7 April 2011 Phil Roe opposes Medicare

The Paul Ryan budget proposal is common knowledge. It has the support of the GOP, the Tea Party mobs, & Congressman Roe.

In their intent to roll back social safety nets to the 1900s, they the plan to abolish Medicare, replacing it with vouchers issued to seniors to purchase health insurance. This is the GOP version of a death panel.

We’ve already seen insurance companies refuse to insure those with pre-existing conditions. Almost no one reaches retirement age without some pre-existing injury or illness that guarantees they would not be insurable by any reliable company at the amount allowed by a voucher system. Ryan’s assertion that insurance companies would cut prices is fiction.

If enacted, Medicare will become block grant money sent to the states to be converted to vouchers that will not meet the costs of vouchers.

I called Roe’s D.C. office this morning, 7 April 2011. I was told by his office staff that Congressman Roe supports the Ryan proposal. When I repeated my question and asked if Roe supports abolishing Medicare, I was told, quite clearly, that he supports the abolition of Medicare.

This should concern every senior citizen, retired or not yet retired, and the families of every one serving in uniform from the 1st Congressional district and the entire U.S.

Roe also voted to continue Congressional salaries while our troops in combat zones lose their paychecks. This is not “supporting the troops.” Please call his office and express your concerns. His D.C. Office is 1-202-225-6356.

The GOP and Tea Party are in league with the insurance industry to privatize Medicare by using a massive propaganda campaign. They will do to healthcare what Wall Street and the GOP did to the economy.

Cassi Creek:

The note above was dispatched this afternoon to the Johnson City Press. It is one of many “letters to the editor” I’ve sent to the local paper since we moved here. They never make it into print although letters from Teavangelists and GOPers living in gated Florida enclaves routinely appear, endorsing the teavangelist party line show up quite frequently.

I know the places where such letters originate. They are bastions of entrenched privilege, occupied only fractions of the year by people who own multiple homes. These homes are prone to hurricane damage and to subsequent repair and reconstruction at public expense. The owner-par-time-occupants prepare for storms by flying out of the storm’s path, leaving their gardeners, maids, and others who live nearby in non-gated apartment complexes to board up, sand bag, and otherwise guard their property before they have time to safeguard their own homes and families.

The fly-from-the-storm folks don’t care about Medicare. They buy doctors to pay attention to their complaints. They don’t care about Medicaid because they don’t know any of “those people.” They pay thousands of dollars per plate to finance legislators who will dance to their tune assuring their gated communities are never invaded by “those people,” that their second, third, and fourth homes will always be rebuilt by the once-middle class who can no longer afford their own homes.

These are the people Phil Roe serves. He doesn’t have enough money to be them. He hopes that he will gain enough by staying in Congress and serving their interests rather than those of the people of the 1st TN. Roe sends soldiers off to war then supports the actions of the GOP/teavangelists that will deprive those men and women in uniform their badly needed salaries and benefits. There is every likelihood that many of our troops will lose a car or house if they aren’t paid. They need those pay checks desperately. They aren’t risking their lives in combat zones so that Roe can be like the folks in Safety Harbor and Naples FL.

At least, that isn’t why they think they enlisted.