When a Bull’s Eye is a Badge of Courage: Congressman Ryan and His Roadmap for America

President Obama submitted a budget earlier this year that includes soaring debt and deficits that even White House Director of Management and Budget Peter Orszag admitted are “unsustainable.”   Perhaps not wanting to showcase an equally irresponsible budget, Congress is not even committing to a Budget Resolution for 2011.  But the President’s projections are still there, threatening the financial stability of the country in a way not seen since the Great Depression.  A weapon of mass economic destruction is ticking, ready to explode and cause havoc on American society in just five to ten years from now.  President Obama and the Democratic Leadership in Congress have offered no plan to stop the fiscal madness, except a toothless bipartisan commission that is studying the problem.

One Congressman, Paul Ryan (R-WI), who is the ranking Republican member of the House Budget Committee, has offered a detailed plan designed to put the United States on a fiscally sustainable path.  In so doing, he has drawn a big fat political bull’s eye on his own back, daring the Democrats to attack his ideas, which they and their allies have done with glee.  But without a plan of their own, Democrats should keep their mouths shut.  For courage alone, Ryan and his ideas deserve respectful consideration.

Congressman Ryan, in his “Road Map for America,” proposes nothing less than a radical transformation for the delivery of most government services.  Under Ryan’s plan, Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security would dramatically change as would the way many Americans buy health insurance.  Ryan would also fundamentally reform corporate taxation by replacing corporate income taxes with corporate consumption taxes.   Ryan invites his fellow citizens to dig as deep they want into the details at his website.  The scope of what Ryan proposes is vast, so here is only a taste of his ideas.

For Social Security reform, Ryan refloats the long-held Republican position that workers should be able to put away or invest a portion of their payroll taxes for their own retirement.  Democrats love to demagogue this idea by accusing their opponents of wanting to “privatize” Social Security, as if the Social Security safety net would necessarily disappear under such a proposal.  Among other safeguards, Ryan would have the federal government guarantee a return equal to the rate of inflation. Opponents would like to categorize such “privatization” as radical, but it’s not. Over thirty countries from around the world allow workers to invest at least a portion of money they would otherwise pay in payroll taxes in private but regulated retirement accounts .   In Ryan’s plan, future Social Security benefits are cut for workers who are 55 or younger in 2011, but beginning in 2012 they will be entitled to invest some of their payroll taxes, which would almost certainly guarantee them much more money at retirement than under the current system.

Democrats, bashing Ryan’s plan like a piñata, claim that he wants to “abolish” Medicare and Medicaid.  While technically somewhat true, Ryan does not propose to leave the old and impoverished without healthcare insurance, out to forage in hospital dumpsters for discarded medical supplies, or to shout medical questions at passing doctors.  Rather, Ryan proposes to move to a model similar to the one offered by Democrat Ron Wyden, author of an innovative universal healthcare proposal that President Obama pretended did not exist during the course of this past year’s healthcare debate.  Under Ryan’s plan, all Americans are encouraged to buy their own insurance, with generous tax credits and vouchers for those who cannot afford insurance on their own.  Medicaid patients might have high deductible  plans with their health savings accounts (HSAs) funded by the government. The long-term care portion of Medicaid would remain intact.  Instead of Medicare, an elderly person would get, on average, $11,000 per year to buy insurance, a sum indexed annually to an inflation rate the falls between the overall rate of inflation and the current rate in healthcare cost increase. It is fair to question whether Ryan is offering  a big enough subsidy, or if his revenue assumption are too generous to balance the budget.   These are reasonable questions that Ryan would probably be happy to debate, but more often his ideas are pummeled by politically motivated cheap shots.  Those who attack Ryan should answer some questions of their own:

1)      How are we going to get our spending and debt under control?

2)      What are the most efficient means to provide the services we all want and need?

In the areas of medical-services delivery and social security, Ryan proposes consumer-centered  and market-driven models, as opposed to the big-government model we currently rely on but is going broke.  In everything we buy as consumers – from vegetables, to home electronics, to auto insurance – we rely on a market to deliver the best combination of quality and price.  Does medical insurance really have to be that different?  And no  individuals in their right minds would prefer to give money to the government to spend immediately, with only an IOU in return, rather than invest their own money, for their own retirement, securely stowed in their own account.

Both political parties need intellectually weighty, honest and articulate leadership to inspire the nation to address the immense and complex challenges of deficits and debt that truly threaten the America we know and love .  Conservative leaders, rising out of a populist tradition, have been insufficiently brainy and articulate.  Paul Ryan, should he assume leadership of the Republican Party, would completely reverse this trend.  President Obama, while possessing some impressive intellectual credentials, has been disappointingly dishonest on many issues, most notably those involving the true cost of his healthcare plan.

If Paul Ryan were to lead the Republicans in 2012, he would force a substantial debate about the issues that really matter – the nation’s debt and deficit, and the related public services on which we depend.  Ryan’s quick-mindedness would make Democratic dissembling more difficult and might bring out some of the nobleness of character that so many Americans thought they saw in candidate Barack Obama.

Ryan sits on the President’s deficit commission, which is all well and fine; we hope they can find a bipartisan solution behind their closed doors.  But Democrats should man-up (or woman-up in the case of Speaker Pellosi), by standing and delivering their own deficit and debt reduction program.  They should engage the passionate young conservative reformer, Congressman Paul Ryan.   It is time for bright and honest people to make the hard choices.