The Trump Country Health Care Divide!!!

This is the big story this week for me. 

The Republican scam that states somehow know how to best manage their own constituents healthcare needs is coming to an end. Seriously, how different are people in Kansas, Texas, or California...ridiculous right? 

Every one of the options below will or would have killed people. Period. Wisconsin may be next...

3 Year Lifetime Cap on Medicaid, after that, you're on your Own: Destroying Medicaid and forcing the poor to wither away and die by withholding life-saving treatments...I know, it sounds insane, doesn't it? But that was the end game all along. Think I'm kidding? From my healthcare email:

The state of Kansas had proposed Medicaid beneficiaries be allowed to remain under the KanCare Medicaid program for a three-year (lifetime) maximum before being dropped, other states including Arizona, Utah and Maine have made similar requests.

Too much for even Republicans, for now anyway...but this is now part of their agenda:

CMS Administrator Verma announced yesterday the agency will reject Kansas’s request ... "We also understand that people’s circumstances change, and we must ensure that our programs are sustainable and available to them when they need and qualify for them."

But that wasn't the driving force to reject the 3 year lifetime cap...it all about money, not lives:

Several healthcare providers in Kansas this year urged the CMS to deny the state's proposed Medicaid benefits limit, claiming it would significantly increase hospitals' uncompensated-care costs.

"Are there No Workhouses?" Health Care Work-for-free Requirement: The new American value? People are useless and social dead weight if they don't work...it's more Orwellian description; "improving the lives of Medicaid beneficiaries." 

The approval makes New Hampshire the fourth state to institute a Medicaid work requirement. six states with pending applications. “I congratulate Governor Sununu’s commitment to join me in improving the lives of Medicaid beneficiaries by creating a crucial link to work and community engagement,” Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services Administrator Seema Verma said in a statement.

Michigan is pushing the same idea, and it's not to save money:

The bill's Senate sponsors admit that this proposal isn't about saving money; in fact, it'll cost about $30 million a year to administer the program. It's pitched, instead, as a firm-but-gentle hand to those who've become dependent on the teat of government dependency.

Rural Whites exempt from Work Requirements, as GOP finally Establishes U.S. Class System: We always knew urban minority communities were never the "real Americans," so under Republicans rule, the lines are literally being drawn:

In Michigan, people who live in counties with higher unemployment rates — above 8.5 percent — are exempted from the requirement ... rural whiter counties unemployment is higher, get a break while urban areas with a higher share of black residents would still be subjected to them. 

Notice how the Republican co-sponsor of the bill, who hasn't done anything to create jobs in his district, found a way to help - let 'em freeload:

Michigan Sen. Wayne Schmidt (R-Traverse City) represents Cheybogan County, where unemployment is high, around 20.9% ... also represents Chippewa County, where unemployment was about 10.5% ... the residents Schmidt represents are unlikely to be harmed by SB 897 ... This is what's called "political cover." It's also one of the ways legislators skillfully pit urban and rural Michiganders with common interests against each other.

The fact is, if SB 897 causes 20% of Medicaid recipients to lose their benefits as the bill's sponsor, Sen. Mike Shirkey (R-Clark Lake) projects, some of them will die. "Every one of these reasons to deny you healthcare kills people," Paul Propson, CEO of Covenant Community Care in Detroit.