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COMMENTARY

The impeached U.S. President, in this year's "State of the Union Address," tried to paint a pretty picture of the state of our nation.

The president made no mention of his Impeachment.

The president did not mention the state of disarray of our nation.

The president did not mention the political divisiveness tearing apart the fabric and foundation of our beloved country.

The president did not mention that the U.S. House of Representatives, which impeached him just over a month ago, and the U.S. Senate, will reconvene on Wednesday following "The State of the Union Address" to vote to convict him or to acquit him in the Impeachment Trial.

The speech appealed to the Republicans who support him, and who staunchly defend him during the Impeachment Trial proceedings.

However, his speech, mainly a political campaign performance read from a telepromter, did not convey to the American people the truth.

The president boasted that "years of economic decay (from the previous administration) are over."

In fact, President Barack Obama, upon taking office, cleaned up the nation's economic mess that President George W. Bush left behind.

It was President Obama who brought our nation from the depth of the Great Recession which he inherited, to economic prosperity.

In the State of the Union Address, the impeached president said, "We will always protect your Medicare and your Social Security."

Yet, last month at the World Economic Forum  in Davos, Switzerland, when asked by CNBC if cuts to entitlement programs - - meaning Medicare and Social Security - - were ever to be on his agenda, the impeached president replied, "At some point, they will be.  It'll be toward the end of the year...At the right time, we will take a look at that."

The New York Times reported that with the president's last budget proposal, severe cuts would be made to Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security, and the Social Security Disability Insurance program.  Under the proposal, there would be $26 billion less for Social Security, including $10 billion less for the Social Security Disability Insurance program.

The impeached president ignores the intelligence and wisdom of older Americans - - who would be impacted by such cuts - - to discern the truth.

In 2018, The New York Times published an op-ed by the president on Medicare.

The op-ed was a snow job.

(Resume article from: https://www.prlog.org/12809124 prlog.org here)

The president should not misuse Seniors to advance partisan and propaganda purposes as he tried to do in his op-ed, and again in the State of the Union Address.

In the op-ed, he claimed that "Democrats will eviscerate Medicare." Was that falsehood just another pre-election scare tactic that he employed in 2018?

How ironic, considering that the president at that time slashed Medicare's budget by over $500 billion over 10 years and the House Speaker, Republican Paul Ryan, had tried to gut Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security.

In his op-ed, he said that he will protect Seniors, and falsely claimed that Democrats' "Medicare for All" would not cover "pre-existing conditions."

Yet the president's and the Republicans' efforts to repeal the Affordable Care Act, President Barack Obama's landmark legislation which addressed pre-existing conditions, were defeated, thanks to Democrats' push back and Sen. John McCain's vote.

Senate Republican Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, like the president, has wanted to make cuts to Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security. This is the same Sen. McConnell who has obsessively tried to dismantle President Obama's Affordable Care Act since its enactment, and who has tried to decimate a law which has helped to provide health insurance coverage to millions of Americans and to their families.

In his op-ed in 2018, the president failed to mention that his budget not only cut over $500 billion from Medicare, it also slashed over $1 trillion in Medicaid over a 10 year period.

While the president and the Republicans gutted both Medicare and Medicaid with abandon, they gave a $1.5 trillion tax cut to the millionaires, billionaires, and corporations.

The president's and the Republicans' unchecked greed and so-called way of governing is to fatten their own pockets further with the hard working American taxpayers' monies.

When they say they will protect Medicare and Social Security, they mean just the opposite.

The Senior citizens of our nation, who have worked hard all their lives and who have contributed their own monies into the Social Security and Medicare programs, are not fooled by the president's and Republicans' words.

Senior citizens wield much political power, and will exercise that power at the ballot box in November this year.

Anh Lê is an independent journalist.  

COPYRIGHT ANH LÊ, FEBRUARY 5, 2020

Editor's note:  After the posting of Anh Le's Commentary: The U.S. Senate voted to acquit President Trump on both articles of impeachment, "abuse of power" and "obstructing Congress."