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It was a pretty big deal on Tuesday night, at the State of the Union , when President Joe Biden got Republicans to promise they wouldnt cut Medicare or Social Security.

Its not clear how binding that promise is or whether it even means what it sounds like. Republicans have a long history of proposing reforms to Medicare and Social Security that, as my fellow HuffPoster Arthur Delaney noted afterward, are actually benefit reductions of one sort or another.

And at least a few Republicans dont seem to have gotten the memo. During a Thursday radio interview , Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) reiterated his belief that Social Security is a Ponzi scheme and his support for requiring the program to get new authorization every few years a plan that Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.) laid out in plain language last year.

But assume, for the moment, that GOP leaders are true to their word and manage to keep their party away from Medicare and Social Security. Assume, also, that Republicans carry out their threat to block an increase in the federal governments borrowing authority, jeopardizing Americas and maybe the worlds economy, until Democrats agree to major spending cuts.

Given the budget math, that would almost certainly force cuts in another big program: Medicaid .