"But you're different. You have the title of 'Savior of the Rust Belt' and the support of the Unions. If you were to say you could propose a plan to delay the legal retirement age by two years..."
"That means tens of millions of seniors would work for two more years and pay insurance premiums for two more years. During that time, they would continue to use lucrative commercial health insurance instead of switching to the government's federal medical insurance."
"For the pharmaceutical giants and insurance companies, those two years represent an extra market worth hundreds of billions of US Dollars."
"Use that to trade for cheaper medicine for Pennsylvania."
Leo took a deep breath.
This was too ruthless.
This was selling out the retirements of workers across All of America in exchange for Pennsylvania's immediate survival.
"This will destroy my reputation. What will the voters who see me as a savior think? I'll be pilloried."
"Leo, don't forget what you yourself said before."
