Aah, The Joys of Aging

Trey Smith

On Oct. 1, the Obama administration started awarding bonus points to hospitals that spend the least on elderly patients. It will result in fewer knee replacements, hip replacements, angioplasty, bypass surgery and cataract operations.

These are the five procedures that have transformed aging for older Americans. They used to languish in wheelchairs and nursing homes due to arthritis, cataracts and heart disease. Now they lead active lives.

But the Obama administration is undoing that progress. By cutting $716 billion from future Medicare funding over the next decade and rewarding the hospitals that spend the least on seniors, the Obama health law will make these procedures hard to get and less safe.
~ from Obama Administration Dooms Seniors To Painful Aging by Betsy McCaughey ~

Every time someone tells me that President Obama is a liberal, I look at policy initiatives like this! Robbing Peter (the elderly) to pay Paul (younger folks) does not make one a liberal. This is how the Republicans tend to legislate -- always sticking it to one segment of society or the other!

So, this is what I have to look forward to. As I grow older, quality health care will be harder to come by. When you couple the new health care law with efforts to privatize Social Security for everyone below 65, it looks like life expectancy in the US is set to go down for those of us who don't claim membership in the top 1%.

What joy!  (I'd do somersaults, but I don't want to take the chance of further compromising my rickety hips and knees.)