It's Sunday

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Mississippi needs a new governor

On top of the 90 percent match, the stimulus bill President Joe Biden signed Thursday would give Mississippi, the poorest state in the country, an estimated $600 million over two years to expand Medicaid to the roughly 200,000 to 300,000 people in the state who would be eligible. Nearly 60 percent of people who’d gain health insurance as a result of Medicaid expansion in Mississippi would be people of color. The vast majority of those people are Black.

[...]

During the pandemic, Mississippi has had the highest COVID-19 death rate of any state outside the Northeast. On Friday, the state’s Republican governor, Tate Reeves, said he remained committed to denying access to Medicaid for constituents near the poverty line, even though expanding eligibility would make money for Mississippi as a result of the new stimulus bill.

“My position has not changed. I am opposed to expanding Medicaid in Mississippi,” Gov. Reeves said during a press conference covered by the Mississippi Free Press. When asked by Vox if the prospect of additional funding might make him reconsider his opposition to Medicaid expansion, Reeves said, “No, sir, it will not.”

[...]

Reeves is forfeiting hundreds of millions of dollars to deny his constituents health care in the middle of a pandemic.

  Mother Jones

Apparently he doesn't want his poor (black) constituents to have access to healthcare. The poor need to stay poor. And blacks need to die sooner anyway. It's God's will.

And he's not the only one...

Twelve Republican-led states have refused that offer, leaving about 2.2 million of their constituents without health insurance.

Reeves also doesn't like transgendered people.

Reeves signed a bill on Thursday that blocks transgender athletes from competing on women’s sports teams. Mississippi is the first state to enact such a law.

[U]nder the ACA, the federal government already covers 90% of the costs of expanding Medicaid. As Vox recently explained, the Democrats' new COVID relief package ups the ante: "[N]ewly expanding states would also receive a 5 percent bump in the federal funding match for their traditional Medicaid programs for two years. Because the traditional Medicaid population is significantly larger than the expansion population, the funding bump is projected to cover a state's 10 percent match for expansion enrollees and then some over those two years." It led Jon Chait to joke, "Now states taking the Medicaid expansion would have more than 100 percent of the cost covered by Washington. They would literally have to pay for the privilege of denying coverage to their poorest citizens."

[...]

In an interview with Mississippi Today, Senate Public Health Committee Chair Hob Bryan (D) added that there "will be more money in the state treasury if we expand Medicaid than if we don't."

  MSNBC

Only the most backward red states have refused to implement expanded Medicaid. Those states are now seeing a lot of their rural hospitals closing down, with many more rural hospitals in deep financial trouble.

[...]

In the last decade, more than 100 rural hospitals have closed across the country, according to the University of North Carolina's Cecil G. Sheps Center for Health Services Research. And an analysis by the management consultancy firm Navigant found that 21% of rural hospital in the United States are in danger of closing, too, if their finances don't improve.

Rural hospitals face a variety of challenges. They tend to serve aging communities that suffer from poor health and require expensive treatments. There are often severe doctor shortages in rural areas, and gaps in insurance coverage if patients have insurance at all. And, several studies show that rural hospitals are closing at a faster rate in states that chose not to expand Medicaid coverage to poor residents under Obamacare.

  Daily Kos

The other states that have refused to expand Medicaid: Wyoming, Texas, South Dakota, Wisconsin, Tennessee, Alabama, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Kansas and Florida. Missouri only recently expanded Medicaid through a ballot initiative, defying its GOP leaders.

I get the impression that the GOP doesn't care to govern by the will of the people.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

When you follow Trump off a cliff

The number is an increase from the 26 lawmakers and 10 others originally reported to have contracted the virus, state health officer Thomas Dobbs said, attributing the increase to more people receiving test results.

  The Hill

LOL.

[Republican Gov. Tate] Reeves earlier this week warned that allowing people to contract and recover from the virus was unlikely to be a long-term solution for the pandemic.

“We would need to TRIPLE our worst day [of cases]—every day—for a year,” Reeves tweeted. “I’m not one of these guys that immediately dismisses any idea that challenges the expert status quo talking points. I’m pretty skeptical by nature. That’s healthy. But herd immunity is not anything like a realistic solution in the short or mid-term. I wish it was.”

Last Thursday, the governor ordered 13 counties in the state to require masks and banned large gatherings, saying at a press conference “Mississippi is in a fight for our lives.”

So quit following the orange asshat.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Charles Koch wants you to get back to work

AMERICANS FOR PROSPERITY, the pro-corporate pressure group founded and funded by billionaire industrialist Charles Koch, wants employees to return to work despite desperate pleas from public health officials that people should stay home as much as possible to help contain the spread of the coronavirus.

[...]

“Rather than blanket shutdowns, the government should allow businesses to continue to adapt and innovate to produce the goods and services Americans need, while continuing to do everything they can to protect the public health,” said Emily Seidel, chief executive of AFP, in a press release.

  Intercept

Because that's what corporations are always concerned with: the public health.

“All businesses are essential — to the people who own them, the people who work in them, and the communities they serve,” said Annie Patnaude, the Michigan state director for AFP, in a statement responding to the order.

All lives matter.

AFP’s position, which directly contradicts the advice of medical experts who say that social isolation is essential to curbing the spread of the coronavirus, comes after the group lobbied the Trump administration in 2018 to rescind $1 billion from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Now why would they have done that? I mean, they only want to protect the public health.

Much of AFP’s recommended cuts to government programs, which included CDC money for infectious disease control and global health, became part of the official White House budget request, though most were not adopted by Congress.

[...]

The libertarian advocacy network has spent tens of millions of dollars lobbying for corporate tax cuts, deregulation, and reductions to social welfare programs, particularly state Medicaid programs. This aggressive advocacy record has come into focus in recent days as Americans confront the coronavirus pandemic. Medicaid funding is seen as a critical tool for treating sick patients, and many are now questioning the wisdom of reductions to the CDC’s funding and staff.

[...]

Internal memos from AFP reveal the size and scope of the organization, which employed 650 staff members during the 2016 election and has successfully worked to block Medicaid expansion in at least four states. During the 2016 election, the group also aired negative advertising sharply criticizing Hillary Clinton and Senate Democrats, an electioneering push that dramatically shaped the current balance of power in Washington, D.C.

The group has since used its government influence to slash environmental rules, retreat from the Paris Climate Accord, and demand cuts to federal programs. It also helped secure $1.5 trillion in tax cuts as part of President Donald Trump’s 2017 tax overhaul.

[...]

Republican state leaders, including Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, have balked at shutdown requests. On Tuesday, Reeves signed an executive order superseding local bans on public gatherings.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, the federal government’s top infectious disease expert and a member of the White House coronavirus task force, has said he has “emphasized very emphatically” that bars, restaurants, and other nonessential businesses close and that those who may work from home do so.

Yeah, well, they'll be sidelining him permanently soon.

AFP and its affiliates, including LIBRE Initiative and Concerned Veterans for America, are now working from home. “Out of an abundance of caution and to ensure the health and safety of our activists, staff, and voters, our staff are working from home and are utilizing digital organizing as one way to continue their grassroots engagement,” a spokesperson from AFP told CNBC.

How nice for you that you have jobs where you can do that.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.