Pruitt – Medicaid Recipients Like “Children” With “Toy”
You may remember House Republican Majority Leader Lance Pruitt. You may not want to remember him, but there he is anyway. He’s the one who, on the floor of the legislature last session said it was important that we not let the American people believe that the United States Supreme Court was the final word, judicially.
(let that sink in)
Rep. Max Gruenberg, an attorney and person-who-must-have-taken-a-Government-101-class, gently informed him that YES the United States Supreme Court DOES, in fact, have the last word.
Now, Pruitt has once again put his foot in his mouth – this time in an attempt to answer a reporter’s question about recently-announced legislation designed to allow the acceptance of federal funding for Medicaid expansion in Alaska. Governor Parnell recently rejected federal funds for Medicaid means that 40,000 Alaskans will lose the opportunity to obtain health insurance.
“It’s like a child, when you give them something, you give them a toy, you’re not going to yank it out of their hands, and that’s essentially what this is,” Pruitt said in a press conference.
You, Alaskan in need, are a child. And life saving treatment for injury and disease? That’s a toy.
Pruitt noted that he “probably speaks for others in the caucus.”
Perhaps, since Rep. Pruitt feels so strongly about setting this precedent, he should put his own toy back on the shelf and give up his own government health insurance. And so should the others he “probably speaks for.”
“Lance Pruitt should apologize and stop demeaning the 41,500 Alaskans who could obtain health care with Medicaid expansion,” said Mike Wenstrup, Chair of the Alaska Democratic Party. “If Pruitt thinks health care is no more necessary than a toy, then he is completely out of touch with the economic realities facing Alaskans who are seeking affordable health coverage.”
Medicaid expansion unveiled today by Sen. Bill Wielechowski (D-Anch) and Rep. Andy Josephson (D-Anch) would accept federal Medicaid funding but allow Alaska to withdraw from the program in the unlikely event that the federal government decided to stop funding its share in the future.
Our first order of business should be to get rid of Parnell. All the good libs are hamstrung by the presence of this idiot.
Note that Baby Face Pruitt is not some back bencher from the Rat Islands. Master Pruitt is deemed the Republican Majority leader. Shameless bunch they are.
How old is this pipsqueak …..?? What an embarrassment…! About like Todd Aiken was to my state… Stupid people do stupid things….but, surely you’d think that they would take their position as people who work for the public good, seriously….!!
The picture goes all too well with his comments. I bet he wouldn’t have that smirk on his face if he had to deal with some of what his constituents have to. And can someone tell me how he represents the same district that Harry Crawford used to? Did they move the boundaries around during the last redistricting? Does anyone know what his parents did? Where did Pruitt come from economically. I see he went to Heritage Christian which can’t be cheap.
http://conservatives4palin.com/2014/01/alaska-1-fiscal-condition-new-jersey-last.html
Quitty herownself endorses this ? from Koch Bros funded group at G. Mason U. Not sure what fiscal condition is,but it sounds dangerous. Surely Alaska’s fiscal condition means Alaska can afford Medicaid for all.
ps I’d like to smack the smirk off Pruitt’s face with a haunch of moose.
😀
Beating Pruitt’s face with moose meat should tenderize one or the other,should it not? How “up” are you on Native custody rights in South Dakota,Oh wisest person I know? 🙂
I’ll leave you some info on the new open thread. Does this have to do with the suit against SD Child welfare secretary and a State’s attorney, and a judge in SD?
However could you have guessed? 🙂
What an ignoramus!
You didn’t say it right. Regarding Mr. Pruitt it should be ” What a maroon!” What an ignoranimus!” Gotta use cartoon phrases for a cartoon character.
Mr. Priitt seems to have no appreciation of the value of medical care for even a year to four years to children and their parents for those suffering from things like asthma or cystic fibrosis or muscular dystrophy. So I take it his solution is not to take what medical care can be provided until it runs it out or new funding is available, but to tell those babies, children,young adults and their parents that it would be better to let them suffer for four years or just to die early? He should be required to spend a week straight in the children’s wards watching the agony of parents and children dealing with the distress of chronic diseases and the poor outcomes from lack of ongoing treatment and monitoring. What a callous individual.
Like a lot..Thank you.
I don’t think exposure to the realities of lack of healthcare or even the realities of poor healthcare move folks like this very much. They are pretty well insulated in their fairy tale world of get-a-job, take-personal-responsibility, blah, blah, blah crap.
Every knee jerk those-minimum-wage-jobs-aren’t-meant-to-be-forever-what’s-wrong-with-you-you-can’t-get-a-real-job response to falling /stagnant wages, lack of decent jobs coupled with the endless sneers about getting “free stuff” is the expression tightly held set of notions that damn the poor for their own plight, sneer at notions of social justice, and sustain inequality of income based on phony notions of human worth based on capitalism run amok. The obvious structural violence flies right on by these doofs.
“In his book Violence: Reflections on a National Epidemic, James Gilligan defines structural violence as “the increased rates of death and disability suffered by those who occupy the bottom rungs of society, as contrasted with the relatively lower death rates experienced by those who are above them.” Gilligan largely describes these “excess deaths” as “non-natural” and attributes them to the stress, shame, discrimination and denigration that results from lower status. He draws on Sennett and Cobb, who examine the “contest for dignity” in a context of dramatic inequality.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Structural_violence
Alaska Pi….Very interesting link. I had never heard of the term “structural violence”.
What you said above was something I could relate with in many ways.
When I was online looking for affordable health care I was quite surprised to find I didn’t quite make enough to “qualify”. Under by a few bucks. I thought, “will I have to pay for not having affordable health care?” I think the answer is yes.
Watching from NYC.
Oh jeez. This doof gets worse every time he opens his mouth.
At the very best, this is a weak analogy.
At worst, it is a nasty privileged and patriarchal slap at Alaskans and not at all acceptable coming out of the mouth of a state representative.
Here ya go , Mr Pruitt- do you know what “excess mortality” is?
How do you feel and what do you think about excess mortality?
Did you even think through your phony toy/game routine with what is really at stake here in mind?
I don’t think so and I hope not because this faux pas would be even worse should it turn out you think people dying because they don’t get their “toy’ is not an issue.
Pfffffttttt!
Like a lot. Thank you.
Lance Pruitt’s parents mus be very ashamed.
Thank you AKM “a citizen who is paying attention” and the contributors for supplying the Mudflats with the news that you do .I agree with Mike Wenstrup, “If Pruitt thinks health care is no more necessary than a toy, then he is completely out of touch with the economic realities facing Alaskans who seeking affordable health care.”
Since I am one of the 41,500 Alaskans desiring to be able to have the opportunity to have affordable health care for my family , I thank Sen. Bill Wielechowski and Rep. Andy Josephson for their efforts to try to make that a reality for myself and my family.
I try to not be offended by adults who do not want others to have affordable health care. What does push me over is when the adults do not want children to have affordable health care.