BY RUSSELL TURNER
THE 4 LETTER “F” WORD
Any good fisherman knows how to entice the fish to bite a wide range of artificial bait and lures. Lures won’t spoil like natural bait and don’t have an expiration date. When you take a close look at the fishing lure, you may notice that it has no nutritional value and it probably doesn’t even taste very good to the fish. If the fish had the intelligence to really think it over they would never try to eat something that only appeals to the eye. We humans like to think of ourselves as being smarter than a fish, but sometimes I wonder?
A few days ago I read about various groups putting pressure on Governor Fallin in Oklahoma to expand Medicaid. Their main argument for expanding Medicaid was that the federal government would pay for 100% of the bill for three years; in their minds this funding would be free money. In my opinion, these people are in the same class as the fish biting something that is artificial and not good to eat, they are using their eyes to support the Medicaid expansion and not their minds. I understood a long time ago that there is no such thing as free money, and that statement definitely applies to the Medicaid expansion.
Oklahoma is already experiencing an unsustainable growth in Medicaid. From 1968 to 2011, when compared to the growth of personal income in the state, Medicaid expense has grown over three times as much. While the expansion sounds good to the short-sighted among us, it is the equivalent of giving someone a baby elephant and three years of food. The federal government is over 17 trillion dollars in debt not counting the unfunded liabilities of social security and Medicare. Simple math tells us that the feds cannot keep spending what they do not have. When they cannot print more money or borrow more, the states that expanded Medicaid will be stuck with the bill.
Obamacare seeks to achieve its goal of reducing the number of uninsured in large part by dumping an estimated 16 million low-income Americans into Medicaid, the federal-state health insurance program for the poor. Obamacare does nothing to fix the program’s problems, especially the rising costs. There has been a trend where many health care providers refuse to do business with Medicaid because of lower pay than private insurers. Because of the underpayment by Medicaid, many hospitals would have to charge those with private insurance more to offset the difference. Private insurers usually pass those higher costs on to the consumers with higher premiums. By some estimates the cost of Obamacare could cause a doubling of insurance premiums when it is fully implemented in 2014.
For everyone that is lured by the 4 letter “F” word “FREE”, just remember many a good fish has landed in a hot frying pan because they let their eyes do their thinking instead of their brain.
THE 4 LETTER “F” WORD
Any good fisherman knows how to entice the fish to bite a wide range of artificial bait and lures. Lures won’t spoil like natural bait and don’t have an expiration date. When you take a close look at the fishing lure, you may notice that it has no nutritional value and it probably doesn’t even taste very good to the fish. If the fish had the intelligence to really think it over they would never try to eat something that only appeals to the eye. We humans like to think of ourselves as being smarter than a fish, but sometimes I wonder?
A few days ago I read about various groups putting pressure on Governor Fallin in Oklahoma to expand Medicaid. Their main argument for expanding Medicaid was that the federal government would pay for 100% of the bill for three years; in their minds this funding would be free money. In my opinion, these people are in the same class as the fish biting something that is artificial and not good to eat, they are using their eyes to support the Medicaid expansion and not their minds. I understood a long time ago that there is no such thing as free money, and that statement definitely applies to the Medicaid expansion.
Oklahoma is already experiencing an unsustainable growth in Medicaid. From 1968 to 2011, when compared to the growth of personal income in the state, Medicaid expense has grown over three times as much. While the expansion sounds good to the short-sighted among us, it is the equivalent of giving someone a baby elephant and three years of food. The federal government is over 17 trillion dollars in debt not counting the unfunded liabilities of social security and Medicare. Simple math tells us that the feds cannot keep spending what they do not have. When they cannot print more money or borrow more, the states that expanded Medicaid will be stuck with the bill.
Obamacare seeks to achieve its goal of reducing the number of uninsured in large part by dumping an estimated 16 million low-income Americans into Medicaid, the federal-state health insurance program for the poor. Obamacare does nothing to fix the program’s problems, especially the rising costs. There has been a trend where many health care providers refuse to do business with Medicaid because of lower pay than private insurers. Because of the underpayment by Medicaid, many hospitals would have to charge those with private insurance more to offset the difference. Private insurers usually pass those higher costs on to the consumers with higher premiums. By some estimates the cost of Obamacare could cause a doubling of insurance premiums when it is fully implemented in 2014.
For everyone that is lured by the 4 letter “F” word “FREE”, just remember many a good fish has landed in a hot frying pan because they let their eyes do their thinking instead of their brain.
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