Washington is Wrong on Medicare Cuts, Let’s Find Cures

At last week’s Republican debate, I criticized Washington’s most recent budget deal, which raids another $150 billion from the Social Security Trust Fund.

Sadly, that’s nothing new. For decades, politicians have been borrowing money from Social Security and Medicare. Now, many Republicans are calling for cuts to Medicare.

Medicare does not belong to Washington, it belongs to seniors. Medicare is not a piggy bank for politicians, it’s a promise. Slapping seniors in the face and telling them to “get over it” is no way to earn people’s trust. I have a better idea, instead of calling for cuts, let’s focus on cures.

As a nation, we’ve invented the Internet, put a man on the moon, defeated Fascism, mapped the human genome, and eradicated both Polio and smallpox.

Have you, or anyone you know, been directly impacted by Alzheimer’s, cancer, heart disease, obesity, arthritis or diabetes? These diseases are the primary cost-drivers of Medicare. They also devastate family income and destroy people’s lives.

It’s true Medicare is on weak footing, but that’s because Washington politicians have been pillaging the Trust Fund like a never-ending slush fund, forgetting it will cost trillions to treat these diseases. Given these realities, it will take more than spending cuts and meaningless vouchers to protect these programs.

Alzheimer’s will cost us $1.1 trillion by the year 2050. I lost my mother-in-law to this horrible disease and the only thing worse than the financial cost is the emotional pain. Heart disease and stroke cost us $313 billion each year in healthcare and lost productivity. Diabetes treatment and management is approaching $500 billion annually. Imagine how much time, money, and agony we could save ourselves if we cured these tragic diseases? Medicare reimburses trillions to treat diseases but not a penny to prevent or cure them. It’s backwards!

Throwing endless money at these diseases is like slapping a band aide on a snake bite. It’s time we start killing snakes, saving lives, and finding cures.

Billions are thrown away each year on politically-motivated pet projects like ‘gun disease’ prevention, drunken monkey research, coffee enemas, sexual studies, and junk science that doesn’t improve the lives of hurting Americans. Some estimate that 50 percent of all NIH funding is squandered by bureaucracy, overhead, waste and duplication. Imagine the Alzheimer’s, cancer, heart disease and diabetes breakthroughs we could achieve if we invested the wasted $15 billion in tax dollars each year to find cures?

I’m running for president to burn down the corrupt Washington political machine and rebuild America. If I’m attacked for protecting seniors and investing in cures for costly, debilitating diseases, than so be it. It’s the right thing to do mathematically…and morally.