Across states and official positions, Republicans opposing ObamaCare have different views on the value of health benefit exchanges.
State executives have made the decision to implement the Medicaid Expansion detailed under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA).
RI officials acknowledge, but downplay, the intention to link additional government services to the state’s health benefits exchange. But advocates for smaller government see a pattern in federal and state efforts to make various public payments easier to get.
The audio in which RI Health & Human Services Secretary Steven Costantino, Health Benefits Exchange Director Christine Ferguson, and Lt. Governor Elizabeth Roberts describe their vision of dependency portals.
A policy brief for the RI Center for Freedom & Prosperity finds multiple reasons for the state to pull back from its plans to implement a health benefits exchange and to expand Medicaid.
Ramesh Ponnuru characterizes the mandate tax as a deduction, but that neglects the portion of the Supreme Court’s ruling that allows an overall increase.
Two more points from the lieutenant governor’s press conference, yesterday, raise questions about the direction of health care and about what freedom requires.
The language of NFIB v. Sebelius ultimately requires the mandate tax to be a sort of property tax on one’s body, with a corresponding tax credit applied to income for those who purchase health insurance.
Justin appears on Rhode Island Public Radio’s Political Roundtable to discuss the Supreme Court’s ObamaCare ruling.
A David Brooks column leads Justin to question new and old statements of common health care wisdom.
Lt. Gov. Liz Roberts’s claims that ObamaCare will expand coverage for small-business employees does not address how the law will affect different small businesses.
Through the RI Center for Freedom & Prosperity, I’ve written a policy brief suggesting that Rhode Island should change its direction on exchanges and turn toward free-market solutions.
The claim that recent health care legislation signed into law last week adjusts depending on the Supreme Court’s pending decision on ObamaCare is a bit of an overstatement.
A Gallup poll finding American confidence in public schools at an all-time low also points to a disconnect between Americans’ opinions of various institutions and the priorities of government.
The economic drag of legal uncertainty surrounding ObamaCare may be resolved with the Supreme Court’s pending ruling on its Constitutionality, but longer-term effects remain a concern.
A jumble of news and commentary headlines leads Justin to wonder where the cause and effect lie in entitlement and nanny-statism.
Despite some local journalists’ reports, RI’s Medicaid Global Waiver reform has saved $55.2 million within the first year and a half of implementation, and would have saved more but for ObamaCare and federal stimulus legislation.
RI’s income tax reform affected taxpayers with little income beyond what they pay for medical care. As the state seeks to fill in the gap for low-income Medicaid recipients, the gravity of government complexity grows.
Justin writes live and extemporaneously from the Senate Finance Committee hearing on Gov. Chafee’s municipal relief package of legislation.
Matt Allen’s petition for repeal of the primary-offense seat belt law leads Justin to consider the real consequence of such legislation.
From digital cameras to cancer treatments, the supply chain is not immune to disruption, and the drive to build the perfect system cannot rely on an assumption that the status quo will hold.
Justin worries that increasing complexity of health insurance arrangements that attempt to factor in patient outcomes take a more dangerous path than just allowing patients to find (and pay for) the doctors who suit them.
The Current interviews Roman Catholic Bishop of Providence Thomas Tobin, part 2 of 3: no political box; healthcare and political lessons; school choice
Legislation to review healthcare mandates is scheduled for House Corporations Committee review; meanwhile, the local insurers and business interests are forming a group for leverage in the impending healthcare exchange.
In Justin’s view, marriage as a social issue is inevitably bound up with other policies as small-government issues, and in a way that both “economically conservative social liberals” and “big-government traditionalists” ought to consider.
Educational imbalances and legal bias against boys and men and the corrosion of cultural mores illustrate why small-government, fiscal conservatism requires a dose of social conservatism, as well.
A Swedish man disabled by his love of heavy metal illustrates how, as community standards are pushed closer and closer to the closed-door home, the police of the public sphere are apt not only to defend, but to subsidize material they like.
National Journal ranking of liberal and conservative legislators points to politics and posturing.
Smoking bans and other government regulations may catalyze or accelerate positive changes, but the critical question is whether their results are worth their costs.