AARP Bulletin - December 2010

Your World ;
consin Republican Paul Ryan, will be a leading voice for change. He
favors private accounts for Social Security, which AARP opposes.
According to association Executive Vice President Nancy LeaMond,
“Americans, particularly the middle class, are facing declining pen-
sions, lack of savings and rising health care costs, and these unbal-
anced proposals take the country in the wrong direction instead of
answering their real fears.”
The issue will no doubt be a central focus. “We’ll be under the gun
much more than we have been,” said Barbara B. Kennelly, president of
the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare.
Health care. Republicans have targeted “Obamacare,” the health
care reform that will provide health insurance for more than 30 mil-
lion people now uninsured by putting new requirements on busi-
nesses, insurance companies and individuals. Many of the newly
elected Republicans who have vowed to repeal the law will try to
curtail funds needed to implement it.
Republicans will have di;culty finding the votes to override a presiden-
tial veto. But they could try to slow down funding for health care reform
or pick o; small provisions, said James Thurber, director of the Center
for Presidential and Congressional Studies at American University.
Boehner also dispatched a letter to newly elected Republican gov-
ernors pledging to work with them to slow down implementation of
the machinery necessary for the national plan.
Taxes. Bush-era tax cuts, as well as cuts enacted with the 2009
stimulus plan, expire at year’s end. The lame-duck Congress is trying
to find a compromise to extend the tax breaks. Republicans want all
of them to stay in place, while Obama
would like to keep the middle-class
tax cuts but let cuts expire for the
wealthiest Americans.
Many of the
issues on the
table are critical
to older Ameri-
cans—the defi-
cit, jobs, taxes,
health care,
Medicare and
Social Security.
Now what? The public seems to
see divided government as a good
thing, said Republican pollster Bill
McIntur; of Public Opinion Strate-
gies. If fellow Republicans are smart,
he said, they will find a few moderate
Democrats to work with so they can
tell voters they are working across the
aisle. And if Republicans do what they promised in the election, such
as cutting spending, it could help the GOP brand in the 2012 election,
McIntur; added.
For their part, Democrats still have a majority in the Senate, though
the November results may be intimidating for the 23 Democratic
senators facing reelection in 2012. And Obama is still president—with
the tools, prestige and power that entails.
“The Democrats are not going to roll over and play dead,” said David
Gergen, of the Center for Public Leadership at the Harvard Kennedy
School. But, added Stephen Hess, “if they’re not willing to do business
with each other, all of this is just a prologue to 2012. It’s the degree of
gridlock the American people are going to have to deal with.” ;
Tamara Lytle is a former Washington bureau chief for the
Orlando Sentinel.