Alaska Gov. Sean Parnell on Thursday refused to expand Medicaid in Alaska under the federal health care law, a move that comes in opposition to leading business organizations that supported the expansion and studies showing substantial economic benefits of providing Medicaid for some 40,000 uninsured Alaskans.
The move puts Alaska alongside some 20 other states that refused to expand Medicaid eligibility, as Republican governors try to thwart Obama and a law they say will financially burden their states while expanding one of the country's largest entitlement programs.
Before the press conference began, state employees handed out copies of a previously secret state-commissioned report by the Lewin Group about expanding Medicaid. The report had been the target of public records requests from Alaska Dispatch and other media outlets, but it was kept under wraps during deliberations by Parnell administration officials.
Supporters of Medicaid expansion, including the Anchorage and state chambers of commerce, said an expansion would boost the economy because the federal government has said it would foot no less than 90 percent of the bill. Both chambers suggested the state re-evaluate its position if federal funding ever falls below 90 percent.
But Parnell said he fears the state will one day be left paying for much of the expansion. He said he could not commit the state to expanding the debacle that has been Obamacare -- with its oft-changing requirements and fumbled roll-out. The federal funds that would come with the expansion are enticing, he said, but the increased federal debt will come with huge costs for future generations that he could not accept. He called for the creation of a task force and further study so Alaska can assess the gaps in its health care system to ensure that the very poor have the access they need.
If Parnell had expanded eligibility, it would have covered tens of thousands of Alaskans who fell through the cracks of the health care law that initially required states, with significant federal funding, to expand Medicaid so that those earning up to 138 percent of the poverty level are included. However, the Supreme Court in 2012 ruled that states could opt out of the expansion.
Uninsured Alaskans making less than $19,803 or $40,627 for a family four would have been eligible. That includes single people and married people without children who weren't previously covered.
Fuck Parnell!
He does not care one little bit about what the expansion may cost someday, or the Alaskans it would cover today.
He only cares about pleasing his corporate masters. and making the woman who handed him his job on a silver platter happy.
I had the radio on in the car (NPR, Q?) and just heard a couple of dignified Canadian journalists crack up when another said of Toronto mayor Rob Ford, "He's like Sarah Palin's entire family rolled into one without a media handler in sight." I laughed for an entire block.
ReplyDeleteThis goes hand in hand with something I heard on The Ed Show this afternoon. "If ignorance were hair she'd be a Wookie" ~ John Fugelsang speaking of Sarah Palin
Delete:-)
Parnell, Sarah's Ho.
ReplyDeleteHey, TAWD has a bevy he manages. She might as well also too, right, $arah?
DeleteChrist in Christmas! You BETCHA!
This is the definition of insanity. What should happen is we throw out the whole act and go for universal or single payer and at that point the insurance companies would be gone, people everyone would pay for healthcare and the middleman expense would be gone.
ReplyDeleteWhat ACA is meant to do was slowly get rid of the for-profit healthcare groups and insurance middlemen who don't have a vested interest in actual medical facilities. Those are the guys funding the kill ObamaCare movement
DeleteI agree that the for profit middle men hurt our system because the CEOs of insurance companies are working for their shareholders rather than the people who buy their policies.
DeleteSince the ACA was modeled after a plan designed by the right wing Heritage Foundation (back when the GOP actually saw increasing number of uninsured as a problem to be fixed),I think it was designed as an alternative to single payer so as not to eliminate private insurers.
These people are evil, disgusting and un-human. They don't want people to get health care or subsidized housing or justice or civil rights. They make it uncomfortable for people who have disabilities to live here, even when they caused the disability. Scum, scum, scum.
ReplyDeleteso does this mean we in AK can't apply for ACA ?
ReplyDeleteNo, it doesn't. But if Parnell had his way, that's what it would mean. After all, he, Mead Treadwell, and Dan Sullivan II have had years of government-subsidized health insurance.
DeleteIt's only poor people who shouldn't get government help.
Here in Tennessee where our governor did not accept the Medicaid expansion we get to tell poor people who show up for our ACA events that they have been left out.
DeleteDon Young's name for him is perfect - "Captain Zero"!!!
DeleteParnell is a small person and faux Christian.
ReplyDeleteI wish someone had asked him, "What would Jesus do?"
Going once...going twice...SOLD! To the man with the oily hands!
ReplyDeleteThe B.
Why anyone voted for this jerk is beyond me and why anyone would vote to reelect him needs to have their head(s) examined.
ReplyDeleteA typical asshole Republican!!!!
On a side and happy note, I had the chance to be part of this today:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/15/batkid-san-francisco_n_4283772.html
Love this beautiful city and loving citizens.
This review nails it!!
ReplyDeletehttp://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/11/16/sarah-palin-serves-up-a-healthy-serving-of-venom-in-her-christmas-book.html
The whole Sarah Palin rant on anything is old hat. It's just repacakaged John Birch Society crap with a new spokesperson. That's what this whole book tour is about (do you actually think any publisher thinks he can profit on a book from her about the war on Christmas?). Somebody (think Koch) promised to buy a certain amount of books to have her tour and blather John Birch Society stuff to help make the JBS viewpoint more mainstream. That's what she has been doing for the past couple years.
ReplyDeleteWhen she was Gov before the VP nom she was fairly progressive and outspoken. Guys, she's been bought off. She's exceptionally dumb, but at one point she was sorta pointed in the right direction.
The right direction? In that case, I'll gladly stay here on the wrong side of the tracks
DeleteHow exactly was she progressive?
DeleteWell, for one thing, she pushed through ACES and AGIA, with the help of the Ds, but Ol' Captain Zero erased all that.
ReplyDeleteNow he's selling the State back to the oil companies.
I have asked before, what do you get when you put an oil company executive in the Governor's Mansion?
Just that, and not much more.
The B.
Another republican governor stands up
ReplyDeleteand proudly says no to Obamacare
I've got an idea....let's vote out all those hard-hearted repubs. They've had their party now they need to get lost. We are sick of them.
ReplyDelete