[PemiaGefe]

As the immortal Jackson said - you have made your ruling, now try to enforce it. No exchange means that no one in Texas is required to purchase coverage.

Thanks Perry!

You're stupid. No exchange means most people in Texas will still buy health insurance but they're likely to pay more for that insurance. Health care exchanges are a way for people and companies to go to one place, say exactly what type of coverage they want, and then receive a bid from every insurance company which is part of the exchange. This means one stop shopping and a reverse auction where insurance companies try to outbid each other so consumers end up paying less.

No wonder the insurance companies don't like them, they result in lower prices for consumers and increased competition. It's also no wonder why a corpora-crat like Perry sides with the companies and against the people of his state.

[jyhugikuhih]

corpora-crat

*groan*

[abubycera]

As of right now 100% of the expansion of medicare is covered by the Feds and it has been pre-funded for years.

Liar.

[Fouttysotlalf]

DinoDoc proves he's clueless once again.

Liar:

The Denver Post reports Thursday (http://goo.gl/B4lmS ) that a Kaiser Family Foundation study shows Colorado would spend $470 million for its share of the Medicaid expansion between 2014 and 2019. The study says the federal government's share of the expansion for Colorado would be $6.9 billion during that time, or 94 percent.
Study: CO Medicaid expansion could cost $470M

PS You are also an idiot for believing that free money exists.

[IodinkBoilk]

And what does that have to do with the price of tea in China? If people weren't paying half their income to support the states, they could afford to donate more to charitable causes, or *gasp*, buy their own private insurance.

Why not? Why should people who make more than me pay more in taxes? Don't they deserve to keep what they worked hard to earn?

You don't have any idea what taxation is for, do you? Rich people get less from the government than they pay taxes, poor people get more; that's what the ****ing taxes are for.

[BoattyGonm]

http://www.nola.com/politics/index.s....html#comments

Jindal is getting a bunch of criticism in Louisiana for doing the same thing Perry did by turning down free money. It's obvious grandstanding to pander to the base and I suspect the GOP will do exactly what they did with the stimulus funds; I.E. initially publicly claim they don't want it but then after the cameras have gone quietly take the free money. Worse the hypocrites tried to take credit for every school repaired, every road built, etc... Even while claiming the stimulus did no good and didn't generate any new work. I'm tired of their political bullshit.

[Obenuearema]

That's why California is in ruins.

FACT: California's financial position is better off than most states. You watch too much Fox Noise. Go ahead and look up the maps detailing state budget deficits as a percentage of GDP or state debt as a percentage of GDP. While you're at it you can look up how Texas is a shithole which is worst in the country in dozens of categories. Most uninsured, most people dying prematurely from preventable illness, etc...

[bF8CCmmr]

Oerdin, spout all the bullshit that you want to spout. It won't make you correct.

[Reftsheette]

Oerdin, spout all the bullshit that you want to spout. It won't make you correct.

It's not bullshit that Texas has the largest percentage of the population uninsured nor is it bullshit that more people die in Texas from preventable illness than in any other state even as a percentage of population. We had a whole thread about why Texas sucks about a year ago, maybe you remember it. Now, I understand why you didn't like it but it was all factually based on different categories of metrics and even if you don't like it, well, it's still true.

[Qwjyrgij]

I quoted the Associated Press, you dullard, and they reported the exact opposite of your opinion piece. You're getting more pathetic by the minute.

It isn't an opinion piece you tard.

[HBPujWBe]

Incidentally, if the health care law does take effect and is not repealed, I plan to go uninsured. Nothing else makes sense since I will be paying a massively higher premium due to limits on how much more they can charge old people and women, and pre-existing conditions can't be excluded. As a young white male, my premiums should be pretty low, but they won't be thanks to obamacare.

Free loaders like you are why the penalty should be much higher. I agree that Universal Care is a far more intelligent solution, especially if it cuts out the useless middlemen, but for now this is a huge improvement over the unsustainable status quo. Also, I shall enjoy the schadenfreude if you get hit by a bus.

[SingleMan]

Not likely. Your premiums would be about the same assuming there is nothing grossly abnormal about you.

Especially since the over all size of the insurance pool has been increased so the per person costs should either be the same or slightly lower. Of course, expanding the insurance pool to it's logical largest extent, the whole population of an entire country, would have the widest possible distribution of risk resulting in the lowest possible cost per person. Dozens of countries manage to do this well so I refuse to believe the US is uniquely unable to do so; it's just a matter of getting the greedy and useless middle men out of their rent seeking positions.

[Opperioav]

Patently false. Old people currently have high premiums. Women have higher premiums than men. Soon insurance companies will no longer be able to discriminate prices that way; there's an upper limit to the factor difference there can be between my premium and an 60 year old woman's. Since the cost of insuring me right now is very very low, it will have to go up to subsidize the expensive health insurance of those people.

Most people have higher premiums that what their healthcare would actually cost. Or at least in a more efficient system, they should. This is not something you can complain about. I suggest you educate yourself on how health insurance (or any insurance, for that matter) works before continuing this conversation.

[kimaddison]

Adding some necessary context to this thread...

Now that the Court has upheld the individual mandate, these insurance exchanges constitute the key to the success or failure of the law. They are also its Achilles' heel.

How's that? Well, as the Cato Institute's Michael Cannon succinctly puts it, "Without these bureaucracies, Obamacare cannot work." And, oddly enough, the law doesn't actually require states to set up these "marketplaces." Moreover, there is no rational incentive for them to do so. If a state sets up an exchange, it then must pay for it, which won't be cheap. Cannon writes, "States that opt to create an exchange can expect to pay anywhere from $10 million to $100 million per year to run it." This is a burden that the states, most of which are already in deep financial trouble, are not likely to embrace with enthusiasm.

The federal government can set up its own exchanges, in theory, but Obamacare stipulates that Washington would then be required to pick up the tab as well. And, as Cannon goes on to point out, "The Obama administration has admitted it doesn't have the money -- and good luck getting any such funding through the GOP-controlled House." And it gets worse. If the federal government is forced to set up an exchange, it faces yet another huge problem. As Sally Pipes and Hal Scherz write, "The text of the law stipulates that only state-based exchanges -- not federally run ones -- may distribute credits and subsidies."

Thus, if a state refuses to set up an exchange, the feds have no real ability to do so either. The states have an opportunity, therefore, to shoot a poison arrow directly into Obamacare's Achilles' heel.

The States Can Still Kill Obamacare

This isn't completely accurate as the IRS has issued rules to allow federal exchanges to distribute credits and subsidies despite the text of the PPACA, but those rules can be changed if the GOP wins the presidency in November.

[chppjdf]

These statements make no sense together. People under 18 have no choice; they do not purchase insurance and, if insured, are carried on their parents' policies. It makes just as much sense as saying that 26 percent of Texans are without coverage because they cannot get it.

[9mm_fan]

those rules can be changed if the GOP wins the presidency in November. Not with Mitt Romney at the helm. They can do it if they win the Senate. The presidency is irrelevant since both Obama and Mitt are pushing Obamacare.