Ryan's Fellow Republicans also Mediscaring Americans? The Inconvenient Truth.

Leave it to John Nichols to research the "demagoguery" of right wingers opposed to Randian Paul Ryan's plan to end Medicare as we know it.

John Nichols, Cap Times: What’s Paul Ryan’s favorite whine? “Mediscare,” vintage 2011. “There is a Medicare story to be told here … and it’s that the president and his party have decided to shamelessly distort and demagogue Medicare,” Ryan explained on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe.” But the scariest talk about Ryan’s plan is not coming from Democrats. It’s coming from Republicans.

First, Newt Gingrich dismissed the plan Ryan rushed through the House with the support of all but four Republican members as “right-wing social engineering”

Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul, who objects that Ryan’s plan is not a serious response to fiscal challenges facing the country.

Maine’s Olympia Snowe said, “I am going to vote ‘no’ on the budget because I have deep and abiding concerns about the approach on Medicare, which is essentially to privatize it.” Snowe is not some duped victim of Democratic distortion or demagoguery.

The same goes for Susan Collins, who announced her opposition earlier, and for Massachusetts Sen. Brown, a former tea party favorite who has abandoned the Ryan plan. As Brown said: “I fear that as health inflation rises, the cost of private plans will outgrow the government premium support (vouchers) — and the elderly will be forced to pay ever higher deductibles and co-pays. Protecting those who have been counting on the current system their entire adult lives should be the key principle of reform … at risk of losing their Medicare Advantage coverage … seniors should not have to bear a disproportionate burden…”

Ouch.  And ouch. That’s not a Democratic demagogue practicing “Mediscare” politics. That’s a Republican speaking, a member of Paul Ryan’s own party.

And that’s the confirmation that the distortion of the Medicare debate is not being fostered by Democratic critics of the Ryan plan. The distortion is coming from Ryan, and anyone else who suggests that his approach preserves Medicare or serves seniors.