Davis Merritt: Arrogance, ideology drive health compact

In Johnson County 14 citizen volunteers advise the county government on matters affecting seniors. As the Commission on Aging, they are understandably worried about the impact on Medicare of the open-ended multistate health compact passed by the Legislature last spring (“Time to stop health care disaster is Nov. 4,” Sept. 23 Opinion).

They decided to express their concerns in the October edition of the Best Times newsletter, published by Johnson County. But word of their plans leaked, and they had visitors at their five-member executive committee’s September meeting: a gang of 11 conservative legislators, led by Sen. Mary Pilcher-Cook, R-Shawnee, and House Speaker Ray Merrick, R-Stilwell.

What the commission members heard was pure thuggery.

“I think you have taken a huge jump, a reckless jump, with the article,” Pilcher-Cook said. Also, “You better get a lawyer.”

Sen. Molly Baumgardner, R-Louisburg, warned darkly: “Keep in mind why you are here and how you are here. You are appointed.”

Merrick told one participant, “This is going to set you guys back.”

To their credit, the volunteers would not be intimidated. Along with the commission’s commentary, the newsletter, in the interest of balance, also published a defense of the compact signed by 23 Republican legislators.

You can compare them at www.jocogov.org/thebesttimes.

The commission’s concern about Medicare is legitimate, though that’s only one of many ominous possibilities in the law that, alarmingly, gives legislators authority to nullify any federal “laws, rules, regulations and orders” having to do with health care. That means legislators, no matter how untrained or under-informed, could override any federal department actions, including the recall of dangerous food and drugs, and the rules governing meat processing or medical equipment and procedures.

The legislators’ printed defense is breathtaking in its disingenuousness. They insist, as they did at the executive committee meeting, that they have no intention of taking over Medicare. They note that Gov. Sam Brownback (whose purging of traditional moderates put many of them in office) has said the same thing. But some legislators also argued that the compact would provide a “safety net if the state needs to save Medicare from the federal government.” That’s not a takeover?

The law does not mention Medicare, and Brownback’s conservatives voted down an amendment that would have exempted it. One legislator said the law, written not by them but by the ultraconservative American Legislative Exchange Council, had to pass in the ALEC form to match action in other states. And, it must be noted, to please the deep-pocket entities, including two Koch foundations, that finance ALEC.

The legislators’ newsletter argument relies on other wildly misleading claims, including:

▪  That the Affordable Care Act, the real target of the compact, cuts $716 billion from Medicare. Simply not true.

▪  That those nonexistent federal cuts can be offset through the health care compact by repealing its several mandates – in other words, gutting the ACA.

▪  That Kansas, through the compact, magically can “attract new insurance companies … to create more competition” and thereby become “a health care tourism site.”

The seniors’ commentary politely asks a dozen sensible, basic questions, such as who would manage a state program and what expertise Kansas officials have to do so. The legislators offered no responses to any of their questions. Only arrogance and mind-numbing ideology.

This story was originally published September 29, 2014 at 7:02 PM with the headline "Davis Merritt: Arrogance, ideology drive health compact."