Protesters rally against Ryan's Medicare cuts
May 17, 2011 | Diana Manos, Senior Editor : Healthcare Finance News
CHICAGO – Chicago-area and Wisconsin residents are protesting Rep. Paul Ryan’s (R-Wisc.) plan to cut Medicare and Medicaid benefits.
Some 225 senior citizens, disabled residents and citizens from various organizations gathered outside the Economic Club of Chicago on May 16 while Ryan was presenting a plan that he has called "a roadmap to prosperity," according to Emily Stuart, a spokeswoman for the Illinois Alliance for Retired Americans.
The protesters, members of the Illinois Alliance for Retired Americans, Illinois Main Street Alliance, MoveOn, Access Living, ADAPT, SEIU HC and Citizen Action/Illinois, called Ryan's plan "a roadmap to ruin," Stuart said.
"It is irresponsible and unnecessary to talk about radically changing Social Security and Medicare," said Katie Jordan of the Illinois Alliance for Retired Americans. "These programs keep our most vulnerable people from falling into poverty. It is not another stock in your portfolio."
Ryan is seeking support for his plan aimed at balancing the budget by privatizing Medicare and slashing funding for Medicaid and Social Security. The protesters claim Ryan's plan would force 631,024 Illinois residents to lose Medicaid.
"Efforts to privatize Medicare and defund Medicaid will dramatically impact local economies, cost millions of jobs and leave countless senior citizens and disabled Americans with no safety net," leaders for the group said. "It is time for Congress to get serious about job creation and economic growth."
William McNary, co-director of Citizen Action/Illinois, said Ryan's plan puts Americans at risk when they can least afford it.
"Representative Paul Ryan's radical plan to eliminate Social Security as we know it was rejected by the American people in 2005, and is opposed by 85 percent of Americans today," McNary said.
In his May 16 speech in Chicago, Ryan said the U.S. fiscal crisis has been decades in the making.
"Republican administrations, including the last one, have failed to control spending. Democratic administrations, including the present one, have not been honest about the cost of the tax burden required to fund their expansive vision of government," he said. "And Congresses controlled by both parties have failed to confront our growing entitlement crisis. There is plenty of blame to go around."
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