Tales from the Trail

Ad connecting Romney to company in Medicare fraud case “mostly true”

Last week a public workers union launched a television ad that raised an old question about presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s connection to Damon Corp, a company that defrauded Medicare by the millions while under the watch of Romney’s private equity firm Bain Capital. Thursday, the Super PAC Winning Our Future, which supports Romney’s Republican rival Newt Gingrich released the trailer for a campaign video titled “Blood Money” that echoes the same criticism.

The ad created by AFSCME equates Romney with Florida Governor Rick Scott whose approval rating is one of the lowest in the country. Scott is the former CEO of the hospital chain Columbia/HCA that became embroiled in a Medicare fraud case in the late 1990s.

A narrator speaking over black and white photos of Romney says he was director of Damon Corp, which was later fined $100 million for medicare fraud. Romney’s image morphs into that of Rick Scott as the narrator asks, “Corporate greed … Medicare fraud. Sound familiar?”

PolitiFact, a fact-checking site run by the Tampa Bay Times, called the ad “Mostly True.” Although it is true Romney was head of Damon Corporation, which did defraud Medicare by the millions, Romney was never personally implicated, the site says.

See the video from AFSCME here, from PolitiFact’s site:

See the trailer for Winning Our Future’s campaign video (much more dramatic) here, from their Youtube page:

House lawmakers tussle over Medicare mailings

Donna Smith

Jun 15, 2011 15:35 EDT

House Democrats are accusing the Republican majority of censoring language in mailings to constituents about a Republican plan to privatize Medicare for future retirees.

At issue is official mail that goes to constituents with taxpayers picking up the cost of postage. Any materials mailed at taxpayer expense have to have bipartisan approval.

In a letter to House Speaker John Boehner, five Democrats complained that previously approved language describing the proposal by Republican Representative Paul Ryan no longer was okay.

“Given this abrupt and inconsistent new interpretation of the established Franking Guidelines, we must surmise that there is a deliberate, strategic attempt to censor any Member communication that echoes the widespread public criticism of the Republican Plan for Medicare,” the Democrats wrote.

“This politically motivated censorship undermines our ability to execute one of our primary roles and diminishes the credibility of this institution,” they added.

Public opinion polls have shown the Republican Medicare plan is unpopular. It was a major issue in a recent special election in New York where a Democrat won in a traditionally Republican district.

From now on, phrases like the Republican plan “will end Medicare as we know it” have to become “will change Medicare as we know it.” Also Democrats cannot call the plan a “voucher system” even though many analysts describe it as such. Republicans want it called a “premium support system.”

Let’s fight…

The overnight news of Dominique Strauss-Kahn’s resignation sets up a global battle over who will succeed him in the IMF’s glass-and-steel headquarters in Washington. But, of course, that’s not the only fight in town.

The bipartisan group of budget negotiators now known as the Gang-of-Six-Minus-One is expected to meet today to try to salvage hopes of a budget compromise after a shouting match over Medicare sent Republican Senator Tom Coburn to the exit door.

Medicare is the third-rail political issue that recently had Republicans showing signs of retreating from House Budget Chief Paul Ryan’s Republican reform plan. Critics call it a blueprint for privatizing the federal government’s healthcare program for the elderly.

But all politics is local. And the national Medicare litmus test is likely to take place far from Washington.

A proxy war over Medicare-as-2012-campaign-issue is shaping up around next week’s special congressional election in one of New York’s most conservative districts, where the Ryan plan has given Democrats the chance for an upset.  Conservative groups are pouring tons of money into the contest and veteran Capitol Hill staffers are expected to parachute in soon to help get out the vote.

The Medicare issue is the same albatross that started hanging out with Newt Gingrich this week, after the Republican White House candidate trashed the Ryan reform plan as right wing “social engineering.” The former House speaker apologized amid a storm of criticism from fellow conservatives. He’s since had “help” from potential presidential rival Sarah Palin, who in a TV appearance urged him not to back down in the face of … lamestream media criticism? hmmm … but who otherwise made sure she underscored his offending language.

Palin, who has been in and out of the spotlight in recent months, says she’s still considering a White House run. That could make for a nice rumble between her and Michele Bachmann, that other woman in Republican circles who rivals Palin as an outspoken darling of the Tea Party movement.

Down to the wire…

House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan expects his fellow Republicans to wait until the “last minute” to strike a deal that averts national default by raising the $14.3 trillion limit on the U.S. debt.

Failure to reach a deal could trigger a new global financial crisis, according to analysts and Democrats including President Barack Obama. But on Monday, the day the U.S. debt reached its current statutory limit, Ryan told an Illinois AM radio station that “we’re going to negotiate this thing probably up through July, that’s how these things go.”

“That’s how these things go” could place negotiations at the very doorstep of an Aug. 2 deadline, which is when the Treasury Department believes it will exhaust its bag of tricks for staving off a financial apocalypse.

Ryan’s comments came a day after Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell advised CNN’s viewers to see the approaching default deadline as a source of opportunity.

Meanwhile, inflation worries buttressed by still-way-high gas prices are driving U.S. states to consider making silver and gold coins legal tender.  South Carolina is the latest to consider legislation to that effect, joining over two-dozen others in a trend that began this month in Utah.

What happens among the states often has a way of entering the circuitry of presidential politics, as Mitt Romney discovered with the healthcare reforms he championed in Massachusetts.

But at the moment, the presidential campaign debate is focused on Medicare, specifically the mini-GOP civil war between Newt Gingrich and Ryan over the latter’s Medicare reform plan. Newt, currently on the defensive, is being taken to the woodshed today by one of the strongest conservative voices in the United States: The Wall Street Journal Editorial Board.

CPAC victory in hand, Ron Paul takes on Tea Party

Libertarian Ron Paul, a godfather of the Tea Party movement, isn’t altogether happy with his political progeny these days.

Fresh from victory in last week’s CPAC presidential straw poll, the Republican congressman from Texas laments to MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” that some Tea Partiers aren’t measuring up when it comes to the tough defense and entitlement program cuts he believes are needed to save the United States from economic cataclysm.

“They don’t want you to touch Social Security. They don’t want you to touch anything but Obamacare,” Paul says. “Some of them are real Republicans and they wouldn’t dare touch Bush’s increase in medical care costs, you know, prescription health programs.”

“They treat the symptoms and they don’t look at it philosophically,” he adds.

This sounds like a new fissure in the divisions emerging among Republicans. The Tea Party movement swept Republicans into the majority in the House of Representatives last November, while narrowing the Democratic Party’s hold on the Senate.

This year, newly elected Republicans with Tea Party backing have embarrassed the party leadership in the House on high-profile votes and pushed to expand initial 2011 spending cuts of $40 billion to more than$60 billion.

Differences between Republicans have appeared to turn on degrees of conservatism and aggressiveness about spending cuts, with some balking at the prospect of reducing popular programs that could cost votes.

Is Rand Paul a U.S. Senate action hero?

It didn’t take Rand Paul long to become Captain America of the U.S. Senate. He’s tough-minded, strong-willed and he’s ready to battle the most dangerous titans on the political landscape, like Social Security and Medicare.

In fact, the Republican Tea Party favorite from Kentucky tells MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” that a courageous and comprehensive plan for fixing America’s public finances will soon be on the march. And if all goes as planned, much may be accomplished before the start of this year’s Major League Baseball season.

“Within two to three weeks, I’m going to propose a fix for Social Security,” says Rand, son of Ron, who has already far surpassed the fiscal aims of the Republican leadership on Capitol Hill by proposing $500 billion in budget cuts.

“We’re going to fix the budget the first week. The second month, I’m going to fix Social Security and then the third month, we’re going to work on Medicare,” he adds, with tongue somewhat in cheek.

At the moment, his blueprint for Medicare still amounts to “a secret plan.” But on Social Security, we can expect what other Republicans are avoiding: an increase in the retirement age and means testing for wealthier beneficiaries.

Paul says the difference between him and other Republicans is that he’s “unafraid” of voter reaction: “If you talk frankly and speak boldly, you’ll get more people to vote for you.”

Another important difference is that his brave ambitious plans are unlikely to succeed at a time when congressional leaders seem increasingly unwilling to consider large-scale reductions. Look at it this way: the GOP’s bold campaign pledge to cut 2011 spending by $100 billion shrank first to about $50 billion and now to $32 billion.

Is deficit debate a new political dawn?

Alan Simpson and Erskine Bowles think it may be a new day in American politics, one where politicans who hike taxes and alter Social Security stay in office.

Simpson, a former Republican senator, tells MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” that he sees evidence of change whenever he strolls through an airport: “I can tell you, we used to get lots of signals. I get more thumbs up now than other digits.”

The pair, co-chairs of President Barack Obama’s National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform, have proposed cutting the U.S. budget deficit by reducing defense spending, eliminating tax breaks, hiking the gasoline tax and altering Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.

Those kinds of measures have been a presciption for political suicide up to now, although the recommendations call for lower tax rates overall.

But with voters agonizing over joblessness, the deficit and growing economic powers like China, Simpson and Bowles believe the public wants to hear straight talk about the country’s problems and the steps needed to set things straight.

“Congress people used to believe if they came up here they’d get punished for making tough decisions. I think it’s just the opposite today,” Bowles says. “They will be severely penalized if they take a walk and don’t make these tough decisions and don’t get real.”

Simpson warns specifically against a current argument that says you can eliminate the deficit by banning earmarks, attacking waste, fraud and abuse, and scaling back foreign assistance.

Bejeebers! A scary fiscal outlook and Tea Party politics

Donna Smith

Oct 20, 2010 16:19 EDT

Tackling huge budget deficits and growing debt is essential for the United States to avoid a financial market crisis that would push interest rates higher and severely damage the U.S. economy, many economists have warned.

Compromise and statesmanship will be needed to cut spending and raise revenues to narrow the budget gap, and that might not be possible in the current political environment, says at least one experienced budget expert.

“We’re certainly going to have a more fiscally conservative Congress next year,” Rudolph Penner, a former Congressional Budget Office director told a U.S. Chamber of Commerce forum.  “The Tea Party, if nothing else, has certainly moved both the Republicans and Democratic Party to the right.”

However, that may not translate into a deficit-reducing budget deal that can pass the House of Representatives and the Senate and then get signed by President Barack Obama, he said.

“A real problem here is that the Tea Party is going to scare the bejeebers out of any Republican that is talking about compromise for fear of what will happen in the next primary,” Penner said. “There is no way we’re going to get out of this problem without a compromise between the two parties.”

Tea Party activists are pushing for deep government spending cuts and have threatened to end the careers of Republicans who go along with tax increases. Democrats are reluctant to cut the Social Security retirement program and Medicare and Medicaid health plans for the elderly and poor.

Alice Rivlin, a former Federal Reserve Board vice chairman and member of Obama’s fiscal commission, said U.S. government spending will rise dramatically faster than the economy can grow as the retiring 77 million-strong baby boom generation begins to draw on promised Social Security retirement and Medicare health benefits. Bringing the budget into balance will take compromise, she said.

Reid to Republicans: healthcare reform is now law of the land

Donna Smith

Mar 24, 2010 15:07 EDT

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid proudly proclaimed on Wednesday that the “historic healthcare reform is now no longer a bill it is the law.”

Someone please tell Republicans.

They are planning a flurry of amendments to try to stall a package of changes being considered by the Senate that Democrats want to make to the legislation signed into law by President Barack Obama.

House Democrats demanded the changes, which among other things would close the Medicare prescription drug coverage gap for the elderly.

Republicans want to change the new law too. They want to repeal it. Some of their amendments would do just that. It is unlikely Senate Democrats will reverse course and undo the hard fought victory for Obama.

But other proposed Republican amendments could force Democrats to take politically unpalatable election-year votes on measures such as one that would strike Medicare spending cuts from the bill.

Republican to seniors: “You’re going to die sooner” with healthcare reform

Donna Smith

Dec 1, 2009 18:26 EST

Republican Senator Tom Coburn doesn’t mince words. He was crystal clear about what he thinks of healthcare reform being debated in the Senate, saying to seniors: “I have a message for you: You’re going to die sooner.”

Senators are debating an amendment by Republican Senator John McCain that would send the bill back to the Senate Finance Committee with instructions to strike the Medicare cuts from the bill.  Democrats defended the legislation saying the proposed spending cuts would not reduce seniors’ health benefits.

“I’d like to once and for all lay to rest this false claim that the pending bill is going to ‘hurt seniors’ and it is going to hurt providers and it’s going to be this long parade of horribles that the other side likes to mention,” Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus said.

“It is totally, patently untrue, the claims that they are making,” he argued.

The bill calls for more than $400 billion in spending cuts for Medicare over 10 years. A big chunk of the money comes from reducing subsidies for Medicare Advantage, which provides health services for the elderly through private insurers.

Baucus argued that Medicare spending would continue to grow, but at a slightly slower pace. The bill also seeks to  achieve Medicare savings by rewarding quality of care instead of the quantity of services and treatments.

The Senate debate is expected to last for at least three weeks and Republicans, who solidly oppose the Democratic-written bill,  plan a number of amendments focused on the Medicare spending cuts.