Who’s confused on entitlements?

Lynn Sweet of the Chicago Sun-Times writes "Palin confused on Social Security, other issues," backed with the following paragraph:

"Sarah Palin, talking about domestic policy with ABC's Charles Gibson in his second day of exclusive access on Friday, seemed confused about entitlement programs -- and unaware that Congress has little say in significantly reducing the costs of Social Security, Medicaid and Medicare. When she seemed to equate these entitlement programs to agencies "where we can find efficiencies in every department" Gibson lectured her that agencies are not involved in entitlements."

Let's repeat part of that paragraph and ask again who is confused: "Congress has little say in significantly reducing the costs of Social Security, Medicaid and Medicare."

Entitlement programs are not imposed on the country by a foreign power, such that we can't change their form and structure any time Congress chooses to do so. Entitlements differ only in terms of having pre-appropriated funds that do not have to be re-approved by Congress each year. But Congress has changed Social Security to reduce costs in several major reforms, and alters Medicare and Medicaid on a far more frequent basis.

It's by acting as if they have no control over entitlements that Congresses and presidents have allowed their problems to grow so large. If nothing else, clearing up this "confusion" would be a big step toward taking responsibility for the future of these programs.