(CNN) -- "Keep the government's hands off my Medicare." Those words -- quoted by so many TV talking heads -- never seem actually to have been spoken by anyone. It's like that poodle in the microwave story: Everybody has a neighbor who heard it from his cousin.



The town hallers were angry, but they were not crazy, and they were not stupid. They knew perfectly well that Medicare is provided by the government. They also knew that their government is proposing to change Medicare in ways they do not like.



The health care reform plans backed by President Obama would cut hundreds of billions out of the the growth of Medicare spending over the next 10 years. More ominous for seniors than the dollar figure is the plan behind the number.



The president wants to reduce spending on Medicare Advantage, the privately run plans that offer seniors a better deal than conventional Medicare. Over the longer term, the president aspires to shift Medicare patients to teams of health care providers paid by the year, instead of individual doctors charging fees for each particular service -- rather than by the particular medical service they perform.



Meet new CNN contributor David Frum



The changes the president has in mind won't kill Grandma. But they will change medicine in ways Grandma may find uncomfortable. Ten years from now, Grandma probably won't have a personal doctor. Her Medicare will cover less -- and cost more.



Medicare was under pressure even before the election of Obama. The gap between the future revenues and future obligations of Medicare and Social Security is estimated by the Social Security trustees at some $45 trillion. How much is that? Adjusting for inflation, it's the cost of fighting World War II -- 10 times.



Medicare is the single biggest spending commitment of the United States. As Obama stacks enormous new health care spending commitments atop the old, Medicare's already bleak future grows dimmer still.



Who wins as Medicare loses?



The short answer is: the uninsured. The president will use the money squeezed from Medicare to extend some form of coverage to the 35 million to 40 million people estimated to lack health insurance. And who are these people?



About one-quarter of them are foreign-born. Recent immigrants to the United States -- unlike the immigrations who arrived between World War II and 1970 -- have tended to be very low-skilled. Their labor is just not worth enough to their employers to support the high cost of an American health insurance plan: $13,000 a year, on average, for a family of four.



So here's how the world looks to a Medicare enrollee:



Over the opposition of some 80 percent of the American people, your government allowed millions of poor newcomers to enter the country, many of them illegally. (Over the past 10 years, half of all immigrants to the United States have arrived illegally.)



These people cut the lawns of your more affluent neighbors, tended their babies, cleared their tables after their restaurant meals.



If you were not so affluent, they reduced your wages and crowded your schools, highways and hospital emergency rooms.



Now you are being told that your old age will be made less comfortable to accommodate them. Unsurprisingly, you don't like it.



The debate about immigration and health care has centered on whether immigrants who are here illegally might qualify for coverage under the Democrats' reforms. Theoretically, they will not be eligible, but since Democrats have so far voted against enforcement measures, some illegal immigrants will no doubt slip through.



But the debate over illegal immigrants is a proxy for something larger and more unsettling to older Americans. The problem is not illegal immigration, it is all low-skilled immigration, legal and illegal. By importing tens of millions of people who earn too little to pay for their own health insurance, we have made this supremely difficult social problem radically more difficult than it ever needed to be. With "Obamacare," the bill for four decades of permissive immigration has at last come due.



Since the 1930s, the United States has run two different kinds of government
who is barack obama? Who will the changes benefit? What does Frum say Town hallers don't like? What is Frum's opinion regarding Obama's plan?
President the uninsured. government is proposing to change Medicare in ways they do not The president wants to reduce spending on Medicare Advantage, the privately run
question: who is barack obama?, answer: President | question: Who will the changes benefit?, answer: the uninsured. | question: What does Frum say Town hallers don't like?, answer: government is proposing to change Medicare in ways they do not | question: What is Frum's opinion regarding Obama's plan?, answer: The president wants to reduce spending on Medicare Advantage, the privately run