I suspect that the reference is in regards to the states (nearly all of them Republican-controlled) which decided to not expand eligibility for Medicaid – that expansion was part of the ACA, but wound up being something that individual states could opt out of. This yielded something called the “Medicaid Gap” in those states – there are people in those states whose income is too high for them to qualify for Medicaid, but who don’t make enough to qualify for a subsidy for an ACA policy (making even the least expensive ACA policies effectively unaffordable for them).
No discussion of this kind is complete without including the notion that the Democratic party supports access to abortion.
I am not personally opposed to a woman’s right to choose. However, if one is to construct an argument regarding indirect deaths, and who is MORE responsible, then abortion has to be included in the calculations.
Touché.
Oh, that. I feel for our patients in that situation - we have a sort of pseudo-Medicaid called “Medically Needy/share of cost” administered by the Florida Dept. of Children and Families. Basically the patient is uninsured until they meet a monthly deductible, then they get Medicaid for the rest of the month.
Yeah, I have no idea how many people die while on those programs. I imagine nobody is counting since it would be such an embarrassment. Maybe some day I’ll make a pit thread about it.
~Max
If counting removal of unwanted or nonviable embryos, don’t forget all other surgical procedures that remove tissues which could be cloned. If including miscarriages and stillbirths, then consider GOP budget cuts affecting prenatal care and infant mortality.
How do infant, senior, and general death rates compare in states run by either party?
I’m curious, Max. Your tone here and up-thread seems dismissive, yet you go on to lament the Medicaid Gap in Florida, and suggest that it leads to deaths — deaths that could be attributed to the Florida State government. What am I missing?
The Following stats do NOT prove the thesis that Republicanism kills. (For example, perhaps drug addicts, suicidals, and obese people have a propensity to vote R.) But I’m not going to waste Googles on a difficult statistic, so let’s start with this:
This page shows 9 states that have age-adjusted mortality above 849 per 100,000 : Ohio, West Virginia, Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Arkansas, Oklahoma. Notice anything red/blue-wise? (There are 13 states in the next tier on the same graphic. Any guesses about the red/blue-ness there?)
Another page shows that of the 19 U.S. states with highest infant mortality, 17 have GOP state governments. Of the 9 states with lowest infant mortality, all 9 have Democratic state governments. (Maybe. I’m going by memory about which states are red or blue.)
As others have pointed out, you completely failed to offer any evidence that any of these things are related to Republican policy. “Inadequate healthcare”? Health care in this country is controlled by the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, passed by Congressional Democrats without a single Republican vote and signed into law by President Obama, who’s a Democrat. So if you dislike our health care system, complain to the nearest Democrat. “The death penalty”? President Clinton signed the Federal Death Penalty Act, which greatly expanded the number of crimes punishable by death. Was he a Republican or a Democrat? “Militarized law enforcement”? Which President signed the modified version of the National Defense Authorization Act in 1996, which greatly expanded transfers of military equipment to police forces? It was Bill Clinton again.
etc…
If that’s your chosen metric, I’ll point out that Republican policies actually increase abortions. Planned Parenthood, by providing family planning advice, free or low-cost contraceptives and affordable women’s health services, prevent far more unwanted pregnancies than they terminate (although I accept thet this is difficult to fully quantify). And when women don’t have access to legal abortion, they wil resort to the back-alley clinics. And many of them will die too, as they did before abortion was legal.
Republican policies also block comprehensive sex education, which reduces teen pregnancies, and advocate abstinence-only programs, which don’t. More abortions.
And even without considering pregnancies, GOP reductions of women’s health clinics (in the name of preventing abortion) increases the likelihood of other conditions, like cervical cancer, going undetected and untreated until it is too late.
And of course there are all the other cuts to the social welfare system that increase death and suffering in the poorest members of society (and their children).
If Republicans really cared about reducing abortions they would get down on their knees and thank the God they pay lip service to for Planned Parenthood. They would help make women’s contraception more available and affordable (and that includes stopping their efforts to keep it from being covered by health insurance). They would advocate for comprehensive sex education. They would improve the support system for poor mothers which would make keeping the baby rather than aborting it a practicable option. In more enlightened countries (as in parts of Scandinavia), the pro-life contingent do all those things, because they understand this. But the “pro-life” Republicans don’t do any of that.
In fact, if you look at what the GOP do (rather than what they claim to be doing), all they want is to act self-righteous while punishing women for having sex and children for being poor. That’s the primary outcome of their actual policies. Where they can’t stop abortions, they will introduce horrific policies like intravaginal ultrasounds or the (decidedly unmedical) requirement to re-implant ectopic pregnancies. There is no other explanation other than the desire to torture women. And if they get want they really want, worse will follow.
So yes. Let’s consider the indirect deaths caused by the parties’ respective abortion platforms.
Funny how you failed to mention that several red states deliberately blocked Medicaid expansion which prevented or delayed wider implementation and access for poorer Americans, nor that while PPACA increased insurance coverage for tens of millions, subsequent proposed Republican efforts will result in millions losing coverage again.
So while “let’s blame the Democrats for what the Republicans do” is always a fun game, I prefer to place the blame where it is deserved.
What a dumb debate.
I’m quite sure they do. Their “pony up or die” approach to Health Care alone should easily do the job.
I’m sure they do. Their “pony up or die” approach to Health Care should easily do the job all by itself.
The Democrats chose to have Medicaid continue to be partially controlled and partially funded by both federal and state governments. They could have chosen to make it a totally federal program like Social Security and Medicare, for which state governments do not decide which groups are eligible.
That said, the really important fact that’s rarely discussed is that Medicaid is incredibly shitty insurance. It pays doctors at much lower rates than most other insurance programs, which means that many doctors don’t take Medicaid patients, which means that many Medicaid patients struggle to get services they need. Data on health outcomes for Medicaid recipients is mixed. If any party really wanted to save poor people’s lives, then junking Medicaid and replacing it with something better would be a top priority.
Yes.
So do cigarettes, alcohol, cars, Democrats, drowning, animal attacks, and accidental falls.
Regards,
Shodan
Your argument would be more persuasive if your facts were correct. The medicaid expansion was not supposed to be under the control of the states until a Republican SCOTUS decided it was an intrusion on states’ rights. And the funding was overwhelmingly federal. In Maine a referendum to expand was adopted by the voters and the Republican governor chose to ignore it. I assume the new governor has implemented it.
I think that for your comparison to be fair, you also have to include deaths that are indirectly caused by terrorism - deaths due to the drug trading that funds terrorists, deaths of people fleeing governments that have been co-opted by terrorists, and deaths caused by our war on terrorism.
My mother is on Medicaid for nursing home care. She is getting the exact same care at the exact same facility she was in when she was a private patient. And the outside practitioners that she sees there… dentists, therapists, doctors, all seem pretty willing, actually eager, sometimes even aggressively eager, to provide their services at the Medicaid reimbursement rate. She gets excellent care and the Medicaid program saved her life and saved us from financial ruin.
So please don’t do me any favors and take that away.
In Ted Kennedy’s case, all at once.
The Democrats had, during the height of the Obama Administration, only 59 votes and it takes 60 votes to defeat a Republican filibuster. (Your post shrieks ignorance but I hope you don’t need a cite for that.) To get past the filibuster a 60th vote was needed. With (as you point out) zero Republicans available, the 60th vote came from Lieberman, Senior Senator from Insurancecticut.
And the ignorance here dazzles! You yourself, got the gist of it — Zero Republican votes. The GOP knew ACA was going to pass, but rather than making any effort to improve it, they concentrated on sabotaging it. Any flaw that could be exploited, they exploited. Any attempt to fix a flaw, they filibustered. Stated differently, you’ve got it exactly backwards: The GOP gets full credit for all the flaws in ACA.
And you still neglect to acknowledge that the Democrats simply lacked the votes to pass ACA. To get a version passed favorable to rent-collecting GOP donors from Big Pharma and Big Insure, a 60th vote was needed. You can call him a “Democrat” if you wish. You can call a pig a horse, but calling it a horse doesn’t make it a horse. Wikipedia: “However, after his speech at the 2008 Republican National Convention in which he endorsed John McCain for President, [Lieberman] no longer attended Democratic Caucus leadership strategy meetings or policy lunches.”
Does this help?
It is, but we’ve debated dumber things.
septimus: Don’t forget Blue Dog Ben Nelson, who also demanded various concessions for his support. Lots of insurance companies based in Omaha. And it didn’t do him a damn bit of good; he got turfed out at the next election anyway.