GOPer: If You’re Concerned About Vouchers Go to Canada

Rep. Rob Woodall, (R-GA) audaciously laid out the Republican agenda that’s being pushed with a vengeance yesterday, in what Steve Benen calls a display of “candor, callousness, and conservatism.”

Constituents from across America are popping up at Town Hall meetings in an effort to find answers as to what the hell is going with the sudden attempt to eradicate Medicare. When the President was elected, Tea Partiers chanted, “Get your government hands off my Medicare” but the outrage suddenly dissipated.

But, reality is setting in with seniors that Republicans will eliminate their health care at the drop of a hat — then claim to be struggling.

Ryan Grim from HuffPo:

[Woodall told] seniors at a local town hall that they ought not look to the government to provide health care for the elderly just because their private employer doesn’t offer health benefits for retirees.A Woodall constituent raised a practical obstacle to obtaining coverage in the private market within the confines of an employer-based health insurance system: What happens when you retire?

“The private corporation that I retired from does not give medical benefits to retirees,” the woman told the congressman in video captured a local Patch reporter in Dacula, Ga.

“Hear yourself, ma’am. Hear yourself,” Woodall told the woman. “You want the government to take care of you, because your employer decided not to take care of you. My question is, ‘When do I decide I’m going to take care of me?’”

Another woman at the Woodall town hall told the congressman that it was unrealistic to think that the market would provide affordable policies to the elderly.

Another woman told the congressman that Medicare provides peace of mind to her children, who would be on the hook for her care otherwise, much as they were before the social safety net was stitched together.

“I’m fine with my Medicare, and my children and my grand children — my children especially — would have a lot of heartburn if they know that I’m not on Medicare, because that voucher is not going to go very far,” said the woman….

Woodall suggested that the woman concerned about vouchers might find the type of health care system she and her children approve of in Canada or another industrialized nation.

“If you want a socialized health care program, there are lots of places to find that,” he said. “But, for your children’s [sic] sake, I beg you: There aren’t many places to find the freedom to succeed by the sweat of your brow like we have here.”

 

Another struggling GOPer that makes $174,000 a year with generous benefits is telling the elderly it’s just too fucking bad. This detached crew of freshmen GOPers have no conception of what the elderly need or desire — nor do they care. Of course, Woodall enjoys a robust health care plan with benefits that will last him a lifetime.

Chuck Schumer weighed in:

“No matter how hard you’ve worked your whole life, no matter how severe your medical hardship, the Republican motto is clear: you’re on your own. This lays bare the ideology behind their goal of ending of Medicare as we know it.”

Tactically this is a bad move for the GOP after being met with ire at Town Hall meetings, but it provides an explanation as to why Health Care reform was fought tooth and nail by Republicans, so much so that they judged Obama as a ‘Socialist.’ Welcome to Ryan’s death panels.

Health Care reform was watered down, whittled away into just a shadow of its former self, but that wasn’t enough — the elderly, their offspring and the under 55s are asked to sacrifice — without a single payer or universal health care system because Republicans put it on the chopping block.

Be sure to thank the freshmen GOPers for putting their true colors on display.

Video: Crooks & Liars

H/T Daily Kos