If you listen to the Democrats, being old in America is now an inconvenience to the rest of us. We know the majority of Democrats are pro-choice and they don’t mind killing the unborn, but now they are turning their attention to the elderly.

I can’t believe that we as a society have to come to say to our senior citizens, you are now a menace to society and it’s time for you to go.

The President and Congress think we can cover up to 50 million more people and bring healthcare costs down. How is that going to work? Well, they will cut Medicare costs by denying medical care to the elderly.

The President said in his news conference last week that the elderly will save thousands in prescription drug costs. Sure they will, because the newly created “government rationing board” will deny them the drugs they need to stay alive. Remember, we are endowed by our Creator with certain unalienable rights, one of them being life.

Medicare was established in 1965 to allow older Americans access to affordable healthcare. According to the Medicare Trustees report, this program will be bankrupt by 2018. If the President and liberals are really concerned about Medicare’s rising costs, then let’s address the fraud, waste and abuse that exists today.

Unfortunately, they are about as interested in addressing that issue as they are in addressing the numerous bogus malpractice suits brought forth daily.

America’s Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009, H.R. 3200, will cut cost to Medicare by denying care to the elderly, require them to attend “counseling sessions” every five years regarding “alternatives for end-of-life care,” and perhaps pressure them to end their lives earlier than God intended.

I’m not going to say that healthcare in America is cheap; it isn’t, but it is the best healthcare in the world. No one leaves this country for medical care, and presidents, prime ministers, kings, queens and everyday citizens come here for treatment.

Let me give you a few statistics that will make you cringe. The death rate in Canada from cancer is 16 percent higher than in the U.S., and the death rate from heart disease is 6 percent higher. If you live in Canada, you are 42 percent more likely to die from colon cancer than in the U.S.

The White House wants to create a new “government body” run from the Executive Branch. Peter Orszag, director of the Office of Management and Budget, wants this new body to “circumvent the democratic process and avoid accountability to the public for cuts in benefits.”

The President sees the best way to deal with the chronically ill and the elderly, who account for up to 80 percent of the total healthcare bill, is to have an independent group make their medical decisions.

Translated, “faceless bureaucrats” will decide your future. I can’t emphasize this enough: the government will decide what treatments our parents, grandparents, and anyone else who becomes ill will receive.

I’m sorry, but that’s not their responsibility, and I won’t stand for it, will you?

The government can’t run the Department of Motor Vehicles, for heaven’s sake; I don’t want them deciding if my grandmother can have her pacemaker replaced.

The President and liberals seem to think that we spend more on healthcare as we get older, but data shows this is not true. According to Dr. Herbert Pardes, CEO of New York Presbyterian Medical Center, a patient who dies at 67 “spends three times as much on healthcare at the end of life” than a patient who lives to age 90.

If we are going to start deciding how much medical care we can spend on an individual, we are all in trouble. There are some individuals younger than 65 who require more medical care than someone over 65. Do we deny them treatment too because of cost?

For all its faults, Medicare has allowed people to live to a ripe old age and have the spirit to boot. If President Obama has his way, this will all be undone.

In every election cycle, Democrats try to scare the elderly and convince them that the evil Republicans are going to take away their Medicare and Social Security. They say they care about “society’s most vulnerable.”

I guess those days are gone. Wonder what they will say in the next election cycle? Stay tuned to find out.

Laura Lunsford

Fayetteville, Ga.

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