http://www.salon.com/news/politics/war_room/2011/05/06/gop_medicare_2012Friday, May 6, 2011 12:21 ET
With Medicare retreat, GOP raises the stakes for '12
Why the news that the GOP is "dropping" its plan to end Medicare doesn't actually mean that much
Just three weeks after nearly every Republican in the House went on record in support of it, congressional Republicans are now walking away from a plan that would end Medicare as it currently exists.
The official explanation, offered by Michigan Rep. Dave Camp (who chairs the Ways and Means Committee, through which any Medicare overhaul would have to pass, is that pressing forward would represent a pointless act of posturing, since the plan has zero chance of clearing the Democratic-controlled Senate.
That's certainly true -- but it was just as true (and obvious) when the House GOP lined up behind the Medicare-ending blueprint in mid-April. All that's happened between then and now is that Republicans have endured a predictable series of aggressive attacks from Democrats for attempting to do away with a program that is immensely popular with voters (attacks that will almost certainly continue through next year's election). So why did they do it in the first place?