Spurring new demands to overhaul the nation's healthcare system, Medicare trustees announced Tuesday that the program's biggest fund for serving the elderly would run out of money in just eight years.

But the announcement, the latest in a succession of dire predictions about Medicare's fiscal condition, also pointed up the chasm separating Democrats and Republicans as the Obama administration and its congressional allies prepare for another major attempt to reshape the U.S. healthcare system.

...

"The government-run healthcare programs we already have are unsustainable," said Rep. Tom Price of Georgia, who heads the Republican Study Committee, a conservative House caucus. "It should be obvious that putting more people under the inflexible control of Washington is no way to bring down medical costs, and it's certainly no way to provide healthcare of the highest quality."

via Report: Medicare fund is 8 years from insolvency - Los Angeles Times.

The Federal government can't afford the health-care programs is has *now*, and it wants to create *more* of them? If you want to reduce costs, then reduce regulations and let a free market operate. Hell, I get the idea that even taxpayer-paid vouchers toward high-deductible health savings accounts would be better.