Obama Deputy Campaign Manager Stephanie Cutter -- last heard from flagrantly lying about what George Will labels the Obama forces' "sociopathic" cancer ad -- appeared on CBS' Face The Nation yesterday morning. As Katie noted yesterday, Cutter bragged about President Obama's great "achievement" of slashing $741 Billion from Medicare in order to partially fund a new unaffordable and unpopular entitlement program. Later in the program, after she predictably dumped all over a caricature of the Ryan plan, Cutter was was asked about Obama's plan to handle the crushing, long-term debt -- of which Medicare is the primary driver. There's a lot of crosstalk in this clip, so it's a little hard to hear, but you're not missing much of answer:
CLICK HERE TO SEE THE CLIP
http://youtu.be/Byw7uquFW4k
According to Cutter, the Obama plan comes in three easy steps: (1) Raise taxes on a tiny fraction of the population -- including nearly a million job creators. If this appreciably increases revenues at all, it would cover a tiny fraction of the deficit, let alone the debt. (2) Cut "waste" from the government. Barack Obama himself warned against this empty cliche last year. And why should a single voter trust the Solyndra adminstration to cut waste? Didn't candidate Obama pledge to go through the budget "line-by-line" in 2008, just before he presided over an unprecedented explosion of wasteful federal spending? (3) "Reform Medicare." That phrase means nothing unless there's, you know, a plan behind it. Obama sometimes talks about reforms, but there's no there there. The only cost containment we've seen from him comes through his massive cuts that instantly went to pay for Obamacare, and a powerful rationing board for seniors (IPAB). There's also this little point: Barack Obama's last budget, which was defeated 513-0 in Congress, included all of his desired tax hikes and waste reductions. Despite all that, it literally never balances. And here's what it does to the national debt:
Care to elaborate, Ms. Cutter? Meanwhile, Paul Ryan not only has a real plan to reform Medicare, he co-authored it with a prominent liberal Senator. Asked about the bipartisan plan on CNN, David Axelrod rejected Senator Ron Wyden's (D-OR) brain child because it's "extreme," or something:
The "Medicare death spiral" line is pretty rich. Medicare is already in a death spiral. It's going to be insolvent by 2024, according to the government's own bookkeepers. Barack Obama has absolutely no idea what to do about this problem. He's already stiff-armed his own debt commission's proposal, and seems intent on just opposing anything and everything in a cynical bid to convince voters that he's "protecting" a program (gosh, that sounds familiar). Indeed, his inaction and dearth of leadership is killing Medicare. National Review's Ramesh Ponnuru catches a top Lefty wonk -- former Obama budget director Pete Orzsag -- picking apart the 2011 Ryan Medicare plan...while conveniently pretending that the revised, bipartisan Wyden-Ryan doesn't exist. This is the vertiable definition of a specious, disingenuous argument. It's also telling that liberals are reduced to arguing against an outmoded framework, rather than dealing directly with a bipartisan solution they oppose for political reasons. I suppose this tendentious and dishonest sleight-of-hand is to be expected from the guy who helped design consecutive trillion-dollar-deficits, but the Romney/Ryan ticket's problem is that they're not just running against Democrats; they're also running against an activist partisan media. Here's the Sunday Miami Herald's banner headline about Romney's VP selection:
Haven't you heard? Paul Ryan's plan hurts seniors, many of whom reside in Florida. Except that the plan doesn't affect current or soon-to-be seniors at all, and Ryan's favorability rating among seniors is very strong. My only question is whether the Obama campaign paid for this front-page advertisement.
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