Congratulations, you lucky 50,000 winners!

I just can't express what a brilliant way this is to run Medicare. It's almost like the reality show of administration policy. Why care about who needs the drugs the most! Hey, the wheel of fortune has already given you cancer, you're due for a change of luck, right?

I just love this quote:

The program will mirror the 2006 drug benefit, meaning that there will be a gap in coverage — known as a doughnut hole — in which patients will bear the entire cost of the medicines. People still will have to spend about $5,300 a year for Gleevec, but that represents nearly 90 percent off the annual average wholesale price of $45,952, Medicare said.


"Only a cynical pessimist can look at a doughnut and complain about the hole," Thompson said.

If you happen to be poor, or even lower middle class, and you grumble about having to pay $5,300 a year, why, you're just a cynical pessimist. It's only $450 a month!