(I found the above cartoon at this wonderful blog. Give it some love.)

Most of my friends and family know that I am (ahem) highly critical of the POTUS. I get all kinds of emails forwarded to me along that line - cartoons, articles, you name it.

Earlier this week I got one from a friend who was a former supporter (mildly) of Bush but who has since changed his opinion. After the flip, a question about the Medicare drug bill, and Bush's priceless response. It's worth reading, so jump with me.

I'd like to give a big shout out to Street Kid who is consistently and tirelessly writing diaries on Medicare Part D with only marginal attention. It's worth your while to bookmark his/her stuff because it's all very timely and highly informational. I can't recommend his/her work on Medicare D strongly enough.

The email I received came without attribution so I searched dutifully through the White House speech files to find the appropriate reference, found after the quote. It was a dark and lonely place, was the White House website. Filled with confusing rhetoric, factual inaccuracies and bloviating talking points. But I knew I had to press onward to appropriately verify and source the quote I received.

One last interesting little tidbit. I had to search the text of various speeches and the word I used to search was 'problem' because it appeared in the original question. In the full speech linked below, Bush refers to the 'problem' 24 times. 24!!

Bush Explains Medicare Drug Bill -- Verbatim

WOMAN IN AUDIENCE: "I don't really understand... How is the new plan going to fix the problem?"

Verbatim response: PRESIDENT BUSH:

"Because the -- all which is on the table begins to address the big cost drivers. For example, how benefits are calculated, for example, is on the table. Whether or not benefits rise based upon wage increases or price increases. There's a series of parts of the formula that are being considered. And when you couple that, those different cost drivers, affecting those -- changing those with personal accounts, the idea is to get what has been promised more likely to be -- or closer delivered to that has been promised.

Does that make any sense to you? It's kind of muddled. Look, there's a series of th ings that cause the -- like, for example, benefits are calculated based upon the increase of wages, as opposed to the increase of prices. Some have suggested that we calculate -- the benefits will rise based upon inflation, supposed to wage increases. There is a reform that would help solve the red if that were put into effect. In other words, how fast benefits grow, how fast the promised benefits grow, if those -- if that growth is affected, it will help on the red."

The official transcript of the actual speech given on February 4 2006 as well as the Q&A can be found by clicking here.

After reading that, it seems to me that the real problem is that our President doesn't understand health care, prescription drugs, or human beings. Not news, I know - just an observation.

Thanks for reading!

posted by RenaRF at 10:58 AM 2 comments