NewsTrust - Medicare - Most Recent Stories

The PolitiFact guide to Medicare attack lines

Sun, 06 May 2012 00:00:00 -0700

PolitiFact - By Angie Drobnic Holan, Louis Jacobson - May. 06 (Fact Check) - Barack Obama has slashed Medicare by $500 billion. Mitt Romney and House Republicans want to end Medicare. And a new board is going to ration care so Washington can waste more money. Believe any of that? You shouldn’t. But it’s what the political ads likely will be saying between now and Election Day in November. We have some advice for voters sorting out the claims: Believe nothing you hear in a 30-second TV ad. Here are a few facts about Medicare: • It’s the government-run health insurance for Americans over age 65. • It’s a Canada-style, single-payer system. Liberals love that; conservatives don’t. • It has approximately 50 million people on its rolls. • That 50 million will grow to 80 million as baby boomers retire. Paying for that will be a challenge. Those realities about Medicare have sparked a full-fledged political brawl for 2012.

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Poor economy worsens Social Security's finances

Tue, 24 Apr 2012 00:00:00 -0700

Seattle Times - By Stephen Ohlemacher, Ricardo Alonso Zaldivar - Apr. 24 (Opinion) - High energy prices and an economy that has been slow to rebound are worsening Social Security's finances, shortening the life of the trust funds that support program by three years, the government said Monday.

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A Love Song for Paul Ryan [Cartoon]

Mon, 09 Apr 2012 00:00:00 -0700

Mother Jones - By Zina Saunders - Apr. 09 (Cartoon) - Mitt Romney woos Paul Ryan with a rendition of Judy Garland's "You Made Me Love You" from the film "Broadway Melody." What else is a flip-flopping Republican candidate to do when he needs some right-wing credentials?

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Fall Preview: Obama vs. Romney (and Ryan)

Sat, 07 Apr 2012 00:00:00 -0700

FactCheck - By Eugene Kiely - Apr. 07 (Fact Check) - President Obama says Mitt Romney has embraced a budget that could throw hundreds of thousands of children out of Head Start classrooms, eliminate air traffic control services in some places, and “ultimately end Medicare as we know it.” Romney says that’s just “rhetorical excess”

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Mitt Romney: President Barack Obama is "ending Medicare as we know it."

Thu, 22 Mar 2012 00:00:00 -0700

PolitiFact - By Louis Jacobson - Mar. 22 (Fact Check) - Mitt Romney is trying to turn the tables on President Barack Obama by using a favorite Democratic line against him, accusing Obama of "ending Medicare as we know it." That's been a trusty line for the Democrats, with variations used in campaign commercia

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Medicare Costs too Much and They Better Not Cut it

Mon, 19 Mar 2012 00:00:00 -0700

nationofchange.org - By Dean Baker - Mar. 19 (Opinion) - There is an old story about two men in a retirement home. The first declares, “the food in this place is poison.” His friend agrees and adds, “and the portions are so small.”

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AARP Plans Secret ‘Salon’ With Social Security Opponents

Sat, 17 Mar 2012 00:00:00 -0700

Huffington Post - By Ryan Grim - Mar. 17 (News Report) - An AARP invitation to a secret "Relaxed and Robust Evening of 'Salon Style' Conversation" to be held at a Capitol Hill home on March 27, obtained by The Huffington Post, indicates that the organization is still very much interested in a "grand-bargain" style deal that puts Social Security and Medicare cuts on the table.

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Ethan Rome: Republicans to America: Death to Medicare

Thu, 15 Mar 2012 00:00:00 -0700

Huffington Post - By Ethan Rome - Mar. 15 (News Analysis) - When the Republicans release their budget next week, they'll likely say they have a "new" Medicare proposal that will "save" Medicare instead of eliminate it. That's not true. The Republicans still plan to end Medicare as we know it. But this time they'l

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Super Tuesday guide: Finding truth in the attacks

Sun, 04 Mar 2012 00:00:00 -0800

PolitiFact - By Becky Bowers - Mar. 04 (Fact Check) - As 10 states prepare to vote on Super Tuesday, here’s PolitiFact’s guide to the multimillion-dollar ad blitz. With the field down to four Republican contenders, campaigns and super PACs are attacking their opponents with hot-button allegations about supporting Planned Parenthood, Obamacare and even Nancy Pelosi that are designed to strike fear in the hearts of Republican voters. There's been some piling on. We've seen several examples where two (or more) candidates have made the same attack. The one candidate who hasn't been attacked much: Ron Paul. He's has been busy attacking others — but we didn’t find ads attacking him. ... >>More

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10 Big Lies (And A Free-Market "Death Panel") Driving the GOP's Plan to Destroy Medicare

Fri, 17 Feb 2012 00:00:00 -0800

AlterNet - By Richard (RJ) Eskow - Feb. 17 (News Analysis) - Know what's really bipartisan? Not cutting Social Security or Medicare. Max Richtman offered the latest figures in an editorial for the Baltimore Sun: "94 percent of Democrats, 82 percent of independents and 64 percent of Republicans prefer raising taxes on the richest 2 percent of income earners rather than cutting benefits" for those programs. I got yer bipartisanship right here, pal. But since they're defying the public's wishes instead, it's no wonder they need to keep peddling that snake oil.

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Where Americans Most Depend on Benefits

Sat, 11 Feb 2012 00:00:00 -0800

New York Times - Feb. 11 (Special Report) - The share of Americans’ income that comes from government benefit programs, like Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security, more than doubled over the last four decades, rising from 8 percent in 1969 to 18 percent in 2009.

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CBO: Medicare cost-cutting programs haven’t worked

Wed, 25 Jan 2012 00:00:00 -0800

The Hill - By Sam Baker - Jan. 25 (News Report) - Programs designed to cut Medicare spending and improve the quality of healthcare have mostly failed, according to the Congressional Budget Office. The findings are a blow to existing Medicare projects as well as a key goal of the healthcare reform law.

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Medicare Madness: Baby Boomers At Center Of Possible Changes

Sun, 01 Jan 2012 00:00:00 -0800

Huffington Post - By Richardo AlonsoZaldivar - Jan. 01 (News Analysis) - Baby boomers take note: Medicare as your parents have known it is headed for big changes no matter who wins the White House...

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Fact-checking in the Echo Chamber Nation

Fri, 23 Dec 2011 00:00:00 -0800

PolitiFact - By Bill Adair - Dec. 23 (Opinion) - At a Republican campaign rally a few years ago, I asked one of the attendees how he got his news. "I listen to Rush and read NewsMax," he said. "And to make sure I'm getting a balanced view, I watch Fox." My liberal friends get their information from distinctly different sources — Huffington Post, Daily Kos and Rachel Maddow. To make sure they get a balanced view, they click Facebook links — from their liberal friends. This is life in our echo chamber nation. We protect ourselves from opinions we don't like and seek reinforcement from like-minded allies. The paradox ...

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The Whoppers of 2011

Wed, 21 Dec 2011 00:00:00 -0800

FactCheck - By Brooks Jackson - Dec. 21 (Fact Check) - Despite what you may have heard in 2011: The new health care law won’t cost many jobs (and they’ll be poorly paying jobs at that). Republicans aren’t proposing to “end” Medicare (and Democratic Sen. Ron Wyden has signed onto a modified version of the GOP plan). Most of the “millionaires” who would pay higher tax rates under a Democratic proposal aren’t job-creating small-business owners. President Obama’s mother didn’t really fight to get health insurance coverage as she was dying. And there was plenty more spin and deception in 2011. Obama claimed he pays a lower tax rate than a teacher. Michele Bachmann endorsed a claim that HPV vaccine causes mental retardation. Joe Biden claimed rapes quadrupled in Flint, Mich., after police layoffs. And that’s just some of the nonsense we debunked.

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Politifact Has Decided That A Totally True Thing Is The "Lie Of The Year," For Some Reason

Tue, 20 Dec 2011 00:00:00 -0800

Huffington Post - By Jason Linkins - Dec. 20 (News Analysis) - So, you know, go form an organization called WordTweaker and commit yourself to advocating for the most civil sounding adjectives, if that's what you want to do! But let's recall, Politifact, that your lie of the year is "Republicans voted to end Medicare." And end it, they did vote to do! Now, if the Democrats had said, "Republicans take Medicare out behind the Cannon Office Building and horsewhip it," that's a different story. But you've decided -- incorrectly -- that the most vanilla way of the describing what happened is a deception. And "privatizing" Medicare ends Medicare, as Medicare is a public entitlement program.

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Op-Ed Columnist: Things to Tax

Mon, 28 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0800

New York Times - By Paul Krugman, New York Times - Nov. 28 (Opinion) - How about making increased revenue part of the remedy? And not just a return to Clinton-era tax rates.

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Panel Fails to Reach Deal on Plan for Deficit Reduction

Tue, 22 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0800

New York Times - By Jennifer Steinhauer, Robert Pear, Helene Cooper - Nov. 22 (News Report) - After one last bout of fitful but futile talks, Congressional negotiators conceded the obvious: that the joint Congressional committee charged with drafting a deficit reduction package would miss its deadline this week. But they did not quite give up the ghost of a chance that a solution might be found later.

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‘Government-Run’ Nonsense

Tue, 22 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0800

FactCheck - By Brooks Jackson - Nov. 22 (Fact Check) - The U.S. Chamber of Commerce puts a new twist on a tired old falsehood about “government-run health care” in one of its new ads attacking Democratic lawmakers. We noted other dubious claims as well. An ad against Sen. Jon Tester in Montana accuses him of favoring “government-run health care”

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Taxation in the United States

Fri, 30 Sep 2011 00:00:00 -0700

Wikipedia - Sep. 30 (Special Report) - The United States is a federal republic with autonomous state and local governments. Taxes are imposed in the United States at each of these levels. These include taxes on income, property, sales, imports, payroll, estates and gifts, as well as various fees. Taxes are imposed on net income of individuals and corporations by the federal, most state, and some local governments. Residents are taxed on worldwide income and allowed a credit for foreign taxes. Income subject to tax is determined under tax rules, not accounting principles, and includes almost all income from whatever source. Most business expenses reduce taxable income, though limits apply to a few expenses. Individuals are permitted to reduce taxable income by personal allowances and certain nonbusiness expenses, including home mortgage interest, state and local taxes, charitable contributions, and medical and certain other expenses incurred above certain percentages of income. State rules for determining taxable income often differ from federal rules. Federal tax rates vary from 15% to 35% of taxable income. State and local tax rates vary by jurisdiction, and many are graduated. State taxes are generally treated as a deductible expense for federal tax computation. Certain alternative taxes may apply. Payroll taxes are imposed by the federal and all state governments. These include Social Security and Medicare taxes imposed on both employers and employees, at a combined rate of 15.3% (13.3% for 2011). Social Security tax applies only to the first $106,800 of wages in 2009 through 2011. Employers also must withhold income taxes on wages. An unemployment tax and certain other levies apply.

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9 Policies Conservatives Were For Long Before They Were Against Them

Thu, 22 Sep 2011 00:00:00 -0700

AlterNet - By Joshua Holland - Sep. 22 (News Analysis) - Journalist Steve Benen noted that while "the record here may be inconvenient for the right ... it's also unambiguous: the mandate Republicans currently hate was their idea." It was championed by the Heritage Foundation ... Nixon embraced it in the 1970s, and George H.W. Bush kept it going in the 1980s. For years, it was touted by the likes of John McCain, Mitt Romney, Scott Brown, Chuck Grassley, Bob Bennett, Tommy Thompson, Lamar Alexander, Lindsey Graham, John Thune, Judd Gregg, and many other ... notable GOP officials.

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Fact-checking the CNN/Tea Party Express GOP debate

Tue, 13 Sep 2011 00:00:00 -0700

PolitiFact - By Bill Adair - Sep. 13 (Fact Check) - The CNN-Tea Party Express debate in Tampa on Monday night was dominated by talk about Social Security and the need for government to balance its budget. Mitt Romney led the attacks on the Republican frontrunner, Texas Gov. Rick Perry, by saying that Perry didn't support the retirement program. "In writing his book, Gov. Perry pointed out that … by any measure Social Security has been a failure," Romney said. We checked Perry's book and found Romney was right. We rated the claim True.

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GOP debate fact check: A look at the record

Tue, 13 Sep 2011 00:00:00 -0700

Associated Press - By Associated Press - Sep. 13 (Fact Check) - Rick Perry 1.0 thought Social Security was a "disease" inflicted on the population by the federal government. Rick Perry 2.0 thinks Social Security deserves being saved "for generations to come." That metamorphosis by the Republican presidential hopeful over recent months contributed to some factual stretches Monday night in a GOP debate, both by the Texas governor and his opponents for the nomination. A look at some of the claims in the Tea Party Express debate and how they compare with the facts.

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Medicare cost-cutting board is under fire - The Washington Post

Fri, 12 Aug 2011 00:00:00 -0700

Washington Post - By N. C. Aizenman - Aug. 12 (Investigative Report) - Known as the Independent Payment Advisory Board, or IPAB, it has been touted by President Obama as an essential tool for curbing Medicare spending over the long term. Comprising 15 health-care experts to be appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate, the IPAB will have unparalleled authority to make cuts to the health insurance program for the elderly if yearly spending exceeds the law’s targets by as soon as 2015. Congress could overrule the panel, but only if it musters a super-majority in the Senate or comes up with an alternate plan that saves the same amount.

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Why Obama won’t face a primary challenge

Thu, 04 Aug 2011 00:00:00 -0700

Washington Post - By Harold Meyerson - Aug. 04 (Opinion) - President Obama is faring poorly these days, but he can console himself with the fact that he’ll probably be spared the fate of previous presidents who fell on hard times: a primary challenge. Those groups within the Democratic Party that might otherwise be shopping around for a more forthrightly progressive alternative are deterred by two factors: the likelihood that any challenge will end up helping a radicalized Republican Party and the fact that Obama is black.

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