Insults, slurs, nasty comments and contempt for Social Security sprout up everywhere these days in Washington. Although Trump himself insists he will protect the program, his underlings sure hate it, and by extension, the nearly 70 million elders who rely on it; and “rely” is an understatement – for many it’s their sole lifeline. These people voted for Trump in their multitudes. But now they hear from his advisor Elon Musk that Social Security is a “Ponzi scheme,” or from billionaire financial services ceo turned commerce secretary Howard Lutnick that only “fraudsters” cash their social security checks. It’s hard not to conclude that these haughty plutocrats want to snatch grandma’s money and leave her destitute.

Of course, this has long been official GOP policy. Just look at what the Republicans want to do to Medicaid. The House passed a bill in January to gut it, even dispensing with the prolonged, mendacious and de rigeur campaign to tar it with fraud. That’s the big lie about Social Security – that it’s riddled with fraud and therefore must be not just trimmed but slashed. I suppose Medicaid, like food stamps, so offends multimillionaire GOP House members that they figured they could dispense with the propaganda campaign and just ravage it.

Besides, all Medicaid recipients are poor, thus easily bullied by the mega-rich. And with its Medicaid bill, the Republican House revealed that it’s full of bullies, who’d like nothing better than to ditch Medicaire, Medicaid, Social Security and of course food stamps, so that the indigent can skip doctor’s visits, ration their chemo and their insulin, eat fewer, smaller........

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