Cut and Expand

The U.S. Senate has been debating the health care reform bill the past couple of weeks. During this time it was voted that Medicare funding would be cut by $400 billion. On another subject, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) has said, "We've overcome a real problem that we had," announcing what he called a "broad agreement" Tuesday night.

That agreement...the new government run health care option is dead. Off the table. Dead. Iced. No longer exisits. Instead they've decided to expand an already existing government run health care plan - Medicare. This plan will open Medicare benefits to uninsured Americans from age 65 to age 55 starting in 2011.

Didn't they just vote to cut Medicare funding and now they want to expand eligibility coverage?

"60 Minutes" did an exposé on Sunday October 25, 2009 on Medicare fraud. Presented by CBS's Steve Kroft outlines facts and figures that are unsettling on how the system gets milked for an estimated $60 billion per year! Read summary here.

By the way, isn't Medicare bankrupt? Or about to be? Hmmm, let's cut funding and then expand it! That makes perfect sense! (Can you sense my sarcasm?) Fraud will double. Taxes will surge. Benefits and quality of care will drop. How can they not see this? How do members of Congress who are for this expect to remain in office? I am tempted to move to another state where the congressmen are for this just to help vote them out of office next year!