GOP Star Rep. Ryan tries to Dismantle Medicare, the same program Republicans Accuse Democrats of Supposedly Downsizing.

So the Republicans want to save seniors from President Obama's plan to destroy Medicare. The illusion that conservatives are our great protectors is laughable. Take Wisconsin's corporate cyborg, Rep. Paul Ryan.

Rep. Paul Ryan is a real piece of work. As I've pointed out before, Ryan is an admitted Ayn Rander, that crazy free market theorist who has since been proven wrong due to the arrival of our second great depression. As a child, Ryan's family relied on Social Security to get by during some very difficult times. Now Ryan wants to thank that social safety net by making it a for profit private entity. But that's not all. Medicare is also on his free market hit list: According to WaxingAmerica.com:

It was Ryan who on April 2, 2009 authored and offered the Ryan of Wisconsin Amendment in the Nature of a Substitute to the Congressional Budget for Fiscal Year 2010.

This substitute amendment, which received 137 Republican votes and no support from Democrats, was authored by Ryan. As reported by the Twin Cities' Star-Tribune, Ryan the...top Republican on the House Budget Committee, called for eventually replacing the traditional Medicare program with subsidies to help retirees enroll in private health care plans. Current beneficiaries would keep their coverage and those 55 and older also would go into the current system...(emphasis added).

Thanks to Matthew Yglesias for his post last week, Republicans Against Medicare.As we march forward in the efforts to fix both social security and the medical system, Ryancontinues to champion systems of private individually managed accounts, which provide none of the efficiencies or protections of a larger system, which is designed to not only protect the individual, but also to maintain its overall integrity.

Yglesias also makes another great point:

The AP noted at the time that Republican leaders were “clearly nervous that votes in favor of the GOP alternative have exposed their members to political danger.”

Of course to pile ironies onto ironies, providing subsidies to help people enroll in (regulated) private health care plans is the core element of the Obama’s administration’s plan for people under
the age of 65. When applied to people 65 and older, subsidized, regulated, private health insurance is considered such a right-wing position that many Republican members of congress won’t vote for it. But when applied to people aged 64 and younger, it’s socialism.