Medicaid After the Supreme Court Decision

Last week there were two disturbing reports about Medicaid, a program of health insurance for the poor that is mostly managed by the states and jointly paid for by the federal and state governments. The Congressional Budget Office predicted that states with a large number of poor people would not expand their Medicaid programs as required by the health care reform law now that the Supreme Court had made expansion optional. And a Harvard study unrelated to the court decision made it clear that a failure to expand Medicaid would likely doom thousands of low-income people to death or poor health.

Revising earlier estimates to take account of the decision, the budget office said that making expanded assistance optional could leave three million more people uninsured in 2022, saving the federal government $84 billion through 2022 because it would not have to subsidize their coverage.

The analysts made no effort to predict which states would or would not expand Medicaid. Instead, they looked at various factors that might influence the states’ decisions and predicted that some would not respond to even the extremely generous matching money that the reform law provided.

They forecast that some states that already had trouble paying for their existing Medicaid programs would put off expanding Medicaid until their economies improved, or would expand the program partially, not to the extent originally required. Other states may shun the program entirely, as some Republican governors have vowed to do. By 2022, the budget office projects, only two-thirds of those who would become newly eligible for Medicaid if all states expanded to the levels sought by the reform law will actually gain eligibility. One-third will not, either because their states refuse to expand Medicaid at all or expand it only partially.

Leaving low-income people uninsured will almost certainly damage their health. A study by three researchers affiliated with the Harvard School of Public Health, published by The New England Journal of Medicine, compared three states (New York, Arizona and Maine) that had already expanded coverage of childless or disabled adults with four neighboring states (Pennsylvania, New Mexico, Nevada and New Hampshire) that had not. Deaths among people ages 20 to 64 dropped in the three expansion states by about 1,500 a year, adjusted for population growth, whereas death rates in the comparison states went up. Expansion also brought a 21 percent reduction in cost-related delays in getting care.

Some critics, mostly conservative Republicans, contend that Medicaid does not improve the health of beneficiaries and may even harm them. The new study should lay that canard to rest. State officials who want to save money by not expanding Medicaid will be harming their most vulnerable residents, and will most likely shift the cost of any emergency care they need to safety net institutions, taxpayers and charities.

View the original article here

GOP senators bash Holder’s decision to give civilian trial to Somali terrorist (Daily Caller)

Several Republican senators have signed a letter to Attorney General Eric Holder ripping him for transferring a Somali-based terrorist to the United States for a civilian trial, The Daily Caller has learned.

U.S. officials transferred Somali terror suspect Ahmed Abdulkadir Warsame from a Navy ship, where he was detained for the past couple of months for interrogation, to New York.

The Obama administration did not announce Warsame’s capture before transferring him to New York, where he’s now been indicted on federal charges. If they did announce Warsame’s capture before his transfer, congressional Republicans may have had an opportunity to publicly object to Holder’s decision.

In their letter to Holder objecting to the decision to give Warsame a civilian trial, the GOP senators say Warsame was an “unlawful combatant” who “wore no uniform and fought for no country. But, they say Warsame “is not an American citizen and was not captured on American soil.”

“Mr. Warsame should have been detained outside the United States and, if necessary, tried by military commission,” the GOP senators wrote.

Illinois Republican Sen. Mark Kirk authored the letter. (Elizabeth Warren snubbed Oversight hearing for Vanity Fair interview, internal meetings)

Signing senators, including Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, wrote that Holder’s decision goes against legal precedents and grants a terrorist Constitutional rights that, normally, only American citizens enjoy.

“Your decision to grant this terrorist full U.S. Constitutional rights and to try him in a civilian court on American soil reverses U.S. policy and legal precedent, and adds unnecessary costs and risks to local governments and populations,” they wrote. “Under your decision, Mr. Warsame will be prosecuted as a civilian with considerable expense and time diverted from U.S. criminal cases. His prosecution will trigger more Jihadist attention to the city and court where the prosecution will take place.”

At the time TheDC obtained a copy of the letter and confirmation that it will be sent, 39 of the 47 Senate Republicans had signed it. The letter is still in circulation, so more Republicans may sign it.

Read more stories from The Daily Caller

Gwyneth Paltrow poses topless for Vanity Fair UK

GOP senators bash Holder’s decision to give civilian trial to Somali terrorist

Obama recognizes mistakes in Twitter town hall

Education secretary can go around Congress for No Child reform, report says

New book asks, 'Whatever Happened to Pudding Pops?'

View the original article here