Video: Time for another Paul Ryan presidential campaign ad

Not as dramatic as his first presidential ad, but that one was designed to set the mood. This is where he starts putting policy meat on the bone. Next, I assume, will come the foreign policy ad and then the “values” ad, and then boom — he wins the Wisconsin primary as a write-in on April 3 and suddenly the convention is pandemonium.

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Seriously, this is the teaser for tomorrow’s big House GOP budget rollout. The headline is already written: Ryan wants just two income tax rates instead of six, the top one of which would be 25 percent — 10 points lower than the current top rate. Lots of “party of the rich” demagoguery coming our way in the a.m. While we wait, though, read Ryan’s op-ed in tomorrow’s WSJ laying out the other nuts and bolts of the plan.

As shown in the nearby chart, our budget tackles this crisis head-on by cutting debt as a share of the economy by roughly 15% over the next decade, putting the nation’s finances on a path to balance, and paying off the debt. By contrast, the president’s budget pushes debt as a share of the economy even higher. In his budget’s own words, it allows the government’s fiscal position to “gradually deteriorate” after 2022…

Our budget’s Medicare reforms make no changes for those in or near retirement. For those who will retire a decade from now, our plan provides guaranteed coverage options financed by a premium-support payment. And this year, our budget adds even more choices for seniors, including a traditional fee-for-service Medicare option.

We also introduce a competitive-bidding process to determine the growth of government’s financial contribution to Medicare. Forcing health plans to compete against each other is the best way to achieve high-quality coverage at the lowest cost, and implementing these reforms in Medicare can have the effect of lowering health-care costs for everyone. This is the key to increasing access and affordability while preventing government debt from threatening the health security of seniors and the economic security of all Americans…

We reject calls to raise taxes, but revenue nevertheless remains steady under our budget because we close special-interest loopholes. More important, our reforms will grow the economy—and the faster the economy grows, the more revenue the government will have to meet its priorities and start paying down the debt.

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He’s got bipartisan cover from Ron Wyden on his Medicare reform plan this year so the “Ryan wants to kill grandma” messaging will have to be slightly more nuanced than in the past.

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Jazz Shaw 8:30 AM | October 06, 2024
John Sexton 6:20 PM | October 05, 2024
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