Democrats stick their heads in the sand

Rep. Paul Ryan, Wisconsin’s rising Republican star and conservative barbarian-at-the-gate, has a Big Idea. An ambitious, far-reaching, multi-point plan to deal with impending and interlocked crises in health care and entitlement spending.

A plan to save us from ruinous taxes or debt. To rescue staple benefits from certain collapse.

A plan that doesn't have a chance.

He calls it A Roadmap for America's Future. In a nutshell, it:

• Offers refundable tax credits of up to $2.500 per individual, $5,000 per family to pay for health insurance;
  
  
• Offers a voluntary investment of up to one-third of an individual’s Social Security taxes;
  
  
• Creates a new Medicare benefit that mirrors a plan currently available only to federal employees;
  
  
• Allows taxpayers to choose between the current tax system and a simpler two-tiered “flat” income tax.

These are good ideas. Fine ideas, offering people choices, and ownership, and a better chance to live long and retire wealthy.

Plus, according to the Congressional Budget Office, this plan keeps the federal government from going bankrupt. Believe it or not, Social Security and Medicare are growing. Fast. Over the next few decades, they will force enormous tax increases and/or terrifying amounts of debt. Either that, or those programs are going to end.

That's a simple fact.

Every American of working age and younger should support Ryan's plan or one like it: we’re the ones, after all, who will pay the taxes and debt. We’re the ones who will pay into the system all our lives, only to see it crumble and fall under its own weight.

Every retired or soon-to-be-retired American should support Ryan's plan or one like it: after all, it’s their children and grandchildren I just described. And it’s today’s retirees and near-retirees who face cuts in service, at a time in their lives when they’re far less able to make up for them.

This is a sweeping plan. A Big Idea. A big-picture new way of doing business that tacks away from reliance on government, bureaucracies, and the picking of taxpayers’ pockets.

Everyone should support it, or something like it. Because otherwise…well, the numbers speak for themselves.

Nevertheless, when all's said and done, this plan – like the ownership society – isn’t going anyplace. Ryan’s ideas are dead on arrival.

One of his re-election opponents (read: sacrificial lambs) shows us why:

"Why does Paul Ryan want to hurt the senior citizens of Wisconsin?" (Marge) Krupp, Democratic Candidate for Wisconsin's First Congressional District, challenged Ryan's proposal was working against the financial security of those that she wants to represent, "The seniors of this district count on a monthly Social Security check as part of their income and Paul Ryan is trying to undermine that." Ryan's plan calls for a privatization of Social Security services that some say could lead to a destabilization of the program.

Also proposed in Ryan's plan is a health insurance tax credit that would allow Americans to purchase a healthcare plan of their choice. Krupp again asked why Paul Ryan would issue such a plan, "This is the same kind of proposition that the Bush Administration has been giving the American people the past eight years, why is Paul Ryan trying to punish our working families and seniors?"

Why does he hate senior citizens? Why does he hate families? Why – oh Lord why – would he "allow Americans to purchase a healthcare plan of their choice?"

And why do I have this image in my head: Marge Knapp running in circles with her hands over her ears, yelling: “Lalalalala! I’m not listening! Lalalalala! I’m not listening!”

I have no idea what Marge Knapp looks like: in my head, she looks like Billy Crystal covered in foam rubber wrinkles.

Want to hurt senior citizens? Want to punish working families and seniors? Then listen to Marge Knapp. Stick your fingers in your ears. Bury your head in the sand. Refuse to face the fact – the fact – that Social Security and Medicare are sinking, and might drag us all down with them.

Do nothing, while entitlement spending squeezes us all out of a secure and stable future.

But, no, liberals and Democrats won’t admit that. They won’t face it. Democrats – in control of Congress and, quite possibly, the White House, won’t do anything about it.

Anything, that is, except stand in the way.