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| (Chris Weyant, The Hill) |
The St. Louis Post-Dispatch has a good editorial on Obamacare and Republican nihilism. Here's a snippet (but read it all here):
The fact remains that even though some big insurance companies have refused to sign up, states that have created insurance exchanges have seen the “magic of the marketplace” — once a favorite phrase of Republicans — drive down the cost of individual health insurance policies. In New York, Oregon and California, rates have fallen as much as 50 percent.
And while the Supreme Court famously upheld the individual mandate, it ruled that state governments could not be required to expand their Medicaid programs. More than 20 states, including Missouri, have refused to expand Medicaid programs to include the working poor, despite the huge financial windfall it would create. To say nothing of healthier populations and lower costs for the privately insured.
This stubborn refusal is driven strictly by politics, by the perverse hope that by keeping people sick and costs high, Republicans — who still have no better alternatives — can salvage some form of nihilist victory. This is profoundly shameful.But, as we've seen for over 4 years, when it comes to any and all things Obama-related, there's no "shame gene" in the Rethuglican gene pool.
