Public opinion, and the CBO, should be the death knell for Ryan's plan. Why isn't it?

I loved this headline: "Walker, Ryan and 'shock and awe' politics."

Totally missing from this clever comparison is the real reference point: "Disaster capitalism,' from Naomi Klein's book "The Shock Doctrine." Why do you think Walker and Ryan are pushing their full plans now, instead of a more responsible deliberate roll out?

But the other revealing part of this jsonline story is this: "What the left sees as breathtakingly zealous and reckless, the right sees as breathtakingly bold and courageous."

"I think you've got to give Paul Ryan and Scott Walker a great deal of credit for standing up and taking on some tough issues and offering things that are not the safe, old, 'just nibble at the edges' (approach)," says Republican Tommy Thompson, former U.S. health secretary and Wisconsin governor.

"That are not safe?" That's what the right and media are playing up as "courageous." Written out of the equation are the American people, who are considered more of an expense at this point, and they need to be reined in. Check out the key word in this view of what Ryan is proposing:

John McAdams, political scientist at Marquette University, says Ryan may be partly right about the politics of the issue changing. "There's an elite consensus (now) that entitlements need to be limited," says McAdams.

Is this where we are suddenly supposed to admire "the elites," instead of bashing them as liberals who always seem to know what's best for us? While Ryan touts the CBO report that says somewhere down the road, the budget is balanced, Ryan ignores the draconian downside of that same CBO report:

The Ryan proposal ... could mean significantly higher out-of-pocket costs for individuals as health care costs out-pace the value of the government's contribution to people's premiums, according to the Congressional Budget Office. But that's precisely how the plan would slow down future Medicare spending, by ending the "open-ended" entitlement and limiting what the government spends per person.

Here's Cenk Uygur and Ezra Klein on the reality of public opinion and the CBO numbers:



Check out this fascinating poll that dug well below the surface numbers, for a real taste of Ryan's plan, the same numbers used by Ezra Klein above:

When a recent Kaiser Family Foundation poll offered Americans a general description of how Medicare works now and how it would change under the Ryan plan, 50% said they wanted to keep Medicare as it is and 46% said they supported moving to a more private system. 

When those who wanted no change were given the arguments for Ryan's plan (that it would reduce future deficits, provide choice and save Medicare for the future), support for keeping Medicare the way it is dropped to 39% and support for restructuring it rose to 54%. 

But when people who wanted to change Medicare were given the arguments against Ryan's plan (that it would put private insurers in charge and cause people to pay more for less coverage), overall opinion shifted sharply in the other direction: 68% said keep Medicare as it is, and 24% supported changing it.