State Opposition to Federal Healthcare Reform
By Randall Holcombe • Friday November 20, 2009 1:39 PM PDT • 6 Comments
I’ve wondered why state governors and legislators haven’t been more vocal opponents of the healthcare reforms being drawn up in Washington. All these proposals would put huge financial burdens on the states.
I haven’t seen much in the news until this article appeared, reporting that two Florida state senators are proposing that the state examine dropping out of the Medicaid program (which is jointly funded by the federal and state governments) and starting a state-only program to replace it.
The story appeared in the Lakeland Ledger and as far as I know hasn’t been picked up by other papers. Perhaps it will be in the next few days.
I’d like to see the story get lots of publicity, and I’d like to see state legislators in other states jumping on this bandwagon. (OK, it’s not a bandwagon yet, but it could become one.) I’m amazed that with Congress trying to place such a huge financial burden on state governments in their proposed healthcare reforms there hasn’t been more vocal resistance by state governments.
Congress is telling the states, “We’re going to design a healthcare reform, but we’re going to make you pay a substantial amount of the cost.” Are state legislatures really so passive that they are content to let people in Washington dictate how a big chunk of their revenues will be spent?
Tags: Budget and Tax Policy, Healthcare, The State 
Tennessee’s Governor, Phil Bredesen (Dem) has been very vocal about the disasterous impact this will have on our state budget. And we, like most other states are hanging on by our fingertips as it is – it will literally break us.
http://taxingtennessee.blogspot.com/2009/11/gov-phil-says-every-member-of-congress.html
RickC | Nov 20, 2009 | Reply
Thanks for that comment, Rick. I live in Florida and have heard nothing about Governor Bredesen’s objections. I can’t claim to be that much of a news junkie, so maybe it’s been reported somewhere outside of Tennessee and I’ve missed it, or maybe the media considers it Tennessee news not of interest to people in other states. Or, maybe the media is just not that inclined to report on elected officials outside of Washington who oppose the reforms. I’d love to see more publicity given to these objectors.
Randall Holcombe | Nov 20, 2009 | Reply
Randy:
State legislatures have no political sway in Washington. Perhaps it was a bad idea to change the Constitution to have Senators elected by direct vote?
As we saw with the passage of the bill in the House, Obama and his Congressional allies will buy off the representatives of those states it needs—as it did Congressman Cao from Louisiana to get 1 Republican vote by offsetting Louisiana’s higher medicare costs (a concession Senator Reid will also take home to Nevada). As for the rest of the states: who needs our consent?
Thanks for the post!
Mary
Mary Theroux | Nov 20, 2009 | Reply
With the recent protests of skyrocketing tuition at UCLA for in-state students, this post strikes me as a very timely one.
How much of these problems is due to the fact that the states can no longer subsidize their colleges to the degree that they have in the past, due to rising obligations in other areas such as medicare? Universities grow accustomed to the state subsidies, and then when the funds dry up, they shift the burden back to the hapless students and their families.
D. Saul Weiner | Nov 21, 2009 | Reply
Recession is making everyone selfish. Maybe this is one of the reasons this is happening. There are rising obligations. Congress is telling the states that they are going to design a healthcare reform, but gonna make them pay a substantial amount of the cost.
r4i kort | Nov 23, 2009 | Reply
States have been afraid to stand up for their rights since the disastrous results in 1861-1865, Now we take whatever the boys on the Potomac jam at us. Seriously, who would have imagined 100 years ago that we would allow the feds to come into the state and tax gas so that they can take the money and hold it up and make us dance like trained monkeys to get some of it back to pave our roads? The code for state representitives is: “go along and get the grease, fight us and get squashed”
As for The current misnamed “Health Care” bill (it’s an Insurance bill – period), the final version that we will get will be a mirror of the “Fix” that we got for our “retirement crisis” 70 years ago. We’ll have to pay the government for health insurance – at the point of a gun (as we now do with SSI), and we will have to buy our own private health insurance on the side if we actually want to be covered (as we now do with 401ks and IRAs).
That said, the sooner that they pass this boondoggle the sooner we can get on with the hyperinflation, the sooner the dollar can crash, the sooner we can replace it with the Amero, the sooner that can fail, the sooner we can revolt, the sooner we can reestablish liberty, the sooner the new government can start to grow too large – wash – rinse – repeat.
It’s too late to turn the ship around, it needs to be sunk, we hop on the life boats, get picked up by a boat headed in the same wrong direction, and once on shore build a better boat and sail back to freedom.
Sad, but that’s the way mankind has done it since time immemorial, and that’s how we’ll have to do it here, at least we won’t have to deal with the burden being a super-power anymore...
joe4liberty | Nov 25, 2009 | Reply