Originally Posted By TomSawyer Huh, who would have thought that seniors would have strong opinions about health care. <a href="http://youtu.be/NF-MX1Jsmik" target="_blank">http://youtu.be/NF-MX1Jsmik</a>
Originally Posted By SingleParkPassholder Wow. The guy is STILL repeating the lies about the $716 billion. What an ass.
Originally Posted By skinnerbox I'm guessing the geniuses at Team Romney/Ryan failed to realize that anyone can join AARP at the age of 50. A significant percentage -- not the majority, clearly -- but a significant percentage of AARP members have yet to reach 65. Which means they're not on Medicare yet. Which means Obamacare is important to them for affordable health insurance, because they're middle aged. Which the health insurance industry takes advantage of in spades. Go ahead, look it up yourself. Whether you have an HMO plan, PPO plan, high deductible plan... once you turn 50 years of age, your premiums take an enormous jump. Huge jump. Obamacare will help to make that less of a problem, because the dissolution of pre-existing condition clauses. It will be easier for folks nearing Medicare age to find another provider with cheaper premiums.
Originally Posted By Dabob2 <A significant percentage -- not the majority, clearly -- but a significant percentage of AARP members have yet to reach 65. Which means they're not on Medicare yet. > And if they're under 55, they're slated to be subject to Ryan's "reforms." And even if they're over that age, their kids aren't. And guess what Paul - you may cynically think you can get seniors on your side by saying your plan to turn Medicare into a coupon won't affect them, but if it means their kids won't have it as good as them - no parent wants that, no matter how old they get.
Originally Posted By SuperDry And there's also the matter of unfounded fear. Consider that one of the major opposition groups to Obamacare has been and is seniors on Medicare who like what they have and don't want any chance of it being changed. Despite Obamacare having nothing to do with Medicare, we saw them out in large numbers protesting Obamacare, in one case even complaining to their Congressman "Keep your government hands off my Medicare." Obamacare is not about Medicare. It never was. It's about the people under 65 that have to get health care coverage otherwise. Yet, the noise machine was successful in stirring up plenty of fear, uncertainty, and doubt over this issue at the time and got quite a few seniors good and riled up. Now, it's going to be that much more difficult to get any reforms that DO affect Medicare passed, no matter how many assurances are given that it won't affect them. If some people were so against a program that made no changes to Medicare because they didn't want Medicare changed, imagine how much they'll oppose a program that actually changes Medicare.
