As I mentioned in my new article, conservative politicians -- meaning
primarily Republicans -- are determined to cut back Medicare, Medicaid and
Social Security benefits, even if it means causing millions of people to be
negatively affected in some way. At the same time, these very same
politicians absolutely refuse to further tax the rich and the elite. They
continue to rob Peter -- meaning the poor -- in order to pay Paul -- meaning
the rich and the elite.

We all know that rich white people drive the fanciest cars; their kids go to
the most expensive colleges and universities; they get the best health care
treatment; they eat the best food; they wear the best clothes; they live in
the most expensive houses; they live in the safest neighborhoods; etc.,
while the working class and the poor foot the bill.

And let's not forget that it is the children of America's working class and
poor who have fought in most of America's wars, while most of the rich kids
stay home safe and sound.

I just read the following news item on the New York Times web site, and it
again confirms exactly what I have been saying for some time now. America
has a caste system just like India, whether America's elite are willing to
admit it or not. Where do YOU fit in?



States Consider Medicaid Cuts as Use Grows

By KEVIN SACK and ROBERT PEAR - NYT

February 18, 2010


WASHINGTON -- Facing relentless fiscal pressure and exploding demand for
government health care, virtually every state is making or considering
substantial cuts in Medicaid, even as Democrats push to add 15 million
people to the rolls.

Because they are temporarily barred from reducing eligibility, states have
been left to cut "optional benefits," like dental and vision care, and
reduce payments to doctors and other health care providers.

In some states, governors are trying to avoid the deepest cuts by pushing
for increases in tobacco taxes or new levies on hospitals and doctors, but
many of those proposals are running into election-year trouble in
conservative legislatures.

In Nevada, which faces an $881 million budget gap, Gov. Jim Gibbons, a
Republican, proposed this month to end Medicaid coverage of adult day care,
eyeglasses, hearing aids and dentures, and, for a savings of $829,304, to
reduce the number of diapers provided monthly to incontinent adults (to 186
from 300).

"We are down to the ugly list of options," the state's director of health
and human services, Mike Willden, told a legislative committee last week.

The Medicaid program already pays doctors and hospitals at levels well below
those of Medicare and private insurance, and often below actual costs. Large
numbers of doctors, therefore, do not accept Medicaid patients, and cuts may
further discourage participation in the program, which primarily serves
low-income children, disabled adults and nursing home residents.

In Kansas, a 10 percent cut in provider payments that took effect on Jan. 1
has prompted such an outcry that Gov. Mark Parkinson, who imposed it, now
wants to restore the money by raising tobacco and sales taxes.

Even if Mr. Parkinson, a Democrat, overcomes resistance in his
Republican-controlled Legislature, it will be too late for Dr. C. Joseph
Beck, a Wichita ophthalmologist who informed his Medicaid patients last
month that he could no longer afford to treat them.

Dr. Beck said that over eight months last year, his practice wrote off
$36,000 in losses from treating 17 Medicaid patients. The state-imposed
payment cut, he said, was "the final straw."

"I'm out, I'm done," Dr. Beck said in a telephone interview.
"I didn't want
to. I want to take care of people. But I also have three children and many
employees to take care of."

Concerns about health care costs are likely to dominate the winter meeting
of the National Governors Association, which begins Saturday in Washington.

In advance of the gathering, administration officials have urged governors
to endorse President Obama's health care proposals, or at least to avoid
criticizing them. The Democratic plan, which is stalled in Congress, would
vastly expand eligibility for Medicaid as one means of reducing the number
of uninsured.

But many governors said they were more concerned about the growth of
existing health programs. The recession and high unemployment have driven up
enrollment in Medicaid while depleting state revenues that help pay for it.

A survey released Thursday by the Kaiser Family Foundation found a record
one-year increase in Medicaid enrollment of 3.3 million from June 2008 to
June 2009, a period when the unemployment rate rose by 4 percentage points.
Total enrollment jumped 7.5 percent, to 46.9 million, and 13 states had
double-digit increases.

Because Medicaid enrollment often lags behind unemployment, this year's
increase could prove even greater.

The National Association of State Medicaid Directors estimates that state
budget shortfalls in the coming fiscal year, which begins in July in most
states, will total $140 billion. Because Medicaid is one of the largest
expenditures in every state budget, and one of the fastest-growing, it makes
an unavoidable target.

"For most states, the fiscal situation is still dire, and the Medicaid cuts
are significant," said Scott D. Pattison, executive director of the National
Association of State Budget Officers.

Governors and legislators have managed to defer the deepest cuts because the
federal stimulus package provided $87 billion to states in Medicaid relief.
The cost of Medicaid is shared by the federal and state governments, with
states setting eligibility, benefit and reimbursement levels within broad
federal guidelines, and Washington covering the majority of the expense.

But the stimulus assistance is due to expire at the end of December, in the
middle of many states' fiscal years, leaving budget officials to peer over a
precipice. Congress and the White House are considering extending the
enhanced payments for six more months, at a cost of about $25 billion.

The House has passed such a measure and Mr. Obama included it in his budget
this month, but the Senate has not acted.

The extension would not come close to filling the Medicaid gap in many
states. In Georgia, for instance, Gov. Sonny Perdue assumed in his budget
proposal that the additional federal money would be provided, but that the
state would still face a Medicaid imbalance of $608 million, said Dr. Rhonda
M. Medows, the commissioner of community health.

Mr. Perdue, a Republican, decided it would be unwise to cut optional
benefits because that might drive Medicaid patients into expensive emergency
rooms. He proposed instead to levy a 1.6 percent tax on hospital and managed
care revenues and to cut payments to many providers by nearly 2 percent.

Without the tax increases, which face opposition in the General Assembly,
the state will have to cut provider payments by 16.5 percent, Dr. Medows
said.

"I won't have any primary care doctors left, much less specialists," she
said. "Certainly down here nobody likes to talk about taxes, but sometimes
you have to bite the bullet and do what's right for a whole lot of people."

In the Kaiser survey, almost every state reported that Medicaid enrollment
for the current fiscal year was exceeding expectations, making midyear
budget cuts necessary.

The options are limited by several realities. To qualify for Medicaid
dollars provided in the stimulus package, states agreed not to tighten
eligibility for low-income people. And any time a state cuts spending on
Medicaid, it loses at least that much in federal matching money.

Despite the ban on restricting eligibility, hard-hit states like California
and Arizona are considering proposals by their governors that would remove
hundreds of thousands from the rolls once the federal financing ends. Gov.
Jan Brewer of Arizona, a Republican, has called for eliminating Medicaid
coverage for 310,000 childless adults and ending the Children's Health
Insurance Program to help close a two-year budget gap of about $4.5 billion.

Gov. Phil Bredesen of Tennessee, a Democrat, is proposing the largest cuts
in the history of TennCare, his state's Medicaid program. To trim 9 percent
of the TennCare budget, he would establish a $10,000 cap on inpatient
hospital services for nonpregnant adults and would limit coverage of X-rays,
laboratory services and doctor's office visits.

"I have no choice," Mr. Bredesen said.


Jeff Snyder, SysOp - Armageddon BBS  Visit us at endtimeprophecy.org port 23
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