Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli (R) is on the road.
The radio road that is.
The presumptive Republican nominee for Governor of Virginia is conducting a series of radio interviews on radio shows across the country. The interviews are in support of his newly released book 'The Last Line of Defense".
Just this week Cuccinelli was interviewed on WGIR- AM a news radio station in Manchester, NH and he made an appearance on the nationally syndicated "Jerry Doyle Show" which airs on WNOX a news radio station in Knoxville, Tenn and several other stations across the country.
Not surprisingly, one of the areas the interviewers pushed the Attorney General on is his book's take on Medicare. His opinion on the government insurance program has led to harsh criticism from Democrats, but during his radio tour Cuccinelli does not retreat at all from his position.
On WGIR in Manchester, he told interviewer James Pindell that Democrats use Medicare as way to scare older voters that their benefits are going to be stripped away. While defending Rep. Paul Ryan's Medicare plan Cuccinelli said that Democrats are more interested in "growing the monster" and if you aren't they will come after you.
"You want to do anything that doesn't grow the monster, like they want you to grow it and centralize power, the way they would like to centralize power and they attack, attack, attack and it becomes the boogeyman to scare people off and to scare them into voting for more, well, politicians who themselves will continue to vote for bigger government," Cuccinelli told Pindell.
He also said nobody in the "right mind" thought that Ryan wanted to harm Medicare.
There is an obvious overtone to Cuccinelli appearing on radio in New Hampshire. He has also visited Iowa and appeared on Iowa radio as well. Those two states are the earliest in the presidential sweepstakes. In fact Cuccinelli is a well-known enough figure in New Hampshire that the state democratic party "invited" him to New Hampshire to discuss some of the concepts in his book.
New Hampshire state Democratic party Chairman Ray Buckley called the release of his book a clear first step in Cuccinelli's run for the Republican nomination in 2016.
"Ken Cuccinelli's opinion that social security and Medicare are 'goodies' that make recipients dependent on government would certainly be enlightening to the many voters he will have to win over during his long quest for the Presidency," Buckley said in a statement.
On the Jerry Doyle show, the Attorney General argued that Medicare is easily used as a scare tactic by Democrats because the way it is designed provides no other options for older Americans. If they don't have Medicare they don't have anything.
"When you got so many big programs, take Medicare, which I touch on in the book, that gets used by politicians to scare off the electorate," He said. "Look at the pushing granny of a cliff ad. You know that wouldn't exist but for the crowding out of all other options for older Americans from Medicare."
This is the just the beginning of a sizeable roll-out of the Cuccinelli book. In addition to what will probably be countless media interviews, the Attorney General will also conduct book signings for the next several weeks. In fact there is one planned for Friday at 6pm at the Barnes & Noble in Fredricksburg.
While Democrats will continue to pester and point out each and everything Cuccinelli says about the book, it is clear it is not something he is running away from. He seems ready to let voters decide if his ideas will work.
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