Following up on the Kris Crawford saga, I see from an editorial in the Sun-News that Tracy Edge, as conservative a representative as you’re likely to find, has also been frank about the House’s reasoning for rejecting Medicaid expansion:
Was the vote’s outcome because that was the best decision for the state? Did it make good financial sense? No.
“It was more political than it was financial reality,” said Rep. Tracy Edge of North Myrtle Beach, who voted against the expansion with all of his GOP colleagues…
Edge, a former chairman of the health care subcommittee that oversaw the state’s Medicaid spending, said this week that he doesn’t necessarily oppose the expansion and in fact thinks it would probably be better than the $83 million alternative that Republicans offered – money that would insure no new patients but would pay hospitals to encourage poor residents to get more care at free health care clinics rather than emergency rooms. Both parties agree that that money would be well spent on worthy programs, but that wasn’t really the point, Edge said. Those voting for the money are “spending $83 million just so you can say you’re not doing Obamacare.”…
Let’s see… expand Medicaid, and the federal government picks up the whole tab for three years, and 90 percent of it thereafter.
Or… waste $83 million trying to pay the hospitals to go away and stop agitating for expansion. Just so you can say you’re not doing Obamacare.
Anyone who doesn’t understand the irrational dislike that SC Republicans have for the president would be shocked that the “conservative” party chose the latter course.
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If the federal government got out of the healthcare business, we wouldn’t have this problem.
It’s not a function of the federal government to provide health care to individuals.
Hey they tried their luck in the used car business, the new car business… why not the healthcare business?
Doug’s right. The problem is that the feds tied health coverage to one’s job to begin with. This has allowed enormous cost inflation into the system.
It’s unfair to act like the decision not to expand medicaid was the only political decision being made. The decision TO expand medicaid was a political decision as well, one aimed at shoring up and expanding an enormous Democrat voting bloc.
The feds aren’t really providing the care in most cases (unless you are going to a military doctor, etc). .
However, they do pay for care- and have for decades and decades. Nothing new about that.
Just arguing over the best way to pay for it at this point.
Exactly where do they think all these “free health clinics” are? The ones I know of are limited in time, space, equipment, and personnel.
Friends of mine who goes to the Richland County free health clinic say the line starts forming at 4 am every morning. If you wait until 7 am, it’s too late. It’s a first-come, first-served ticket system, and all the tickets are gone by 7. And then you sit there (sometimes all day) until your ticket is called.
It’s called the value of your time. If your time is cheap (free) you can sit all day at the free health clinic. If your time is valuable, you pay money for a doctor to see you at something close to the scheduled time.
So Doug wants to kill veterans hospitals. No surprise. But except for veterans hospitals, the federal government is not providing health care. They’re providing the means to pay for it without bankrupting the average citizen.
Uh, no, Burl, I don’t want to kill veteran’s hospitals. I don’t want the federal government to be involved in the payment for health care for private citizens at private hospitals and doctor’s offices. If they want to run veterans hospitals for which they do not charge veterans for any services, I am fine with that.
There is no evidence that the existence of Medicare and Medicaid have improved the quality of service or contained health care costs.
Individual states should be allowed to determine the best way to treat their citizens. The one-size-fits-all behemoth of the federal government is the worst solution.
And to be even more clear, the tax dollars that are collected at the federal level and then redistributed back to the states (minus the wasted overhead) would be better left at the state level in the first place.
If Romneycare was the model for Obamacare, why wouldn’t we want 50 states to have the freedom to adopt their own versions that deal with the specific demographics of each state?
Because Doug South Carolina would only do what it has already done. Nothing.
In a way, I am fine with that. Creative destruction applies to states and governments as well. If people don’t want an improved society, then they can have their economic stagnation, poverty, lack of vision, etc. and revel in it. It’s just that I don’t think sitting around bitching and moaning about our (low) taxes and doing everything in our power to restrain our future – like the legislature and the governor – is the course to follow. That’s the easy way out. That’s not being responsible for our (collective) future.
Last, the problem with your first statement above is that SC is a net tax recipient from the Federal government. And anyway, who do you trust more to deliver services the Feds or Harrell/Leatherman?
I trust neither group. Which is why I am for term limits as well.
These GOP, have lost their minds. The little mind that they had….
Coming from someone who’s a faithful follower of Nancy Pelosi that’s funny.
Ad hominem alert.
There you go with that foreign language elitist stuff….
Why does the lady in the picture above have two faces?
If you’re talking about this picture, here was my explanation as to what happened: “The panorama app in this shot of the gathering by Chip Oglesby sort of hiccuped when it got to Beth Baldauf. She’s not really two-faced.”