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The Daily Show mocks states that oppose Medicaid Expansion
The Daily Show mocked those that oppose Medicaid Expansion. Jon Stewart’s start of the Al Madrigal piece was great.
In 2012 the Supreme Court ruled that the Affordable Care Act did not destroy the country or the constitution. But the did allow states to opt-out of the Medicaid expansion. How do the citizens of those states feel now? I bet they feel good.
Al Madrigal sarcastically started his segment.
Al Madrigal: Obamacare was designed to do more than just eliminate jobs.It also gives states the option to take Federal Funds to expand Medicaid for their working poor. Luckily nineteen states were smart enough to say no leaving just a few million people without coverage. Ashley Landess of the South Carolina Policy Council explains why it was the right call for her state.
Ashley Landess: First of all, the cost of Medicaid are [sic] going to skyrocket. It’s not a question of whether this is a great plan. Even if it were, we can’t afford it.
Al Madrigal: Eventually going to cost how much?
Ashley Landess: The idea is that the federal government will fund 100%.
Al Madrigal: So zero dollars. You guys can’t afford zero dollars?
Ashley Landess: We are seventeen trillion dollars in debt at the federal level. And even if we stop thinking about the money for a minute. Does any plan that starts with my congressman had a great idea ever turn out to be a great idea?
That initial dialogue shows the disingenuousness of the debate. States not accepting Medicaid Expansion are doing it based on ideology not cost. That ideological decision is sentencing many of their citizens to death.
The segment continues where Dr, Harry Heiman of the Satcher Health Leadership Institute begins to enumerate the good ideas that Ashley Landess appears to have disregarded. He included interstate highways, civil rights, voting rights, clean air, and many others. Dr. Harry Heiman further refutes the argument that we cannot afford the Medicaid Expansion to Obamacare as the Congressional Budget Office already confirmed that it reduces the budget deficit.
The piece continues to make the point that most people even in the states not accepting the Medicaid Expansion want it. Ashley Landess condescendingly disregards them. She even assumes that without the Medicaid Expansion somehow the uninsured would find some way to get healthcare. Of course the reality is very different.
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