GOP Candidate Backs Away From Ryan's Medicare Plan

Benjy Sarlin reports for Talking Points Memo that Republican Candidate Jane Corwin has backed away from Rep. Paul Ryan's proposal to remake Medicare as we know it in the New York 26th District Congressional race.

"The Republican vote plus the Tea Party vote will equal a majority," University of Virginia political science professor Larry Sabato told TPM in an e-mail. "On the other hand, this is Jack Kemp's old district, a rock-ribbed Republican one that even went for the rather loony GOP nominee for governor in 2010. So how did a Democrat get in position to potentially win even a split-vote here? The Ryan Medicare proposal is the most obvious answer."

Corwin apparently feels the same way as she's spent her final days before the vote carefully walking back her previous support for the Ryan plan. "It's starting a conversation that we absolutely have to have, but I'm not married to it," she told elderly voters on Sunday, according to Politico. "I certainly would entertain any proposals that would improve any of these programs. ... I've been saying the same thing since Day One."

Brian Beutler reports for TPM that Senator Scott Brown has now publicly criticized the plan after initially backing it.

--Ballard Burgher