The Heir Apparent to the Throne Weighs In

Jeb Bush is already demonstrating that if you like the social Darwinism inherent in the Bush 43 regime, you'll LOVE Bush 44:

Gov. Jeb Bush outlined a plan Tuesday to link Florida's Medicaid program to private insurance companies that would set limits on health coverage.



Bush said Florida's health care safety net for uninsured nursing home patients and the poor faced unsustainable double-digit cost increases and was in dire need of revamping.



The governor said he envisions giving people with different health care needs flexibility to choose between plans, and rewarding those who make healthy lifestyle choices, such as not smoking.



Under the plan, which would need approval from Florida lawmakers and the federal government, the state would pay the premiums of Medicaid recipients for health care plans offered by private insurance companies and health maintenance organizations.



Participating insurers or HMOs, rather than the government, would set limits on care and coverage. Providers would compete to serve Medicaid patients, saving money, Bush argues.

Wonderful. Let's give for-profit HMOs, who pay huge salaries to their CEOs, the power to decide what medical care Medcaid patients get.



Suppose you lose your job and can't find another one....and you can't afford COBRA payments. You too could find yourself on Medicaid. Do YOU want HMO's deciding what care you get?



It's astounding to me how the Bush Boys have such reverence for the fetus, and for people with irreversible brain injury, but people with actual cognitive functioning, who might not always be relied on to vote for them, can go fuck themselves.



These hoary Republican memes of "choice" (which means you can choose between one company which will deny you coverage or another company which will deny you coverage or a third company which will deny you coverage so its CEO can buy another Ferrari) and "competition" (how is it competition when the company is going to want to get MORE government money so its CEO can buy another Ferrari) have become so ludicrous, it's astounding that they still use them.



So next time you go visit your grandma in the nursing home in Florida, you know, the one who's paid out all her money and is now in a Medicaid bed, just think about the infected bedsores she's going to be endured when the HMO administering Medicaid decides that its CEO needs a new vacation home more than your grandma needs to be turned over in her bed.