A few things we know for sure:

• Medicaid is quickly heading toward insolvency and threatening to bring many state budgets down with it.
• Current health care legislation in both the House and the Senate seek to expand the defunct Medicaid program to millions more by raising the eligibility levels by as much as 50% (150% of FPL in the House bill and the Senate HELP bill and 133% in the Senate Finance proposal)
• To finance the expanded coverage, proposals seek $500 billion in Medicare cuts to help pay for it.

In perhaps the most damning report yet on the recent House health care bill, the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services – the government agency charged with administering both programs – released a significant report over the weekend analyzing H.R. 3962. The report brought some harsh fiscal reality back to the health care debate.

Cutting $500 billion from Medicare would likely prove so costly to hospitals and nursing homes that they could stop accepting Medicare altogether. In an attempt to expand insurance coverage to millions, the Pelosi plan limits options for many seniors.

Of course, Congress could and likely would intervene to prevent such rationing but the effect would be to virtually nullify any savings obtained from the Medicare cuts. Under an Administration that has already spent more in 9 months than President Clinton did in his entire 8 years in office, such a proposal should be roundly rejected for adding billions more to the deficit and failing to put patients first by all but guaranteeing rationed care for seniors and the poor.

This is not real reform. It will leave patients, doctors and taxpayers all worse off. It’s time to push the restart button and do reform right rather than fast.