Eric Scheiner at CNS News:
Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D.-Ill.), who is the second-ranking Democrat in the Senate after Majority Leader Harry Reid (D.-Nev.), praised Rep. Paul Ryan’s (R-Wis.) willingness to work on entitlement reform, saying on the Senate floor Wednesday, “I don’t disagree with Paul Ryan saying we have got to look honestly at Medicare.”
You don’t see this often—from Dick Durbin no less.
“If we don’t touch Medicare, in about 10 or 12 years it goes broke and we can’t let that happen. So we have to look at Medicare in a sensible way to reduce the costs of Medicare,” Durbin said.
Ok, I’ll bite.
Durbin’s praise of Rep. Ryan’s candor in dealing with the need to reform Medicare came mixed in with some criticism. “He has studied this issue and knows it well,” said Durbin. “We come to different conclusions but he did tackle the entitlements. I think he went too far on Medicare. Doubling the expenses for people on Medicare is a non-starter.”
Here it is. So Durbin wants to cut Medicare costs, but doesn’t want Medicare recipients to pay more. Well, unfortunately that’s the position we’re in. Now you can think we’re not in that position, but the fact is, either we print more money to cover our debt, or cut our spending (entitlement programs make up the largest portion of our budget). Either way, it’s going to cost the american citizen.
The difference between the two approaches is that you can cut entitlement programs in a planned and organized fashion without causing panic. We can cut entitlement programs going forward, so that future generations are aware of the reduced benefits from the time they are young and can plan it into their life. Printing money eventually results in inflation and is essentially a tax on everyone. Ironically Liberals love printing money, yet it affects the poor and middle class the most, because they can least afford it.