Whither the uninsured?

Ron Brownstein asks a question not a single member of the Republican Party in Congress or running for President cares to answer: What happens to the rising number of Americans who have no health care if they succeed in their “repeal Obamacare!” goals?

Those millions of uninsured rarely intrude into the promises from GOP congressional leaders and the party’s presidential field to defend liberty by repealing Obama’s plan. But ignoring them doesn’t make them go away. If the 2012 election rewards Republicans with enough leverage in Washington to erase Obama’s initiative, they will face the choice of finding an alternative means to expand coverage or allowing the number of those without insurance to grow, with far-reaching consequences not only for the uninsured but for those with insurance as well.

Mr. Brownstein is laboring under an incorrect assumption: that the Republican Party cares a damn for those people. It doesn’t. It cares only for defending the status quo, in which its friends and donors continue to enrich themselves while the other half of the country sinks deeper into penury. One only has to look at the Ryan budget proposed this week to see that. That budget decimates Medicaid, the program which principally benefits the poor.

It’s Medicaid and other health spending, which includes the Affordable Care Act, where Ryan really brings down the hammer: That category falls by 1.25 percent of GDP. So Ryan’s cuts to health care for the poor are almost twice the size of his cuts to health care for the old.

So, Mr. Brownstein, you need to recalibrate your assumptions.