Who will stand up to Paul Ryan and John Boehner?

We can’t afford to lose sight of the fact that access to quality, affordable health care will always be a priority for New Mexico families. I’ve been fighting for it for more than two decades.

If the issue wasn’t so serious, I would be amused with the Republicans who are trying to divert attention away from their attempts to cut Medicare benefits for our most vulnerable citizens.

As Democrats, we’re not trying to scare senior citizens about losing access to health care and unaffordable prescription drugs – the Republicans have already done that with their draconian ideas for dealing with a deficit that they created under President Bush.

The question now isn’t whether Republican candidates in New Mexico will support these cuts to Medicare. Janice Arnold-Jones and Heather Wilson will do whatever their Republican leaders tell them to do.

The real question is who will stand up to Paul Ryan and John Boehner, and, just as important, who has real solutions that will drown out the Republican rhetoric.

When I debate Janice Arnold-Jones in October, I won’t need political talking points; I will have more than two decades of experience as a fighter for senior citizens and protecting their rights to quality, affordable health care. And I don’t need a congressional campaign to enlighten me about the concerns of the uninsured or the under-insured – I have been to every senior center in the state, doubled the number of school-based health clinics and taken on big pharmaceutical companies.

I know where to look to find and cut bureaucratic waste and invest directly into people. I know that people want guaranteed access to health care, not bogus voucher schemes or loopholes that allow their prescription drugs to be unilaterally taken off the market.

As a result of my experience, I have debated some of the same people who are now waging this assault on Medicare benefits. Click here to watch the video of one of those debates, which was produced by PBS NewsHour in 2008.

We can’t afford to lose sight of the fact that access to quality, affordable health care will always be a priority for New Mexico families. Many of us are one illness, or one accident, away from losing everything. It doesn’t have to be that way.

Lujan Grisham, a Democrat, is a candidate for New Mexico’s 1st Congressional District seat in the U.S. House.