Medicare Benefits, Leave Them Alone

It was government health care assistance, not originally requested nor sought by the majority.

For forty four years those who are retiring now have paid a huge price for elderly medical benefits. An enormous amount of money was taken from our employers and from our pay checks during our prime earning years.

We were not given a choice. It was compulsory. We were not allowed to choose not to participate.

We were promised certain benefits upon reaching the age of sixty five.

The Congress, Representatives and Senators, ignored the actuarial tables of the time that clearly told everyone the program could not sustain itself without massive and rapidly increasing taxpayer contributions.

Again, we did not ask for it. It was a bribe for reelection votes by the well meaning, but uninformed. We were compelled to pay for it. And we must register for it, even if we do not want to use it. It's nearly impossible, if you are age sixty five or older, to get and pay for medical treatments of your choice without using Medicare.

You are virtually forced to use it.

I didn't want it. I don't like it. I didn't ask for it. It was a socialistic mistake. I don't want it now. I wish I had the money I was forced to waste on it for 44 years. If I would have saved and invested it in a medical savings account, I would have more than 1 million dollars now to pay for my own health care needs.

Now is not the time to withhold the promised benefits.

You've already taken our money.

Now you must pay up.

If you welsh on your promises now, you will have a grey insurrection the likes of which you cannot possibly imagine.

It would be a scandal dwarfing Bernie Madoff''s pyramid scheme by a hundred fold.

If you want to make changes that decrease benefits 50 years from now, and you inform the young wage earners entering the workplace today, go ahead. But, be prepared to leave office quickly. They won't like the very high costs with the promise of very little benefit 50 years in the future.

I doubt they will trust you any more than I do now.

Medicare was a mistake 44 years ago. It's still a mistake. If you are considering any changes;

1. Your first change should be how to systematically and quickly close the program down.

2. Deliver the full benefits to those who have paid in since it started.

3. Decreasing benefits to those who have paid in less to this point.

4. Never attempt anything like it again. Especially any kind of government provided or encouraged health care for those who choose not to provide for themselves.

Health care or access to it, is not a constitutional right. The Federal Government should remove itself from all health care involvement, except for providing tax exemptions for health care costs and allowing nonprofit philanthropic and religious organization to provide for widows, orphans, and others incapable of caring for themselves, tax-free.