Rounds Issues Challenge: Challenge Taken

Rounds has issued a challenge through the South Dakota GOP.  Prove that Mike Rounds supports vouchers for Medicare.  

A South Dakota Republican Party spokesman, Dick Wadhams, responded to the outrageous charge: 

“It is time for Rick Weiland to put up or shut up about this false allegation. Mike Rounds has never endorsed ‘voucherizing’ Medicare as Weiland claims in a recent tweet. It is time for President Obama’s candidate, Rick Weiland, to either provide proof for this charge or retract his falsehood.”

Okay, challenge accepted.

1. Mike Rounds won't make any real specific position on basically anything.  We can only assume that he supports the Republican's budget that has been proposed since 2012: The Paul Ryan Budget.

2. The Paul Ryan Budget calls for turning the Medicare into a voucher system.

In 2012: 

But the Romney-Ryan approach pretty much matches the dictionary definition of "a form or check indicating a credit against future purchases or expenditures." We think that describes the general way Ryan's plan would work. For a political discussion aimed at voters rather than policy wonks, we think Obama’s use of the term "voucher" is close enough to earn it a rating of Mostly True.

In 2013:

Ryan's proposal, unveiled Tuesday, is essentially the same as others the House Budget Committee chair has proposed in previous years. This plan formed the heart of the Republicans' entitlement reform platform during last year's election, when Ryan ran as the GOP vice presidential candidate. 

Ryan argues that the Republican Medicare proposal keeps costs under control through competition and more choices for patients. President Obama and other Democrats deride it as a voucher program that will leave seniors with higher health care costs.

In 2014:

The Medicare proposals in the 2014 budget resolution developed by House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-WI) are essentially the same as those in last year’s Ryan budget.  Once again, Chairman Ryan proposes to replace Medicare’s guarantee of health coverage with a premium-support voucher and raise the age of eligibility for Medicare from 65 to 67.  Together, these changes would shift substantial costs to Medicare beneficiaries and (with the simultaneous repeal of health reform) leave many 65- and 66-year-olds without any health coverage.  

The Ryan budget would cut Medicare spending by $356 billion over the 2013 - 2023 period compared to CBPP’s current-policy baseline.  It would save $129 billion by repealing the Medicare benefit improvements in health reform (including closure of the prescription drug “donut hole”), limiting medical malpractice awards, and raising income-tested premiums.  Ryan’s budget also includes $138 billion in scheduled cuts from Medicare’s sustainable growth rate formula for physicians and $89 billion in Medicare cuts from sequestration.

3. If Rounds supports the only Medicare plan offered by the Republican party, then he supports vouchers for Medicare.

Rounds new mouthpiece repeats the Mike Rounds lie about Medicare and Obamacare:

“Poor Rick Weiland, he is already stuck supporting Obamacare which will move more than $700 billion out of Medicare to fund Obamacare but then he wants to also destroy Medicare as we know it by making it available to everyone, not just seniors. Now, he falsely charges that Mike Rounds wants to ‘voucherize’ Medicare. Put up or shut up, Mr. Weiland. Tell South Dakota just where and when Mike Rounds said he wanted to ‘voucherize’ Medicare. And, when you fail you to do that, apologize to Mike Rounds and the people of South Dakota for telling deliberate lies while you seek to destroy Medicare as we know it with your own misguided plan.” 

The thing is that this lie has been disproven time and time and time and time and time and time and (well you get the point) again. 

AARP states:

Medicare is ending. False. Obamacare is not replacing Medicare. In fact, AARP representatives say that Medicare will become stronger once the ACA is fully in effect. "Medicare's guaranteed benefits are protected in ways they hadn't been protected in the past," says Nicole Duritz, AARP's vice president for Health Education and Outreach.

We will now wait for Dick Wadhams, The SD GOP, and Mike Rounds to apologize to the citizens of South Dakota and Rick Weiland.