Welcome to 55 and Better

The News is Getting Better

Time to Unwrap November

The "55 and Better" series focuses on the issues that effect everyone sooner or later. With that in mind, it is important that we join together in tackling the problems and looking for the solutions as we plan for the future. All of us have inherited a system including Medicare and Social Security from those who have fought the "good fight," now it remains up to us to continue the promise so that the years after 55 will be even better.

We at “55 and Better” opened our gifts on the morning of November 8th with great excitement: A Win! Somehow we received a win; in fact we received several wins. Digging through the goodies we now have a chance to see just what this will all mean and what the future holds. Hopefully, our issues will now get better…we like better.

Grinch or No Grinch? At least the Pirates are gone.

First the good news: Representative Hoyer assured the country that any thought of Social Security Privatization is off the table. Say goodbye to the Pirates, this is one program that is searching for calmer waters. Not everything is perfect (it never is), and both Rep. Hoyer and Rep. Rangel are putting a few things on the table:

Raising retirement age or reducing benefits can't be ruled out if the Social Security system is to be saved from going bust, Rep. Charles Rangel said yesterday.
"All of these things are on the table to find some way to make certain that Social Security is solvent," said Rangel, who is poised to take control of the powerful House Ways and Means Committee.
Rangel (D-Harlem) discussed the fate of Social Security - which some have estimated will have a cash-flow problem as soon as 2017 and run out of money by 2040 - during a Manhattan breakfast talk sponsored by Crain's New York.
Any solution will cause some pain, according to Rangel. "If you call tax increases pain - and I do - that'll be a part of the mix, too," he said. "There's no easy way to do it, but it has to be done."
But the congressman also swore Social Security and Medicare health benefits would not be scrapped entirely. "If you're talking about getting rid of entitlements, forget about it," he said.

Okay, so we know that Social Security is being taken seriously, and that the effort will be geared to saving a valuable program. That is surely better than another Bush gift sent to some fat-cats. We must remember that not everyone believes that Social Security needs a radical overhaul. Here’s a snip from the Atlantic Free Press:

As the Bush presidency faces low polling numbers for its foreign and domestic policies, he needs political allies for yet another go at building support to reform Social Security. So we see an olive branch of sorts being extended to the Democratic-majority Congress to discuss Social Security.

The problem with the administration’s plan to privatize Social Security remains what it has been. The program’s finances are sound, on rock-solid ground for the next 40 years with no change at all, the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office reports.

A Lump of Coal?

The New Year promises to ring in changes in Medicare Plan D. For the folks who depend on this program, it recommended that you make your list and check it twice:

— For anyone interested in learning how to navigate through the maze of the Medicare Part D puzzle, here’s a quick solution: Go to the Medicare.gov Web site online and glance through the online publication the federal government has placed there — all 156 pages of it.
Since its inception last year, the government’s medication assistance program for seniors has taken a lot of flack for being hard to understand. The length of the governmental guide to the program is a case in point. Seniors who were registering for the program for the first time last year had six months in which to decipher the program. This year, that window of opportunity is six weeks, not six months. And those who wait until just before the window closes will be out of luck as far as assistance for their drug benefits in January.

Here’s a little something that might help:

CMMS offers these ten tips for seniors:
F Calculate your health care costs. Try to figure out how much you paid for medications, hospital bills, doctor visits and other health costs this year.
F Write it down. Make a list of your doctors and drugs as you consider your options.
F Confirm your coverage. Make sure your doctors and drugs are covered by the plans you are considering.
F Do your homework. Consider an insurance company’s financial security, customer service and reputation before signing up.
F Consider different options. New Medicare insurance plans often include health and drug insurance for little or no premium beyond Medicare.
F Be realistic. Don’t leave a Medigap or supplemental insurance plan for a $0 premium plan if you expect to be frequently hospitalized.
F Be a smart shopper. Compare plans from a variety of companies or use a service that can help make that comparison for you.
F Don’t believe everything you hear. Be cautious about signing up for a plan at a seminar that sells only one company’s plans.
F Read the fine print. Always review potential plans’ “Summary of Benefits.”
F Get expert advice. Use appropriate independent resources to help you assess how competing insurance plans may or may not meet your needs.
Josh Taylor, an assistant to U.S. Rep. Chet Edwards, D-Waco, indicated that revision and simplification of the program is high on the agenda of the new, Democratic majority congress. Edwards, Taylor said, tried unsuccessfully in the last session of Congress to address the possibility that Medicare use the same negotiating tactics used with high praise by the VA.

Return to sender: The doughnut hole gets bigger. Bush seems to have slipped something into our stockings, which would be filled with holes if he had his way.

Those grinches at Fox News think everything is working just fine and we owe Bush a “thank you.” The problem according to Mort "Toto" Kondracke

"Exactly. Look, what I'm tempted to say, and I will say is Milton Friedman has passed away in more ways than one. I mean, the Democrats do not believe in the private market, private competition. The way the Medicare prescription drug plan works is that private insurance companies negotiate formularies with these various drug companies, and they have lowered the price from what was expected…"

You see. We just don’t get all of this competition, and any problems we have are just a mirage. Fortunately, there is a great big bundle coming soon called “The First 100 Hours.” One of the gifts that arrived on November 8th, the one that will keep on giving, is the new Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi. She has plans:

There is a lot on the agenda plate for the new Democratic-controlled Congress to tackle. Years of the Republican Congress rubber-stamping the Bush Administration and selling out to corporate special interests have produced legislation that serves big business instead of the broader electorate. But Democrats want to change that. Soon-to-be Speaker Pelosi has outlined her vision for the first 100 hours of a Democratic Congress, which includes passing the 9/11 commission recommendations and raising the minimum wage, as well as instituting ethics reform to "drain the swamp" of the Culture of Corruption that has plagued the Capitol under Republican rule.
On that agenda is also a desire to fix the disastrous Medicare bill passed by the Republicans which prevents the federal government from negotiating lower drug prices for seniors.

Looking over this year’s gifts, here’s what 55 and Better found: No privatization, an effort to fix Social Security, a promise for a new and improved Medicare Plan D, and a fighting new Madame Speaker.

We wish we could tell you that everything would arrive tomorrow, but just knowing that change is coming may be the best gift of all.