Paul Tonko: “Absolutely. Representative Edwards, you struck on a chord that is just repeated over and over again in my district. Many…”

“Absolutely. Representative Edwards, you struck on a chord that is just repeated over and over again in my district. Many thought, well, if the seniors are told that this will affect senior communities into the future, that they will get buy-in from today's senior citizens. I am impressed with the very generous statements made, the advocacy embraced by our senior community of today saying, This has served me so well, I don't want it denied my children or my grandchildren. And as you pointed out, you know, a 54-year-old of today will have to save about $182,000 out of her or his pocket in order to pick up the slack that would be part of this shop on your own, you know, putting the insurance companies back into control. The senior's going to get a voucher that covers a third of the costs that they need to have health care coverage and then dig into their pockets for the rest. So that means a 54-year-old of today will have to save $182,000, but then the 30-year-old will have to save $400,000. Where are we going with this? This is all to cut a program that has served, with dignity, the senior community of this country, all to pay for the Bush-era tax cuts. So this is a way of sliding savings by ending Medicare and bringing it over to pay for millionaire and billionaire tax cuts and for subsidies to oil companies. This is as vulgar as it can get.…”