Busts of Ronald Reagan... We're Practically Giving Them Away!

We've seen that the Republican's response to the massive public health crisis they created while bungling the implementation of Medicare Plan D has been a PR offensive. Not to fix the problems, not to create any legislation to remedy the system, but to charm the pants off of seniors so they'll forget that they're in constant agony because their painkiller costs $500 now.

But this little nugget, buried in paragraph 24 of an LA Times story on the failures of Plan D and how it may hurt the GOP, has to take the cake.

...Republican congressional leaders have been urging their rank and file to talk up the benefit to constituents. House leaders are offering rewards — a bust of Ronald Reagan — to lawmakers who make extra efforts to reach out to their constituents and explain the program in town hall meetings, mailings and more.

(sound of head hitting computer desk)

You're telling me that it isn't enough that a Congressman's own constituents are forced to choose between medicine or rent? He won't go to his district and talk to them unless he GETS A BUST OF REAGAN???

I don't think you can find an instance of government that's more unresponsive to its citizens than this. Republicans ramrodded this "giveaway to Big Pharma" plan through the Congress with threats and lies, eventually admitting that they undervalued the true cost of the plan. Despite worries that moving 6 million people onto dozens of private plans without their knowledge could be a clusterfuck, they assured everyone it would work just fine. Now, by even the rosy admission of the plan administrator Mark McClellan, 20% of the information in the database is wrong, affecting hundreds of thousands of people.

And the Congress can't get off their collectively fat asses and talk to those in trouble? They have to be bribed to do it?

This is a majority party that is completely out of touch with ordinary Americans and what they go through on a daily basis. They don't even recognize the consequences of their bungling actions. And as Rahm Emanuel notes, this issue won't go away:

Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-Ill.), chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, predicted that complaints about the program would intensify as seniors bumped up against a limitation on benefits known as the "doughnut hole" — a gap in coverage of drug expenses. "If you think they are mad now, you ain't seen nothing yet," Emanuel said.

Democrats, for their part, have offered legislation to fix the gaps in the system and reimburse the 20 states that have stepped in to provide emergency funding for seniors. The Bush Administration wants that states to try and get that money from the private insurance companies adminstering the various plans. Good luck with that.

The other thing that occurs to me, slightly off topic, is: do the Republicans just have a bunch of Ronald Reagan busts collecting dust somewhere that they give away like the President gives away Medals of Freedom? Is it a sign that you've "made it" in DC if you get your very own Reagan bust?

It would be funny, if hundreds of thousands of elderly Americans weren't suffering. I think they'll all have something to say about this plan in November. And nobody will have to offer them a Ronald Reagan bust to get them to the polling place.