Dems Make Ryan's "Roadmap" the Issue

Will it work? Since the US budget came out to universal raspberries last week the Obama administration is trying a Full Alinksy. They are diverting attention from their own budget by making Rep. Paul Ryan and his "Roadmap for America's Future" the issue, according to Kim Strassel in the Wall Street Journal.

Well, it's not surprising. Ryan's Roadmap turns Social Security into a genuine savings program and it replaces Medicare with a voucher program. Can't have that! So the Dems are pulling out the Medi-scare playbooks and blaming the Republicans--for what, exactly? I thought that the Democrats were in power.

Some Republicans are acting scared. They are worried that the Democrats will demagogue the issue and scare seniors. Some "anonymous" House members are griping "to the press that Mr. Ryan doesn't 'speak' for them."

I say: Bring it on. This is a political battle that Republicans are going to have to fight sooner or later. Sooner or later, the welfare state--and that means Social Security and Medicare--are going to hit the wall.

But the question is: What do Americans want now? Americans are frightened by deficits, but not so much that they would accept reducing their entitlements.

Most likely, of course, the Democrats will win the argument, as they did when President Bush tried to privatize Social Security in 2005.

They will win up until the day that the US defaults on its debt and the grim international bankers from China in 2035 summon the US crisis negotiating team to Beijing to discuss swingeing spending cuts.

And the American people are probably right to resist reform until the system actually breaks. Because if we reform now then it will just encourage our Democratic friends to find new ways to spend money and we'll end up broke anyway.

But the time is now to start thinking about what a genuine welfare society, rather than today's government dependency welfare state, would look like;.

Surely there is a better way to protect people against the tribulations of old age than a government program. Surely there is a better way to help grannie than taxing young working families trying to start a family and buy a house.