Where “this” would be Medicaid Expansion here in NH (or as Steve points out, a step to “a single-payer system.”). Here’s what current Manchester Mayor Ted Gatsas said at the Windham GOP Gubernatorial Debate (emphasis mine, reformatted):
However, the candidates differed on a few key issues, including whether to continue Medicaid expansion and whether they support abortion rights.
Those differences emerged at the beginning of the debate, when all candidates were asked whether they would sign a pledge from outside group Americans For Prosperity to cut taxes and regulations and oppose the Affordable Care Act and Medicaid expansion. While Forrester and Edelblut said they would have no problem signing the pledge, Gatsas and Sununu were more hesitant, especially when it came to health care issues.
“Hesitant” – sometimes a code word used to describe Republican that KNOW what the right thing to do is (in terms of living up to the Conservative ideals of less taxes and smaller government) and KNOW that if they were completely truthful, they’d lose in a heartbeat (because they DON’T want to do the right thing – they just want to get elected). So what did Gatsas say? Obfuscation:
“I believe as a state, when you talk about getting rid of Obamacare, you’ve got to have a solution to the problem because 46,000 people will be going to the emergency rooms again and all of us are going to be paying for the increase in health insurance,” Gatsas said. “So let’s be rational in how we talk about things.”
Yes, let’s be rational. No matter what the circumstances are, Ted, Government has made us ALL responsible for those that can’t or won’t pay (and make no mistake, there are those that deliberately game the system and have no problem in living off the hard work of others). It started with the Progressive push that ALL good things could only come from Government starting with Wilson, sped up by FDR, continued to be gassed up by Republicans, shifted upgear by LBJ, shoved from behind by Nixon, and now into overdrive by Obama. Ordinary people within Civil Society with charitable intentions were crowded out every which way with new laws, new regulations, and an almost bottomless pit of taxpayer money to use.
Also, make no mistake – Republicans have campaigned against this growth in government in the past but haven’t kept their promises when it was time for action – here is Republican Gatsas giving his blessing and head nod assent to the growth of Government. Here, he adopts the Democrat mantra of “How DARE you take stuff away from people” (even as it was Republicans Chuck Morse, Jeb Bradley, Nancy Stiles, Jeanie Forrester, et al voting to implement Obamacare here in NH reGARDLESS of the lame rebranding they tried (a skunk is still a skunk even if you call out “here kitty, kitty”)).
So how is Ted trying to pull the wool over our eyes? Easy to pop his balloon. With ETLAMA, Government law made it mandatory for hospitals to take all comers, no matter the cost. And when something is free, people not only want some, they want a LOT of it. After all, it was someone else’s money they were consuming with Government watching to make sure the hospitals were spending it. And costs went up astronomically (go look how many hospitals illegal aliens and deadbeats put out of business in CA). And people started to notice their hospitals charging more to make up for the Government mandated costs.
And that’s what Ted is warning against – well, just the financial cost borne by the paying users of that hospital (spread among the insurance companies who had to pay more because Government was forcing hospitals to give away money on one hand and needing to use the other to grab other peoples’ money). BECAUSE GOVERNMENT CAUSED IT!
These same Smart People said “Government must DO something” (but never being truthful that Government caused the problem in the first place), because healthcare costs went up so high, they affected ALREADY PAYING customers either directly or through increased premiums and deductibles.
So here comes along Ted, riling against that system (whose increased cost was due to Government) saying, what, you want to go back to that?
HEY, SMART DUDE, Ted Gatsas, ARE YOU TRYING TO TELL ME THAT THE COMBINATION OF HIGHER TAXES TO PAY FOR OBAMACARE’S MEDICAID EXPANSION and even HIGHER PREMIUMS and deductibles is CHEAPER? That sticking with this is going to make Government smaller (it hasn’t as it has increased the size and cost of the bureaucracy)?
No, it isn’t.
What Ted Gatsas want us to believe that the current way relieves us of paying for it (“all of us are going to be paying for the increase in health insurance“) but like all the other people that won’t mention Government’s role in jacking up prices, ALL OF US ARE NOW PAYING MORE IN TAXES.
EITHER way, you and I pay. The only question is, who is making us pay (and again, you and I WILL pay)? Is it better the private sector way where we can have some choices that we can make? Or by Government that decides for us with a one size fits all solution (because that’s what Government is good at – punishing us all, all at the same time. Shared misery (gosh, that describes Socialism, doesn’t it?)).
Whether we all are paying more in our insurance payments for the freeloaders or pay [even] more in combined taxes and higher insurance payments, it’s still the same – we all pay no matter what. Either way, Government is making us pay.
Gatsas seems dandy with the philosophy, like the Democrats, that Government should continue to make our healthcare decisions for us. He’s for the status quo – how is that upholding the Republican promises of delivering smaller and less intrusive Government?
It isn’t. Gatsas doesn’t care – he only cares that you think he does. Remember, his words, not mine. I’m only commenting on them.
Is that what Republicans do? Certainly seems and feels that way, lately, here in NH and crammed down our throats by NH GOP elected politicians.
Government decides – and we all just lump it. NH GOP Platform? Promises made to voters?
So how is Gatsas, on this issue, any different than Democrats? He’s not and is giving Democrats cover with their end goal of taking our choices away – completely.
