Friday, August 15, 2014

Round's May or May Not Support Voucherizing Medicare

Mike Round's mouthpiece, Dick Wadhams, is getting upset with people questioning his lies statements about Mike Round's support (or not?) to voucherize Medicare?  Some people pointed to the GOP debate that Mike attended as evidence that Rounds supports Ryan's plan.  Wadhams and Pat Powers have to run and defend their man by showing a clip from the SD GOP debate and a radio clip from the Greg Belfrage interview.  
Rounds responded that while he respected Congressman Ryan’s efforts to balance the budget, he could not support that specific plan. Neither Medicare nor the use of vouchers in Medicare were mentioned in the question from the panelist but Rounds did clearly state his opposition to more than $700 billion in cuts to Medicare that would fund Obamacare.
In the debate clip, it is unclear if Rounds supports or does not support the Ryan budget.  In the Belfrage interview, he does say that he doesn't support the Ryan plan, but only because it doesn't seem to go far enough.  In neither case, does he come out against the Ryan plan to voucherize Medicare.  It has been pointed out that Rounds doesn't really have anything to say about Medicare other than spreading a lie about Obamacare and Medicare.  

Until Rounds actually states a real position on Medicare, we have to go with John Thune's vote since Mike Rounds is willing to follow Thune's lead (unless Dick and Mike want to be clear that John Thune is wrong on Medicare).

So, we have no clear position on voucherizing Medicare from Rounds and only a lie that continues to be spread about Medicare money used to fund Obamacare.  If you don't want to believe this "leftist ally," then you can believe the KELO Land report:
"We just really don't find this one all that true," PolitiFact.com reporter Joshua Gillin said. 
PolitiFact says the claim isn't accurate because the $700 billion doesn't come from the traditional Medicare program itself.  Instead, it's a reduction in payments to insurance companies through the privately-managed Medicare plan called Medicare Advantage. 
"The idea behind that is that the Affordable Care Act is trying to reduce the amount of payments that are going to Medicare Advantage plans because they are reimbursed at a higher rate by the government than actual Medicare is," Gillin said. 
Gillin says far from losing hundreds of billions of dollars, Medicare spending will actually increase as more Baby Boomers become eligible in the years to come.  
Still waiting for apology Mr. Wadhams.

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