How McCain intends to pay for his health care plan

October 6, 4:29 PMProgressive Politics ExaminerJay McDonough

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Did you wonder how Senator McCain intended to pay for all those $5000/family rebates he includes in his health care plan?  According to the Senator's campaign, the money comes from cuts to Medicare and Medicaid. 

Douglas Holtz-Eakin, Sen. McCain's senior policy adviser, said Sunday that the campaign has always planned to fund the tax credits, in part, with savings from Medicare and Medicaid. Those government health-care programs serve seniors, poor families and the disabled. Medicare spending for the fiscal year ended Sept. 30 is estimated at $457.5 billion.

Holtz-Eakin said the Medicare and Medicaid changes would improve the programs and eliminate fraud, but he didn't detail where the cuts would come from. "It's about giving them the benefit package that has been promised to them by law at lower cost," he said.

The nonpartisan Tax Policy Center, a Washington think tank, estimates that the McCain plan would cost the government $1.3 trillion over 10 years. The plan would allow as many as five million more people to have insurance, it estimates. (Link)

This is more "just trust us" from the McCain campaign.  It's irresponsible to claim all these mysterious cuts to Medicare and Medicaid are available to be made and fund a major new entitlement program. 

One more thing....as Josh Marshall observes, the McCain campaign just pulled out of Michigan, thinking they were sufficiently behind Obama in the polls and they were just pouring money down the drain.  The campaign has apparently refocused on Florida now.  What kind of knucklehead would make a big investment in a Florida campaign and concurrently announce they intend to make cuts to Medicare?