Medicaid Reform Advances in Senate

In a major victory for Missourians needing health care, the Republican-led Senate this week gave initial approval to MO HealthNet, Gov. Blunt’s bold proposal to reform a broken Medicaid system and expand healthcare coverage for Missourians. The MO HealthNet plan creates a system to reduce the number of uninsured Missourians and to provide more cost-effective delivery of health care. The bill is designed to improve the lives of Missourians, despite the lies and deceptions spread by Democrats who ignore good policy to try and score political points. "What we're trying to do in Missouri HealthNet is entirely replace the old Medicaid system and move from a focus on responding to sickness to a focus on health and wellness," the Governor said. With six weeks left in the legislative session, the measure still requires final Senate passage before moving to the Republican-controlled House for consideration. With strong support for the measure in the House, it at long last appears that Democrat attempts to play politics with the health of Missourians will fail, and MO HealthNet will ultimately benefit Missourians and our entire state for years to come.

Agency Finds Nixon Still Receiving Ameren Cash

Disturbing new revelations this week emerged about Jay Nixon’s ties to illegal Ameren political contributions: Nixon is still taking money from Ameren even after he filed a lawsuit against the utility for the Taum Sauk Dam collapse and claimed that he had returned $19,000 in tainted contributions. While Nixon says he gave back more than $19,000 in contributions from the utility last year, Department of Natural Resources Director Doyle Childers wants Nixon off the Ameren case after it was discovered that even though the money was supposedly returned, two Democrat committees turned around and sent at least $7,000 of that money right back to Nixon. In an understatement, Childers called the scheme “deeply troubling”. Nixon is not going to be able to run from the conflict of interest issues raised by the initial contributions and this new information is further evidence of the kind of arrogance and hypocrisy Democrats are infamous for. Stay tuned!

Bond Rips Pelosi Over Middle East Trip

Sen. Kit Bond took Secretary of State/House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to task this week for her ill-advised and potentially illegal trip to the Middle East that included a stop in Syria, a known sponsor of worldwide terrorism. “I think it's a disaster when the Speaker of the House... tries to conduct foreign policy," Bond told reporters in Jefferson City. "Speaker Pelosi has lots of powers in the House. But we give under the Constitution (the president) the power to conduct foreign affairs, because you cannot have one person in a 535-person Congress trying to speak for the United States or conduct foreign policy." The Israeli government also issued a statement disputing Pelosi's previous statements indicating that Syria and Israel might be ready for peace talks. Meanwhile, the Wall Street Journal reports that Pelosi’s trip to Syria may have violated the Logan Act which makes it a felony and provides for a prison sentence of up to three years for any American who engages in foreign policy “without authority of the United States”. All in all, Pelosi’s grandstanding might have resulted in a lot more than she bargained for.

Governor Focuses on Health Care Technology

While the Senate is moving forward with MO HealthNet, other efforts sparked by the Governor are already under way to help serve low-income Missourians seeking health care. The Governor recently directed the Department of Social Services (DSS) to utilize state of the art health care technology to develop durable medical equipment (DME) consistent with the MO HealthNet approach. Currently, a full range of durable medical equipment is available to any child in the Medicaid program, while some equipment items are available to adults only through an exceptions process. In a recent court decision, a judge ruled that the exception process did not provide adequate access and indicated that providing services, like DME, that are not required for federal participation must be an "all or nothing" decision. Under the judge's ruling, the state is prohibited from providing access to some eligible equipment but not others. The governor, however, has ordered the department to make the full range of equipment available on the basis of medical necessity using electronic, real time prior authorization. The court gave DSS thirty days to report back regarding how the state would proceed to implement the court's ruling. Blunt directed the agency to develop an ambitious plan to roll out the program and asked DSS to request a 60 day extension for development of the plan.

Job Creation, Economic Growth Continues

The success of the Governor’s commitment to job creation was on display again in February. The Department of Economic Development reported this week that 5,000 new jobs were created in February in spite of a particularly harsh winter. But this increase is only part of a longer-term story. In the last year, 28,800 new jobs have been created. Even more impressive, though, are the 82,500 new jobs that have been created since the Governor took office in January, 2005. It is now clear that measures like litigation reform, workers’ compensation reform, the Quality Jobs Act and responsible budgeting have helped Missouri rise above the Democrat fiscal mismanagement of the past to a new level of economic prosperity and an improved quality of life for thousands of Missourians and their families. Meanwhile, in other positive economic news, the Office of Administration reports that state revenue was up 4.8 percent through the first three quarters of the state fiscal year. Missouri's net revenue of $5.18 billion through March was better than anticipated. State officials' revenue projections, updated in January, counted on Missouri revenue to grow by about 4 percent for the year ending June 30. Net revenues for March, compared with March 2006, were up 4.2 percent.

GOP Invites Democrats to Oppose Judicial Taxation

Democrats are infamous for publicly supporting massive job-killing tax increases, but that certainly doesn’t mean that they should shirk their constitutional responsibility to Missourians by allowing unelected judges to engage in taxation without representation. Democrat lawmakers have a duty to Missourians to support House Joint Resolution 1 that would bar courts from ordering tax increases on hard-working Missourians, even though their political leader Jay Nixon has refused to take a stand on the proposal that already has cleared the House and the Senate Judiciary Committee. The only thing Nixon is saying, through a spokesman of course, is that he’s still studying it despite the fact it is only 35 words long and he has more than 200 lawyers on staff. This is not a partisan issue but one that involves the separation of powers between the legislative and judicial branches of government. Republicans this week invited Democrats to take the high road and join us in support of House Joint Resolution 1. Under the Missouri Constitution, only the Legislature has the power to tax Missourians. Surely Democrats would not shirk their constitutional duty as elected officials by allowing unelected judges to impose tax increases from the bench! Jay Nixon and his Democrat minions in the Legislature should put good government before their selfish tax and spend obsessions for the good of Missourians and our representative system of government.

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