Putty in Her Hands
2010-02-16 - by
Last summer, Governor Perdue promised legislators huge spending cuts in Medicaid if they’d let her pass out $250 million in no bid contracts – which she said would bring cost saving efficiencies.
They did. She did. But no savings materialized.
Instead, the Department of Health and Human Services is $250 million over budget.
So, the other day, the Governor had to send a minion over to the legislature with a movie projector and slide show to explain what went wrong; now, a slide show is one of the deadliest weapons a Governor has when it comes to dealing with cantankerous legislators – first, they get bored, then frustrated, then confused, and then they’re putty in the Governor’s hands.
The Governor’s slide show whipped right past explaining what happened to all the savings she’d promised and, instead, villianized Medicaid Home Care patients: Her aide flashed up a chart that told legislators 23% of the Home Care patients were welfare cheats (who shouldn’t get any care at all) and 40% were cheating to get more care than they deserved.
It looked – in chart form – like cool and officious truth and the message to legislators said loud and clear all that cheating had devoured $130 million of the Governor’s promised savings.
It was lucky there weren’t any seventy or eighty year old Home Care patients in the room because even the liberal legislators were so mad they’d have been lynched.
It was the perfect diversion and legislators forgot to ask the Governor or Secretary Lanier Cansler: Let’s see your proof – which is a good thing because Cansler didn’t have any.
It’s simple common sense that a bureaucrat sitting at a computer in Raleigh can’t tell if an eighty year old Medicaid patient in Manteo is a welfare cheat. Instead, a nurse or doctor has to eye-ball and examine the patient – which Cansler hasn’t done.
What he did do was ask his computer how many patients had to be cheats for him to explain away his $130 million snafu – the computer said 40% and Cansler said, Voila. Then he showed the numbers to legislators who got so mad they never thought to ask him if he’d stopped to examine even one patient.
Which may explain – in an odd way – why the Governor thought Cansler would make a first rate Secretary of Health and Human Resources. This is a man who knows how to deal with legislators. By all rights, legislators should be grilling the Governor about passing out $250 million in no bid contracts (a lot of them to Cansler’s former clients from his days as a lobbyist, and to her contributors). But, instead, Cansler’s got legislators mad as hops at Home Care patients.
Posted in General, North Carolina - Democrats
Putty in Her Hands
2010-02-16/
Last summer, Governor Perdue promised legislators huge spending cuts in Medicaid if they’d let her pass out $250 million in no bid contracts – which she said would bring cost saving efficiencies.
They did. She did. But no savings materialized.
Instead, the Department of Health and Human Services is $250 million over budget.
So, the other day, the Governor had to send a minion over to the legislature with a movie projector and slide show to explain what went wrong; now, a slide show is one of the deadliest weapons a Governor has when it comes to dealing with cantankerous legislators – first, they get bored, then frustrated, then confused, and then they’re putty in the Governor’s hands.
The Governor’s slide show whipped right past explaining what happened to all the savings she’d promised and, instead, villianized Medicaid Home Care patients: Her aide flashed up a chart that told legislators 23% of the Home Care patients were welfare cheats (who shouldn’t get any care at all) and 40% were cheating to get more care than they deserved.
It looked – in chart form – like cool and officious truth and the message to legislators said loud and clear all that cheating had devoured $130 million of the Governor’s promised savings.
It was lucky there weren’t any seventy or eighty year old Home Care patients in the room because even the liberal legislators were so mad they’d have been lynched.
It was the perfect diversion and legislators forgot to ask the Governor or Secretary Lanier Cansler: Let’s see your proof – which is a good thing because Cansler didn’t have any.
It’s simple common sense that a bureaucrat sitting at a computer in Raleigh can’t tell if an eighty year old Medicaid patient in Manteo is a welfare cheat. Instead, a nurse or doctor has to eye-ball and examine the patient – which Cansler hasn’t done.
What he did do was ask his computer how many patients had to be cheats for him to explain away his $130 million snafu – the computer said 40% and Cansler said, Voila. Then he showed the numbers to legislators who got so mad they never thought to ask him if he’d stopped to examine even one patient.
Which may explain – in an odd way – why the Governor thought Cansler would make a first rate Secretary of Health and Human Resources. This is a man who knows how to deal with legislators. By all rights, legislators should be grilling the Governor about passing out $250 million in no bid contracts (a lot of them to Cansler’s former clients from his days as a lobbyist, and to her contributors). But, instead, Cansler’s got legislators mad as hops at Home Care patients.
Posted in General, North Carolina - Democrats