I’ve never been more optimistic. Keep up the activism. UPDATED with links to a new action tool and a petition to be delivered directly to the Senate. See below. I was hopeful, then I was nervous and now I’m genuinely surprised — in the best possible way. I’m thrilled by the number of Michigan Representatives who voted in favor of […]

An open letter urges conservatives to “sit out” Governor Rick Snyder’s re-election campaign. That’s how much the Michigan Tea Party hates Obamacare. They’d sabotage the Republican Governor’s chances of winning re-election to prove a point. They published an open letter today railing against Gov. Snyder’s continued efforts to convince the Michigan legislature to accept Medicaid expansion. Never mind the fact […]

The House GOP is dropping demands for a 48-month cap on Medicaid coverage for able-bodied adults. The Michigan Tea Party can’t be happy about this. There are signs of Republican willingness to compromise on Medicaid expansion, a big step forward in making it a reality in Michigan. Yesterday, a story in Crain’s Detroit Business reported that House Republicans were abandoning […]

GOPocrisy at it finest

Lee Fang has a great piece up at The Nation this week detailing new evidence of the unrelenting hypocrisy of Republican legislators on the Affordable Care Act. After spending four years demonizing it, many of them continue reap the political gains from the benefits it brings to their communities.

Click through for more.

Some Republicans will say anything to see the Affordable Care Act fail. The best defense is the truth. Now I’ve heard everything. Well, probably not, when it comes to myths the GOP invents about Obamacare. But this one’s a doozy. On the May 29 edition of The Last Word, I saw Tea Party Republicans leading citizens at a town hall […]

It’s just another end-run around Obamacare that’s almost certain to fail — and could drag Medicaid expansion down with it.

Don’t let the Michigan House GOP fool you. They don’t really want Medicaid expansion in Michigan. They just want you to think they do.

Click through for the full story.

Let’s just remember who our opponent is in this race. The race to win South Carolina’s 1st District Congressional seat in a special election on Tuesday is virtually a dead heat. Former Republican Governor Mark Sanford has closed in on Democrat Elizabeth Colbert Busch’s early lead, with at least one poll putting him one point ahead. From what I’ve seen, […]

It’s about opposing Obamacare from every possible angle.

Considering all the shenanigans in the Michigan legislature lately, you might have forgotten about Michigan Senate Bill 136, the “Religious Liberty & Moral Conscience Protection Act.” Well, I haven’t — and I hope you won’t, either. It could come up for a vote in the Senate at any time and we need to let our Senators know this bill does not represent the will of most Michiganders, including many in the healthcare field.

As I wrote here previously, the bill would give healthcare providers, facilities and insurers the right to refuse to provide or cover “objectionable” healthcare services on religious or moral grounds. But the bill is alarmingly vague, opening the door to discrimination and refusal to provide care to almost anyone, for almost any reason.

Worst of all, there are no genuine protections for patients in this bill. Those are even more vague because the bill isn’t about patient care at all. It’s about legislators and a vocal minority who want to put up roadblocks to anything even remotely related to Obamacare, the Affordable Care Act.

Click through for more.

Dude, are you SERIOUS???!

There’s a piece in today’s Livingston County Press & Argus that starts with this statement: “Both those for and against the Affordable Care Act, or “Obamacare,” agree on one thing: Emergency room visits by those with little or no insurance are driving health-care cost increases.” The article then goes on to prove that’s not entirely correct. Apparently Republican state Senator Joe Hune DISAGREES with this.

All the facepalming details after the jump.

Hey, Republicans, are you listening?

The percentage of Michigan residents covered by health insurance through their job has dropped from 78.1 percent in 2000 to 62.9 percent in 2011 according to a new report out by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. That’s the second highest decline in the entire country, second only to South Carolina.

The study was done to get baseline information prior to the implementation of many of the core components of the Affordable Care Act (“Obamacare”) so that we’ll have something to compare to as the ACA is rolled out.

Some of the key findings and more after the jump.

You have to give them credit for taking government back — to a time when it didn’t care about the poor

Tea party groups in Michigan appear to have succeeded in preventing an expansion of Medicaid that would have given health insurance to nearly a half million working poor Michiganders and preventing the formation of a state-run health insurance exchange. The actions will cost the state millions and millions of dollars, ensure that fewer people have health coverage than would have under the provisions of the Affordable Care Act and, ironically, help take the country a step closer to a single-payer health care system in the long run.

On Wednesday, the House Appropriations subcommittee passed their annual budget bill without the inclusion of the expansion of Medicaid that Governor Snyder, doctors, and hospitals across the state supported emphatically. Even tea party governors like Florida’s Rick Scott support this element of “Obamacare” since it would mean coverage of millions of their residents while relieving the burden on their hospital systems. They also kicked poor people in the teeth in a couple of other ways, as well.

Click through for details.