Politifact and Politico urge end to Medicare, blissfully ignore Economic Reports Ryan's Plan Dismantles Safety Net.

Ryan now has media cover and approval for their inclusion in his reelection ad campaign to dismantle Medicare. 

Even though Paul Ryan's plan for Medicare is a dramatic change in the program, resulting in higher out of pocket costs to seniors who won't be able to pay for it, on some bizarre generalized apolitical reading of Ryan's plan, Politifact has deemed the "end of Medicare" a lie....of the year!

And once such a plan is in effect, tinkering and downsizing government payments will further tear up a very successful and necessary program. But Politifact does this all the time; they ignore the overall objectives of both parties, in this case, the Republican vow to do away with the social safety nets. That's what makes their pronouncement so unsettling, and why opportunists like Paul Ryan are going to ride this wave of conservative "I told you so's." 

Even worse, Politico's nomination of Ryan for the Legislator of the year for Health Care Reform is over the top lunacy. But Ryan was so "courageous," they'll argue. But these same kind of helpful media nudges took us into the Iraq war too. It wasn't until the media noticed they had ignored the facts provided by professionals who knew more than a spinning politician did. So now we're headed for the end of Medicare:

jsonline-Dan Bice: U.S. Rep. Paul Ryan is calling on his supporters to head to the polls to vote in a crucial election ... is trying to gin up the vote in PolitiFact's "Lie of the Year" contest for 2011. He has even put together a web video, shot on the dimly lighted streets of Washington, D.C., in his effort to stuff the ballot box.

Ryan is campaigning for the PolitiFact ruling that said Democrats lied when they claimed Ryan's well-publicized budget plan would "end Medicare." It is one of 10 bogus claims named as finalists for the Readers' Choice Award from the national site.

"That is the lie of the year, and I encourage you to go to PolitiFact's website to vote in the readers' choice on that. Because if we don't fix these issues, they will get us. If we keep kicking the can down the road, we're going to run out of road to kick can down."

Ryan's email has liberal bloggers accusing Ryan of "trying to rig" the contest. Ryan's people denied the allegation.