Tag Archives: Medicare for All

national news

Biden is no far-left lackey

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We had better steel ourselves for the onslaught of demagogic attacks from Donald J. Trump’s campaign against Joseph R. Biden.

The current theme is laughable and disgraceful all at once.

Trump is contending that Joe Biden is a puppet of the far left, that he is intent on “defunding” local police departments and creating a lawless society.

Stop! Whoa! Hold it!

Joe Biden has said categorically that he does not favor any effort to “defund” police departments. He has said they should be examined and that police practices perhaps need to be reformed and improved. That, I want to assert, has nothing to do with whatever garbage is coming from Trump’s political campaign.

Biden also has argued that he does not favor “Medicare for All,” which has been a favorite talking point among the progressive movement. Instead, he has taken a more reasonable approach, which is to tinker with the Affordable Care Act, to improve the legislation he helped create.

Donald Trump is facing someone  I consider a traditional Democrat. Joe Biden comes from a working-class background. His legislative legacy is full of efforts to lend a hand to aid working families. His alliance with traditional Democratic constituencies has become legendary in political circles.

Donald Trump will not dissuaded from facing political reality. His poll standing very well is filling him with some sense of urgency to say damn near anything he believes will drag down the frontrunning challenger. So … he’s settled on the “far left lackey” argument.

It won’t work. It shouldn’t work. My hope is that Joe Biden’s team will ensure that it is ready to respond with equal or greater force to any demagogic lie that Donald Trump is willing to throw.

Game on!

medical news

Far from persuaded that Medicare for All is worthy, practical

I will need some additional persuasion, perhaps a lot of it, to be sold on the idea of Medicare for All, the pet project of U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, the newly anointed “front runner” for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination.

She now says it’ll cost “trillions of dollars” over the next decade, but she won’t raise taxes on middle-class Americans to pay for it.

I must stipulate that I am an elderly American. I am nearly 70 years of age. I am enrolled in Medicare, but also am enrolled in the Department of Veterans Affairs health care program. My VA membership trumps Medicare, given that if I need acute medical care, I am going to rely on the VA to take care of my needs.

So this Medicare for All notion is out of my wheelhouse. Or my wife’s wheelhouse. My sons, though, would be eligible for this program that Sen. Warren is pitching, along with our 6-year-old granddaughter.

I don’t want them to go broke looking for medical care or trying to find insurance that would pay for it.

I am just trying to wrap my noggin around how our federal government — which already is gazillions of dollars in debt — would be able to foot the bill on a government-financed medical plan that by definition would cover “all” Americans.

Warren says, if she’s elected president, she wouldn’t push for a middle-class tax on all Americans to pay for this package?

I need to figure this one out.