Gentlemen, if you haven't seen this before. Received from a trusted
source. This is primarily for military retirees. If you have any in
your address list please forward.
Subject: PASS THIS TO ALL MILITARY RETIREES
This is true. It is on pages 77, 172, 218, and 434. You have to dig to see
the charges. We (retirees) would lose the Medicare for life benefit and
would have to pay. We would lose TRICARE as a total care package. We would
not be allowed to keep TRICARE so when Obama stands and says if you like
what you have you can keep it, He lies.
This is a "Heads Up" on a battle we are facing nowand down the road with
the new Administration. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has already
drafted proposed legislation that would basically reduce our TRICARE for
Life benefits to a system whereby we pay deductibles and co-pays up to
$6,301 the first year for you and your spouse, with future years being
indexed to increase with inflation.
What canwe do? The article below, obtained from an Air Force Association
and written by BG Bob Clements, best describes what we can do. Please read
it and check the links for CBO language and do what Bob says-Send this
emailto every Military Retiree you know and write and email your
Congressman often. For those of you that might have voted for "Change",
you should doit more than often!
TRICARE FOR LIFE'S FUTURE....
TRICARE For Life was instituted to correct the broken promise that
military retirees would receive free healthcare coverage for life and it
covers the Medicare co-pay. Now a heavy assault has begun on
Veterans'/Retirees' benefits to pay for other programs our President
promised during the campaign. And it is a high priority of his
administration. The one item of most interest to Retired Military is in
Article 189. If approved by Congress the first assault wave would hit in
2011 and would hit hard. It would initiate cost sharing to require
retirees to pay the first $525 of medical cost and 50% of the next $4,725
for a first year cost of $2,888 per person. Itwould be indexed to increase
with inflation. A reason given for this action
(for PR effect) is "overuse" by Retirees.
For those of you who are covered by TFL you will want to pay attention
(Below) to what BG Bob Clements has surfaced about the future of TFL. In
any case, on page 189 of the Congressional Budget Office report, see the
note below on how toget to that spot, there is a strong recommendation to
eventually eliminate the program as it is too expensive. Just another move
to slight those of us who dedicated much of our adult lives to the defense
of our country.
Strongly recommend that you contact your elected officials and register
your strong opposition to the elimination of the TFL program. Heads-up
from BG Bob Clements, USAF Ret The following has been added to the
Congressional Budget Office
Web Site
www.cbo.gov/ a. Budget, Options, Volume 1: Health Care
(
www.cbo.gov/doc.cfm?index=3D9925
) For those who have never opened one of these web sites from OMB :
1. double click on the above URL
2. click on PDF
3. click on the binoculars
4. do a search for TFL
Now here it is folks and I will guarantee if you sit around on your behind
and do nothing about it as they bring these options forward this coming
year, you will lose one of the best healthcare benefits that the Medicare
eligible retired military have. It is short f the promises made that we
fought so hard for back in the late 90s and early 2000s but it is still
the best healthcare program that anyone in the United States has, bar
none.
People who are professionals always look for the channel of least
resistance when it comes to cutting money out of the Federal and DOD
budget. I can tell you this straight on, military retirees are one of
those channels of least resistance noted for sitting around, doing
nothing, and waiting for ole Joe to do it for them. You had better wake
up. Your medical benefits are prime target. If you lose them, you have
nobody to blame but yourself. Let me repeat that ... you have nobody to
blame but yourself.
The way to secure your benefits is to write to your members of Congress
and to keep writing and writing and writing. ONCE IS NOT ENOUGH!! Keep
repeating the above statement until you are blue in the face.
Now I'm going to make one morestatement to all of you younger people out
there who are not yet eligible for TRICARE for Life.
HEALTH CARE WILL EVENTUALLY BECOME THE DOMINATING FACTOR IN YOUR LIFE.
Remember that . . . . it will impact you big time with the utmost in
cruelty unless you are fortunate enough to die from a heart attack or get
run over by a truck.
The service organizations will put up a fight, but, they will need your
help and can't do it by themselves. I hope this makes it clear as to what
you can expect if you do nothing.
To show you how stupid these professionals can be at times just read the
data on the noted sites closely. You will see that in spite of the MTFs
(Military Treatment Facility) need to get patients back to keep their
doctors busy and the hospitals from going to clinic status, these people
from OMB would employ a means to keep retirees from using MTF facilities
by charging them a fee for services. How dumb can you get. Even if you are
an Obama fan, and believe that changeth cometh, FL option from OMB will
not go away. They need the money they spend on you for other programs for
people who produce nothing but votes to keep their boss in office. If you
know of anyone who is Retired Military, please forward this on to them.
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