But, boy, the opposition campaign ads are writing themselves now, aren't they?

I hope everyone is as awed by the brilliance as I am...

Maybe we will get a $500 billion - $1 trillion cuts package.

For those who retire at 65 or earlier or do not have employer-provided health insurance, it may mean more federal expenditures for Medicaid, increased federal support for premiums and cost sharing subsidies under the Exchange.

Trust me, the log train's importance can't be underestimated. I bet MT will back me up on this.

Since I'll be unemployed and uneployable for the forseeable future, I might as well learn how to supply a brigade, since angry, hungry, homeless people might want to create a voice.

Yeppers. Obama's first fix for anything except banks?  CUT!!!

Fire this pathetic public employee.

After W, I was told that anyone would be better.

Then he is defeated in the next Pres. election.  

Next, we'll have as many employers as possible dropping employee health insurance because it's too expensive - or converting employees to independent contractors or part-time workers with no benefits. And who can blame them? Those costs destroy profits.

After that, we'll have employers getting rid of us oldsters as quickly as possible. And certainly never hiring anyone over the age of 50. Sure, age discrimination is wrong, but so what? You think the Supreme Court is going to do anything about it?

This is all without considering the pre-retirement folk who are already ill and those willing to work who can't find a job.

Medicare isn't that great right now. Part D is an abomination. I won't sign up. Part B is pretty terrible too and you need to have a supplemental plan or no doctor will touch you. I won't sign up for that either. Out of an average Social Security check of about $1,500, that's close to $300 and rising rapidly.  

Obama is convinced of his brilliance, though. He will go down in history, in his mind, as the great one who made the peons eat peas, when in reality he will go down in history as the one who gave away all our hard-earned money to the banksta gangstas and the insurance scam artists.

This is all kabuki. When they put those worthless IOUs into the lock box, they knew they'd never honor them. That's why Social Security and Medicare are being tied to the deficit. They had and have no intention of ever paying us back. Good thing Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, etc. have all been such raging successes.

The GOP won't do it, thank Gawd.

& if there is palpable relief here, on TL, it's folly to imagine that the same relief is not being felt in considerably more centrist & conservative venues

stupid, Obama

stupid

Hint: It is impossible to make a campaign ad (or refute another campaign ad) with a completely unsourced leak.  

How would that ad work exactly? We the dems were on the line protecting medicare from Paul Ryan and others.

GOP counter: No you weren't because unconfirmed leaks of an unconfirmed arrangement voted on by no one and formally proposed in public by no one say otherwise.

Public: "wait, what?"

When you have someone on record saying that Obama's position is to raise the retirement age, I will agree with the political analysis here.

Pew Research Center estimates 10,000 baby boomers a day are turning 65.

Glad you asked. Stated very simply, the demographers, sociologists and the media define baby boomers as those born between (and including) 1946 and 1964. (There is no law or constitutional amendment so stating; and other boundaries have been suggested. But this is the time frame most commonly used.) In 2011, that would make us between 46 and 64 years old. There are about 75 million boomers in the U.S.; we currently represent about 29% of the U.S. population.