to keep his health-care plan "budget neutral," as he has promised. The McCain campaign hasn't given a specific figure for the cuts, but didn't dispute the analysts' estimate.

In the months since Sen. McCain introduced his health plan, statements made by his campaign have implied that the new tax credits he is proposing to help Americans buy health insurance would be paid for with other tax increases.

But Douglas Holtz-Eakin, Sen. McCain's senior policy adviser, said Sunday that the campaign has always planned to fund the tax credits, in part, with savings from Medicare and Medicaid. Those government health-care programs serve seniors, poor families and the disabled. Medicare spending for the fiscal year ended Sept. 30 is estimated at $457.5 billion.

Mr. Holtz-Eakin said the Medicare and Medicaid changes would improve the programs and eliminate fraud, but he didn't detail where the cuts would come from. "It's about giving them the benefit package that has been promised to them by law at lower cost," he said.

Of course, Medicare already operates with a mere 3% of its budget for operating costs and overhead (unlike private insurance), so where's that money coming from? Let me tell you: patient care and premiums.

McCain's going after Medicare just all Republicans do. In his case, he's already on record as believing that it's bad - not market-driven, the government getting in between you and your doctor, all the sound bites. Now the only way his crappy health-care plan - the one that takes away incentives for employer-offered plans and offers you less than half the average policy price in tax credits to pay for it - can be financed is to go after the single most effective government plan there is.