Brooks conveniently forgets about the fact that the gov can not

[rodeodance]

negoiate with drug companies to lower prices--and that this clause was perposely inserted into the prescription bill to the benefit of the pharmaceutical company. Instead he blames the AARP!!

February 19, 2005
OP-ED COLUMNIST
In the Midst of Budget Decadence, a Leader Will Arise
By DAVID BROOKS

There's going to be another Ross Perot, and this time he's going to be younger. There's going to be a millionaire rising out of the country somewhere and he (or she) is going to lead a movement of people who are worried about federal deficits, who are offended by the horrendous burden seniors are placing on the young and who are disgusted by a legislative process that sometimes suggests that the government has lost all capacity for self-control.

He's going to be set off by some event like what is happening right now with the Medicare prescription drug benefit. He's going to look at an event like that one, and he's not only going to be worried about the country's economic future - he's also going to be morally offended. He's going to sense that something fundamentally decadent is going on........


We may as well be blunt about the driving force behind all this. The living and well organized are taking money from the weak and the unborn. Over the past decades we have seen a gigantic transfer of wealth from struggling young families and the next generation to members of the AARP. In 1990, 29 percent of federal spending went to seniors; by 2015 roughly half of all government spending will go to those over 65. This prescription drug measure is just part of that great redistribution........



E-mail: [e-mail]

[rodeodance]

1. Email [e-mail]

[punpirate]

2. Brooks, like all conservatives...

... overlooks a good many things, as a necessary convenience....

[cornermouse]

3. Which ice floe do you want to put them on, Mr. Brooks?

[TomClash]

4. So . . .

we can have a war of the young against old, but we can't have a class war.