Bill Clinton and Paul Ryan on the same page on Medicare Reform

Topics: Political News and commentaries
It's not exactly what the leadership of his party wants to hear, but it looks like the predictably unpredictable Bill Clinton is on the same page with Paul Ryan on medicare reform, and may be willing to do what his party is unwilling to do - put his country and the future of Medicare before politics, or in this case, recognize that these aren't necessarily mutually exclusive issues.
ABC News' Jonathan Karl reports:

The day after the stunning upset in the special congressional election in upstate New York, Rep. Paul Ryan is a man under fire.

But ABC News was behind the scenes with the Wisconsin Congressman and GOP Budget Committee Chairman when he got some words of encouragement (from) none other than former President Bill Clinton.

"So anyway, I told them before you got here, I said I'm glad we won this race in New York," Clinton told Ryan, when the two met backstage at a forum on the national debt held by the Pete Peterson Foundation. But he added, "I hope Democrats don't use this as an excuse to do nothing."

Ryan told Clinton he fears that now nothing will get done in Washington.
"My guess is it's going to sink into paralysis is what's going to happen. And you know the math. It's just, I mean, we knew we were putting ourselves out there. You gotta start this. You gotta get out there. You gotta get this thing moving," Ryan said.

Clinton told Ryan that if he ever wanted to talk about it, he should "give me a call." Ryan said he would.

Over at Hot Air, Allahpundit sees a couple of possible motives for Clinton's reach-out to Ryan:

The last thing Obama, Reid, and Schumer want before the election is one of their own elder statesmen -- one who's personally popular and famous for budget-balancing, no less -- pressuring them to inch out on the Medicare limb that's cracking under Ryan. So ... why would he do it? Could be that he's earnestly concerned about the Medicare time bomb and appreciates Ryan's leadership on it. Remember, before Erskine Bowles was co-chair of the Deficit Commission, he was Clinton's White House chief of staff. Or it could be that Clinton's worried about Democrats being perceived as debt do-nothings even though the public, for the moment at least, is with them on the specific issue of Medicare. As we saw earlier today, the more the GOP can drive home to voters that preserving the program as-is necessarily means raising the debt ceiling again and again, the more potentially vulnerable Democrats are. Or maybe Clinton doesn't much care what the White House thinks or what it might do for the Democrat' electoral prospects. Being an ex-president means never having to say you're sorry. Why not let it rip?

My own guess, and it's indeed a 'guess', is that it's a case of 'all of the above'. Despite his many shortcomings and despite my disagreeing with most of his political views, Bubba is reasonable, politically savvy, and like Ryan, smart enough to know that in regard to Medicare ... reform now rather than later is both good politics and good for the country, and all the better to be on the right side of both.


And do I hear a Hillary 2016 in the background?
Related video: ABC News was listening in:

Posted by Hyscience