President Obama said at his speech today in Ohio:

"There is no cutting of your guaranteed Medicare benefits, period. No ifs, ands or buts. This proposal makes Medicare stronger, it makes the coverage better, and it makes the finances more secure. And anybody who says otherwise is either misinformed or they're trying to misinform you. Don't let them hoodwink you."

Others would disagree. According to the head of the Congressional Budget Office:

"CBO expects that Medicare spending under the legislation would increase at an average annual rate of roughly 6 percent during the next two decades--well below the roughly 8 percent annual growth rate of the past two decades (excluding the effect of establishing the Medicare prescription drug benefit). Adjusting for inflation, Medicare spending per beneficiary under the legislation would increase at an average annual rate of less than 2 percent during the next two decades--about half of the roughly 4 percent annual growth rate of the past two decades. It is unclear whether such a reduction in the growth rate could be achieved, and if so, whether it would be accomplished through greater efficiencies in the delivery of health care or would reduce access to care or diminish the quality of care."

As Bill Kristol wrote in December:

CBO is explaining that the legislation's claim to fiscal responsibility requires cutting in half the rate of growth of per capita Medicare spending. And, according to CBO, absent magical greater efficiencies in the delivery of health care, accomplishing those fiscal goals might well require reducing access to health care and/or diminishing the quality of health care. So less access and lower quality is a very real possible consequence of this legislation. This is a point critics of the bill cannot allow to be lost in all the hubbub.

Paul Ryan (R-Wisc.) recently explained that Obamacare, unlike his free-market plan, would "deeply and systematically ration health care."

Michael Capuano (D-Mass.) wrote in a letter last week that the Independent Medicare Advisory Council would "undermine the quality of care we provide to our own citizens and slow progress in biomedical sciences globally."

Did I mention this death panel is unrepealable?