Balloon Juice’s own presidential aspirant, ¡Baud! 2016, reminded me of something I meant to FP yesterday: how red state Republicans have chosen to pay — hugely — for the privilege of denying their fellow Americans access to health care. Let me turn the mic over to Kevin Drum:
In 2015, according to a survey by the Kaiser Foundation, spending by states that refused to expand Medicaid grew by 6.9 percent. That’s pretty close to the historical average. However, spending by states that accepted Medicaid expansion grew by only 3.4 percent.
In other words, the states that have refused the expansion are cutting off their noses to spite their faces. They’re actually willing to shell out money just to demonstrate their implacable hatred of Obamacare. How much money? Well, the expansion-refusing states spent $61 billion of their own money on Medicaid in 2014. If that had grown at 3.4 percent instead of 6.9 percent, they would have saved about $2 billion this year.
Two billion eh? Pocket change! Take it away, Kevin:
The residents of every state pay taxes to fund Obamacare, whether they like it or not. Residents of the states that refuse to expand Medicaid [22 of them — map here] are paying about $50 billion in Obamacare taxes each year, and about $20 billion of that is for Medicaid expansion. Instead of flowing back into their states, this money is going straight to Washington DC, never to be seen again.
So they’re willing to let $20 billion go down a black hole and pay $2 billion extra in order to prevent Obamacare from helping the needy.
Ladles and Jellyspoons! Your modern Republican party! Ready to fork over handsomely to make sure the wrong people suffer.
PS: Let me call out the could-be great state of Texas for vicious derp on a grand scale:
Statewide, Texas hospitals had to eat 5.5 billion dollars in uncompensated care last year. The reason is this – after the Affordable Care Act passed, the amount of money the federal government provides to hospitals for uncompensated care was significantly reduced. It’s cause and effect; if 9 out of 10 Americans have health insurance, the amount of uncompensated care hospitals have to provide goes down. But when the U.S. Supreme Court gave the individual states the option to opt out of part of the Affordable Care Act, then-Texas Governor Rick Perry could not opt out fast enough.
Vote, folks, as if your life depends on it. ’cause it very well may.
Image: Pieter Huys, A surgeon extracting the stone of folly, before 1584.
craigie
And yet they win elections. What’s up with that, voters? Or should I say, non-voters?
Punchy
Just how many leeches, prayer sessions, and “suck it up, pussie” treatments does $5.5 billion account for in Texas?
Anoniminous
Given recent historic evidence of the Democrat’s spine*, I’m sure the GOP thought they could easily repeal the ACA after the 2010 elections and so did not want to expand medical care in the states they controlled and then have to contract it back to pre-ACA.
* as in: the lack, thereof
srv
Here’s another example of how Trump’s wall will save billions – just in alien care alone.
RSA
I remember being online with 1200 baud.
MomSense
I still cannot believe we said no to so much money when our rural hospitals are always struggling and so many of our citizens are struggling to live on poverty wages.
goblue72
I said it before, I’ll say it again. Baud needs more umlaut.
Dork
What’s the conversion rate of $5.5 billion to Ameros?
goblue72
@MomSense: The average citizen didn’t. The rich arseholes who own and run the government did (whether directly or through their puppets).
The rich literally do not care about the rest of us – regardless if they are rich people who are support gay marriage & compost their garbage or not: http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/the_dismal_science/2015/09/income_inequality_rich_democrats_don_t_care_about_the_problem_any_more_than.html
MomSense
Ok, I’m going off topic, but what the fucking fuck Benghazi Committee Republicans? They keep talking about all the things they didn’t have for security–do these numbskulls imagine that some fucking budget money for State Dept. security might have been a good idea???
I would never be able to sit through that mess and try to answer these fucking questions. I’m singing “Mitch better have my money”.
Congress needs to grow up. What a disgrace.
MomSense
@goblue72:
Unfortunately here in Maine we had really high voter turnout. People actually voted for the assholes who denied Medicaid expansion. It was brutal.
jl
Why aren’t we rummaging through Baud’s emails? That’s what I want to know. Something in them will make the scandal of premature death due to Obamacare deadenderism look like peanuts. It has to be true.
Steve in the ATL
@goblue72: in unrelated news, I had a sandwich and gelato at Zingerman’s yesterday. I can see why it’s the toast of Ann Arbor.
agorabum
@Anoniminous: you know, that’s BS. The democratic party, led by Obama, Pelosi, and Reid got the ACA passed over massive opposition and fear mongering. And it is helping poor people. Tragically, voters didn’t turn out in 2010. But that’s not because the Dems failed to do the right thing and we’re cowards
rikyrah
The Cop who murdered Corey Jones DID NOT HAVE A BADGE?
WHAT DA PHUQ?
So, now, some random White person comes up to you at 3 AM on a lonely highway…
and, you’re supposed to believe them…JUST CAUSE THEY’RE WHITE??!?!?!
https://twitter.com/JamilSmith/status/657206280780697600
WaterGirl
@rikyrah: I’m white and female and I sure as hell wouldn’t believe them.
Botsplainer
The legacy of Jean Calvin is deeply imbedded in the psyche of white America.
Paul in KY
@jl: I would imagine various candidate’s oppo teams are combing his BJ posts for dirt!
Aardvark Cheeselog
FTFY. Because “wrong people” in this case would be fine, upstanding, real Americans. Not lazy commie welfare queens, or those shiftless layabouts who are such losers they can only get fake jobs that don’t include insurance and only pay 5 figures a year.
Pogonip
“A surgeon looking for lice.”
patrick II
What people in general and Democrats specifically don’t point out enough is how many people die each year because they don’t have health insurance. Surveys have shown generally that one person out of 1000 will die without health insurance. Another survey done the last six months has shown that the numbers are higher for the people who have been refused expanded Medicaid because the target population is poorer and less healthy than the population in general. Across United States 8 million people are now uninsured who don’t need to be. Approximately 8000 people will die this year because of that.
Here in Virginia there is an especially egregious example of greed and corruption that has allowed 400,000 Virginians to go uninsured. There were enough Democrats in the Virginia Congress to pass Medicaid expansion. One Democrat took a bribe — the bribe being that his daughter would be awarded a judgeship if he retired and took away the Democratic majority. He accepted the deal, his daughter is now a judge, and 400 people in Virginia will die this year so she could have a lifetime tenure judging other people’s crimes when she herself has participated in essentially a mass murderer 400 people. If she appeared before herself in court she would be the worst person that she would ever have put on trial.
I remember when Grayson called the Republicans on their “insurance plan” which called for their constituents to “die quickly.” The Republicans went berserk saying it was impolite to point out the actual consequences of their policy — or lack thereof. Republicans are calling Hillary to heel over the four lives that were lost in Benghazi, while nobody calls them for the thousands of people who are alive now but will not be next year — not because a human error was made in a complicated world but because, for Republicans, the value of profit and political advantage exceeds the value of human life.
waspuppet
I can virtually guarantee you that the GOP voters in red states don’t know that. I’m less sure, though still reasonably confident, that the GOP officials in those states don’t know that.
Stop giving them the fig leaf of “modern.” They’ve been at this for at least 40 years. They haven’t been radicalized as much as they’ve been emboldened in terms of what they think they can get away with.
bemused
@MomSense:
And many hospitals had to close.
Assholes.
Nominus
It’s more evidence of what I have been arguing for years now: not only are these “fiscal conservatives” completely uninterested in saving money, but they are also spectacularly bad at it. Even when they try to save money they fail.
Frankensteinbeck
This has been the entire point of being a Republican since the 80s. Reagan’s genius was making it sound mature and reasonable.
@Anoniminous:
Nobody in power but the Teabaggers could possibly have believed this. The votes to override Obama’s veto weren’t there. It was never possible, and the 2010 elections didn’t change that.
@goblue72:
This is the opposite of true. Medicaid expansion money might help the poor, but it goes into the pockets of the rich. The CoC hated Obamacare, but once it passed they loved Medicaid expansion. The rich lobbeyed for it. The racist crazed average Republican voter made it impossible.
bemused
@waspuppet:
I can guarantee that conservatives in blue/purple states, whether their state expanded Medicare or not, don’t know that either. They don’t bother learning annoying facts they won’t like or believe.
MomSense
@bemused:
When rural hospitals close, it places an even greater burden on poor people because of the cost and time required to travel long distances for care.
gene108
@agorabum:
If you pass a big sweeping law that goes into effect 4 years later, people will assume you are not doing anything for them.
People want what they want and they want it NOW!
Republicans, with their tax cuts get this.
There’s no ramp up period, no time for people to be compliant.
Bush, Jr. basically ran, in 2000, on a platform of vote for me in 2000 and in 2001 you’ll get $300 dollars.
Trying to get people to think long term is hard.
Knowing you’ll get a few extra bucks in your pocket, via tax cuts, is a lot easier to understand than explaining anything based on spending tax revenue for shared prosperity.
***********************************
One other problem with Obamacare is it has minimal impact on most people, who either received health insurance through their employers or through Medicare.
So the majority of the country, on employer coverage, has just seen benefits go down and costs go up for the last four years, since Obamacare has been enacted.
Obamacare maybe helping some people, but it sure is not helping me, I think is a mindset a lot of people have taken about Obamacare, which can easily be morphed into “those people” are getting free stuff on my dime.
Elizabelle
@patrick II: Hear, hear.
The horrible, dreadful, very no good Phillip Puckett. I hope he rots for betraying Virginians and his fellow Democrats. No way his daughter should be on the bench.
WaPost: Puckett’s Senate exit undid McAuliffe’s plan for Medicaid expansion.
People should go to jail for that. It was determined that no criminal charges would be filed, but that may say more for Virginia not having strong ethics laws.
After McDonnell, it still does not, to my knowledge.
gene108
@rikyrah:
I doubt with a name like Nouman Raja, we’re dealing with a white cop. Probably South Asian.
bemused
@MomSense:
Yes! I’m trying to remember if it was a mayor or senator/representative from NC, Republican, who walked to DC with a group to protest this very thing happening in his town or district. I do remember him talking about sad example of a fairly young woman dying from heart failure because the nearest hospital that she could have been brought to in time had to close, iirc.
Roger Moore
@Nominus:
They have redefined fiscal conservatism to mean being in favor of lower taxes rather than in favor of fiscal prudence. Why they’ve been allowed to get away with such a radical redefinition is another question.
MomSense
@bemused:
I remember that. Hospitals are also providers of good jobs and really important to rural economies.
replicnt6
@Steve in the ATL: Yum. Which sandwich did you get?
WaterGirl
@gene108:
That’s true, I guess, if you don’t count the young adults (who are having trouble finding jobs) who get to stay on their parent’s health insurance until they are 27, or anyone with a preexisting condition, or anybody who was really sick and ran up against the lifetime limit and they they were shit out of luck, etc etc etc.
edit: I should have said that I am sorry Obamacare is not helping you.
Kropadope
It’s not just the Medicaid expansion either. Republicans love spending money like lotto winners whenever they’re in power, but can anyone name a single Republican spending priority that has even a tiny return on investment?
MomSense
@gene108:
It added a lot of services to basic Medicare coverage, provides wellness visits, contraception, etc. There are actually a lot of improvements for people who had coverage through Medicare and/or private insurance.
MomSense
Fireworks between Cummings and Gowdy!!
Gene108
@bemused:
It was a mayor from eastern NC
bemused
@MomSense:
Absolutely. I live rural and small town about 6 miles away has a population of about 300 or so. The hospital which has expanded in recent years has a newly remodeled emergency room which is very good as my husband with kidney stones experienced early this year. Helipad. We know when someone is getting airlifted to Duluth because we hear helicopter fly over our home from a larger town 40 miles from us. Clinic and nursing home attached. The dental clinic was connected to hospital but moved to bigger space a couple of blocks away due to their expansion and I just read that 3 more dentists were hired. The pharmacist in town now has his two children, new pharmacist, working with him. That’s a lot of local jobs and economic activity for every other business. This hospital treats patients from a large area in all directions. If the hospital had to close, it would devastate the community and leave people without health care close to home.
bemused
@Gene108:
Thank you. My memory wasn’t too far off.
Gene108
@WaterGirl:
Keeping people on parents insurance is a win for making Obamacare more popular.
If you have employer coverage your pre-existing condition is covered.
@MomSense:
The improvements are not enough to off set a 15% increase in what your employer is charging you or the extra $1000 deductible that got added to your plan.
It has had an impact, but it has not changed the steady push of paying more for less coverage that has been going on for the last 15 years, which is what people tend to notice.
Edit: That is people with employer insurance
Mandalay
@rikyrah:
Indeed. It’s worth noting that the family’s lawyer is revealing information that the police have deliberately concealed. It looks like there is a leaker in the police department (which is great).
And here’s some more WHAT DA PHUQ?:
The Palm Beach Gardens Police Department is happy to employ a cop who concealed that he had stolen morphine?
And the PBGPD also hid this during their press conference:
Same old story. The pigs carefully cherry pick the information they reveal to the public, and conceal anything that is damaging to them.
Roger Moore
@Gene108:
Which has fuck all to do with Obamacare. Insurance rates have been going up like crazy for decades, and their rate of increase has actually slowed dramatically since Obamacare was instituted.
Frankensteinbeck
@Roger Moore:
Close. They have redefined ‘fiscal conservatism’ to mean ‘everything is wrong because the government is wasting the vast majority of our tax money helping Others who don’t deserve it.’ Lowering taxes on the rich fits entirely within that definition, since that adds more pressure towards cutting social services and the safety net (which is the first thing they always propose).
As for how they got away with that redefinition, well, half the country agrees with it and that includes the rich, ‘my best friend is black’ racist media.
bemused
I don’t think it’s hyperbolic to say that Republicans enjoy being cruel such as denying people healthcare coverage but I’m watching off and on the hearing today and it’s obviously going on there too. They are practically drooling that they have free rein to bully to their heart’s content. Those 40 Freedom caucus guys may have firm ideological beliefs but I can’t help but think that a huge bonus for them is that they get to push people around, make them suffer and let their asshole flags fly. Very sick, ugly people.
Matt McIrvin
When I tell Republicans that states are turning down free money and hurting their own populations by refusing to expand Medicaid, they tell me that it’s all a trap, and the federal government is obviously going to yank the 90 percent subsidies and leave the states on the hook for a colossal bill. They just know it, because that’s what the government does.
Well, maybe it’s another one of those things where as soon as a Republican President gets in they’ll make it the truth.
tybee
@RSA:
110 baud (acoustically coupled)
NonyNony
@Mandalay:
From your second link:
Oh yeah – it’s 3am and a guy in a plain white van with tinted windows pulls up behind my disabled car and gets out. I’m sure that guy is a plainclothes detective.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
Conservatives want to feel superior to other people, and they’re willing to pay good money out of their own pockets in order to feel that way. It makes no sense to me, but they really do seem to think it’s somehow a sign of virtue to be willing and able to spend thousands of dollars just on themselves rather than paying hundreds of dollars (at most) in taxes in order to cover everyone, including themselves and their families.
So much for “fiscal responsibility.”
dedc79
Speaking of paying to be cruel: Airbnb takes down controversial ads after offending San Francisco residents
bemused
@Matt McIrvin:
@Mnemosyne (iPhone):
And it’s a lot easier to push down any bit of conscience lurking if you demonize the groups you disagree with or resent and convince yourself that anyone trying to show you the facts is just plain lying or brainwashed.
Patricia Kayden
@rikyrah: And that random White person will get away with taking your life if you’re the wrong color. This is the U.S.A. in 2015. David Duke and his ilk should be proud of what America has become.
Steve in the ATL
@replicnt6: number 7, ménage a turkey. Grilled onions and one of their own cheeses. Damn good. Chased by three scoops of dark chocolate gelato.
Today I’m in the GM Renaissance Center, which is fun because I get to a sneak preview of all the cars that will be recalled next year.
Patricia Kayden
@patrick II: I thought Governor McAuliffe was able to do something about expanding Obamacare in Virginia. Sad to hear that I’m wrong.
srv
Rubio says 9/11 was Clinton’s fault:
I guess the play for all those Brink’s trucks has started.
Paul in KY
@NonyNony: No door handles on inside of van either…obviously a cop.
RSA
@tybee:
I hear you. With one of those funny-looking double receptacles that wouldn’t work for 99% of phones in use today, probably.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@rikyrah:
Seriously, the story just gets worse and worse the more that comes out. But the killer is a cop, so he must be protected from the consequences of his actions at all costs.
And as I said from the beginning, if my car breaks down at 3 am and some guy in street clothes drives up in an unmarked car and claims he’s a cop, I’m going to be prepared to defend myself.
dr. bloor
Hard to believe after all these centuries, no one has actually done a painting titled “Fucking morons going about their business.”
Roger Moore
@Patricia Kayden:
More like what America has remained. I don’t know if there was ever a time where whites couldn’t kill blacks in “self defense”.
Patricia Kayden
@Mnemosyne (iPhone): And on top of that, the killer doesn’t even show his badge. Just some random dude coming up on you at 3 am. Sigh.
Mandalay
@NonyNony:
It’s even worse than that:
An unmarked van with tinted windows parks perpendicular in front of you at 3 a.m. Even if you were James Bond you’d be shitting you pants.
But wait! There’s more:
Somehow the police forgot to mention that during their press conference. What could and should have happened (and does happen all the time) is that a marked police car pulled up to offer assistance.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@Patricia Kayden:
In any other job, if you broke as many rules as this guy did and then proceeded to kill someone, you’d be out on your ass. But, no, he’s a cop, so he must keep his job at all costs no matter how many times he fucks up.
Juju
@NonyNony: he also pulled the van at an angle in front of the car. If I had been alone in my car at the side of the road at 3:00 am, I would have been terrified just by that action.
I’ve seen pictures of the officer involved. I would have identified him as white.
scav
@Mnemosyne (iPhone): Apparently, and the official position must be that this is anexample of acceptable, if not exemplary policing, which should be non-controversial in their (the police) lights, accomplished by a non-controversial perfectly qualified officer of the law. This is apparently the book they are abiding by.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@scav:
It really seems like we’re going backwards on this in a lot of ways. When Tyeshia Miller was killed by 4 Riverside cops back in 1998 (she was asleep or convulsing in a locked car with a gun on her lap, seemed to aim it at the police when they tried to get into the car, and they shot her), I distinctly remember that the police chief said in a press conference that the cops had screwed up. They were fired and eventually got back pay via a lawsuit, but were not reinstated.
These days, there would probably be a stonewall like this one with no firings at all.
Paul in KY
@Juju: I’ll bet you the cop’s defense will say that it was that type of parking that should have informed the victim that he was a cop. cause only cops ever pull in front of you that way, dontcha know.
Enhanced Voting Techiniques
@srv:
what a Rhino; every TRUE Republican(tm) knows 911 is Jimmy Carter’s fault.
Mandalay
@scav:
The police actually fired Michael Slager shortly after he was caught on video executing a fleeing suspect, but there is no damning video in this case so the police are not going to roll over, and will back their man for now.
But regardless of the legal outcome it seems unlikely that Raja will remain a cop. I don’t see how they can keep him on the job after he deserted his post, and failed to show his badge; those failings directly contributed to the death of Corey Jones. And I suspect that most cops who worked with Raja are far angrier about what he did than any of us.
germy shoemangler
@Mnemosyne (iPhone):
Well, they’ve got a good union.
les
@Gene108:
Bitch about your employer, not ACA. Cost increases for all insurance are rising more slowly post-ACA than pre. Required coverage under all insurance are greater. Permitted admin costs under all insurance is capped and lower. If your costs are going up more than average, check your CEO comp numbers.
NonyNony
@Mandalay:
Jeebus. This story gets worse with every fact that comes out.
The story you linked to with the leaked cop’s report summarized said that Jones pulled his gun when the guy identified himself as a cop – but the cop didn’t show a badge, wasn’t in uniform and wasn’t in his police car. Frankly I find it more likely based on his obviously stellar training that the cop didn’t realize that Jones had a gun until he’d gotten close enough to see it, and then panicked and shot him.
You’d think the concealed carry nuts would be all over this – pointing a gun at a plainclothes police officer who presents no id is an excuse for said officer to shoot you? What’s the point of having your weapon on hand if you can’t actually use it as a deterrent against shady characters because the guy you’re pointing it at is actually a cop in disguise? (Except I know the answer to that one, and it happens to be related to skin color.)
NonyNony
@germy shoemangler:
I don’t know how good their unions actually are – it doesn’t seem like Management ever even tries to fire anyone. You don’t have to have a very good union to protect your job when your bosses aren’t even interested in firing you for your incompetence.
goblue72
@Steve in the ATL: I do miss Zingerman’s. I lived off-campus about a block away.
I do NOT miss the winters.
nominus
Ah yes – speaking of redefining conservatism and killing minorities with impunity, read through some of the earliest activity of https://twitter.com/search?q=%23WhenAmericaWasGreat&src=tyah ; open, unapologetic racism and chauvinism mixed with a pinch of historical and economic ignorance. It pretty much proves that the material in this thread is a a feature, not a bug. 100% intentional.
goblue72
@Frankensteinbeck: Healthcare COMPANIES supported it (and rich people whose riches derived from healthcare, like healthcare CEOs)
“Average” billionaires (and multi-millionaires) not so much.
Monala
@gene108:
Is this the case for the majority on employer coverage? I saw the opposite with my employer coverage, although they enacted limits on use of out-of network providers. Otherwise, benefits went up for me and costs went down. My husband started out getting insurance on the Exchanges, then got a new job with health insurance, and the following year, his benefits went up and costs went down, too. Plus, I’ve read stories about people being issued reimbursement checks because their insurer didn’t meet that 80% spending on actual care rate.
Monala
@Gene108:
Prior to the ACA, this was only true if you developed your pre-existing condition while covered by your employer. If you had the pre-existing condition already and then got a new job, the employer-based insurance could still deny you coverage for that condition (but not for your other healthcare needs). In other words, we’ll cover you for the ankle you just sprained, but not for the diabetes you had before you were employed here.
Mandalay
@NonyNony:
But wait! There’s more:
Strange that the Chief of Police didn’t mention at his press conference that the deceased was fleeing when the cop was shooting him. It must have slipped his mind.
If only someone had recorded this clusterfuck that cop would now be ex-cop, and charged with murder. And yet he’ll probably walk, with just a slap on the wrists for not showing his badge before he executed Corey Jones.
Mike G
@Aardvark Cheeselog:
Republicans:
We won’t make your life better, but we’ll make someone else’s life worse and let you watch.