Wednesday, January 19, 2005
Is it true that the GOP plan "fits in very well" with Healthy Kansas?
[John Hanna, "GOP health plan proposes to lower prescription costs," Associated Press, The Lawrence Journal-World, 19 January 2005.]
From most accounts, the Governor's Healthy Kansas Initiative is at odds with the recently announced Senate GOP health care proposal. She seems to disagree:
A no-new-taxes health care plan offered Tuesday by Senate Republicans was quickly co-opted by Gov. Kathleen Sebelius, who said the GOP's alternative to her much more expensive proposal "fits in very well" with her ideas.
What is going on here? Likely for the sake of political expediency, Sebelius is choosing to join with the GOP rather than fight them. Calculating that a head to head fight over the plans might end in failure, she is attempting to present her plan as a complementary offering to the GOP's, and sell the state on the idea that both are essential to solving health care issues in Kansas. From a political standpoint, this is essentially logrolling. It makes more sense to give in on the Republican measures and still get hers passed than to risk Healthy Kansas forever being counted as a failure.
It's unclear whether the GOP will respond by agreeing to this trade - and the tax hike that goes with it - but hopefully legislators will see through the maneuvering and instead work to reduce spending in Medicaid and improve the availability of affordable health insurance through health savings accounts and mandate-free policies.
[Matthew Hisrich, "Additional Medicaid Spending is Irresponsible," The Flint Hills Center, 22 July 2004.]
[John Hanna, "GOP health plan proposes to lower prescription costs," Associated Press, The Lawrence Journal-World, 19 January 2005.]
From most accounts, the Governor's Healthy Kansas Initiative is at odds with the recently announced Senate GOP health care proposal. She seems to disagree:
A no-new-taxes health care plan offered Tuesday by Senate Republicans was quickly co-opted by Gov. Kathleen Sebelius, who said the GOP's alternative to her much more expensive proposal "fits in very well" with her ideas.
What is going on here? Likely for the sake of political expediency, Sebelius is choosing to join with the GOP rather than fight them. Calculating that a head to head fight over the plans might end in failure, she is attempting to present her plan as a complementary offering to the GOP's, and sell the state on the idea that both are essential to solving health care issues in Kansas. From a political standpoint, this is essentially logrolling. It makes more sense to give in on the Republican measures and still get hers passed than to risk Healthy Kansas forever being counted as a failure.
It's unclear whether the GOP will respond by agreeing to this trade - and the tax hike that goes with it - but hopefully legislators will see through the maneuvering and instead work to reduce spending in Medicaid and improve the availability of affordable health insurance through health savings accounts and mandate-free policies.
[Matthew Hisrich, "Additional Medicaid Spending is Irresponsible," The Flint Hills Center, 22 July 2004.]
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