Keep Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid as we now know them and take those basic safety net programs we all pay taxes for OFF the "fiscal cliff" spending cut table NOW! Employ armies of accountants and prosecutors to eliminate waste and fraud in those programs and invest the savings in better nursing home care for the elderly.
Why is this important?
Even President Obama and too many Democrats appear willing to cut Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid benefits as part of a "grand bargain" to avoid the "fiscal cliff" despite the fact that these are bare bones safety net programs that hard working taxpaying people pay specific taxes for and, if necessary, are willing to increase so that in this richest country in the world our elderly can live their final days in relative comfort and basic dignity. Anything less is a travesty of justice given the harsh regressive tax cut driven disparity of wealth and income in our country fueled by decades of GOP deregulation of greed in the banking, finance, and energy sectors of our economy.
