We should be ashamed. And don't give me that crap about other states. Texas is at or near the bottom in a host of social services metrics.
Rick Perry upholds the right of Texans to have the worst health care in the country By Lori Stahl DALLAS – Texas has the sovereign right to keep the very worst health in the country, Gov. Rick Perry insisted on Monday. Then he boldly blamed the finding that we have more uninsured people, and rank last in just about every known way to measure care, on a federal government that supposedly “doesn’t like Texas to begin with.’’ One in four Texans lack health insurance, so why would we want federal help? Yes, we knew Monday was going to be “buck the federal government day’’ in Texas; everyone has been stoked for a big showdown this week when federal judges started a hearing on the Texas voter ID law. (Critics loved the prequel, which had the same plot but was set in South Carolina.) But who knew we were going to get a double-feature? Even as the state’s top lawyers battled the US Justice Department over voter ID, Perry launched a battle against “Obamacare” on Fox News. First, he told the interviewer that our state won’t participate in health care expansion because the real issue is freedom: “We’re just not going to be a part of socializing health care in the state of Texas.’’ That means Texas won’t expand Medicaid or establish a marketplace for consumers to shop for insurance — two major facets of the Affordable Care Act that were upheld by the Supreme Court earlier this month. He’s now the sixth Republican governor to say no to participation in the Medicaid expansion. But he distinguished himself in disputing the premise of a fair-minded question about our state’s millions of uninsured residents. “Every Texan has health care in this state,’’ Perry maintained. “From the standpoint of having access to health care, every Texan has that.’’ “How we pay for it and how we deliver it should be our decision, not some bureaucrat in Washington D.C. that may have never been to Texas day in their life…trying to mandate this one-size fits all kind of health care.” That’s an extra bold statement, coming less than a week after Texas ranked worst in the nation in health care services and delivery, according to an annual scorecard issued by the federal Agency for Health Care Research and Quality. “Rated "weak" or "very weak" in nine of 12 health delivery categories, Texas dropped from 47th place in 2010 to 51st in 2011, behind all other states and Washington, D.C.,’’ according to the Houston Chronicle. The lead author of the federal study told the Chronicle that one factor in the ranking was the high proportion of residents who lack any form of health insurance. In fact, Texas has the nation’s highest rate of uninsured people; more than 25 percent of Texans lack medical coverage. But when the Fox interviewer asked about that, Perry simply disputed the findings. “The idea that this federal government, which doesn’t like Texas to begin with, can pick and choose and come up with some data and say somehow Texas has the worst health care system in the world is just fake and false on its face,’’ Perry said. Perhaps the TV interviewer was going to grill Perry about why he thinks the feds “don’t like” Texas. Or about what he meant when he said that “every Texan has health care in this state.’’ It would have been fascinating. But at that point, Perry had fiddled so much with his television earpiece that the Fox anchor interrupted the interview to ask: “Are you OK with your hearing, by the way? Are you able to hear us all right, Governor?’’ Perry stopped fiddling and completed the interview. It seemed as though he heard every question. In Texas, on this day, our leader picked his battles. Just because the feds say the state has the nation’s worst health care doesn’t mean we have to believe it. Nor do we have to believe those statistics about the highest percentage of uninsured Texans. We put our energy behind a larger, less-intrusive mission: requiring every voter to get a photo ID. http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs...n-the-country/2012/07/10/gJQAblcTaW_blog.html
What an ******* statement. Every Texan has a Mercedes too, from the standpoint of having access to one.
You mean like repaired ligaments when you tear something? Because otherwise you are screwed because no one has insurance here. But its OK because people from all over the world come to Texas for care.
I lol'd at those Rick Perry comments. Especially "The idea that this federal government, which doesn’t like Texas to begin with, can pick and choose and come up with some data and say somehow Texas has the worst health care system in the world is just fake and false on its face.." This is embarassing. Some data? Wow.
California has a problem with their state implementation of SNAP that puts up regulatory barriers to participation that keeps their rosters low. They have the lowest participation rate of people eligible for food stamps. It's not often that Texas gets to say they do social services better than California, but I think this is one. It's a good thing that Texas makes it comparatively easy for residents to access the services the federal government provides. It is California that should be embarassed to not be at the top of the food stamp lists -- they are the most populous state, they have the most poor people, they should be handing out a lot of food stamps and they're not (albeit, they are trying to get better). http://abclocal.go.com/kabc/story?section=news/state&id=9001890 It's always nice to be #1 at something, but this list of gross recipients is really an insult to my intelligence. It says nothing of the people who are eligible, and the drivers of that eligibility or the drivers of participation. Gross recipients is a useless number in understanding the issue.
they just pick and choose some of that there data, that gimmewhachit with the numbers and symbols... Wow. Strong work.
