Posted by
Frigglesnitz on Sunday, September 02, 2007 4:31:09 PM
This blog post was inspired by a column today in Townhall (link follows), along with a comment thereto by "jlohman."
http://www.townhall.com/columnists/BillSteigerwald/2007/09/01/uh-oh,_canada?page=full&comments=true
To believe the Democrats (if elected) will "fix" the Medicare Prescription Drug Plan program is pie-in-the-sky hogwash.
Democrats wanted to give away even more of the farm than the Republicans did.
If elected, the Democrats will do exactly that: they will give away even more of your grandchildren's retirement future, including whatever assistance they may have hoped for in the prescription drug realm.
The only thing any elected party could do to make this plan more palatable to its participants is to restructure that "doughnut hole" during which the entire "negotiated" price for a drug must be paid by the participant.
The negotiated price, just to remind those who are unaware, is the price determined between the insurance company and the drug company to be paid by the consumer. Naturally, nobody works for nothing, so the prices are also naturally elevated. Lots of middlemen -- lots of them -- need to be paid.
Just for the fun of it, see if you can check a Medicare Prescription Drug Plan "negotiated" price against a retail price for someone walking into a drugstore off the street -- someone with no drug insurance whatever. That "negotiated" price would be found to be staggering of its own weight.
What is the sense in that? My answer: none.
In my opinion we were "done wrong" by the Republicans when they voted in this travesty and when the President signed it into law that December day.
The Democrats should be reminded, however, that two wrongs do not make a right.
Too many middlemen spoil the soup.