MAINE HOUSE FAILS TO OVERRIDE, THANKS REPUBLICANS

Sad news, our Maine State House has failed to override Lepage's veto of Medicaid expansion. They voted 97 to 52 in favor of expansion but apparently didn't get the needed moderate Republican support they were pushing for. This is unfathomable to me. Its indicative of the Republican party's war on the poor, many of whom are working poor. I am sure my Rep, Mike Nadeau, voted to support his boss Paul Lepage. He put this comment on his Facebook page today directed at House Speaker Mark Eves.

 "today I lost respect for the speaker of the house. games games games. trickery and devisive behavior. this man has done nothing but play devisive games. at a time when we need strong nonpartisan leadership all that we get is mockery of the system and the people!!!!!!"
*NOTE: devisive is spelled divisive and hold a few exclamation points Mike.*  

Well, my feeling is that the Speaker was using the power at his disposal to use legitimate parliamentary means to try to save this Medicaid expansion. I guess to an amateur like Nadeau, the whole process would be overwhelming. Guess we'll just have to put someone else in office that can work within the democratic system and advocate for the people.  

Apparently Kenneth, "man's brain" Fredette  really strong armed any Republicans in his caucus that showed the slightest inkling that they might vote to override. In the Press Herald article it reported that some Republicans tried to "walk" so their vote wouldn't be recorded. The Republicans will pay in next years election for failing the people.

This whole self-righteous attitude exhibited by the Republicans regarding the need for basic health care for all is baffling to me. Maybe if they got off their pedestals and went amongst the people of their community they would find that there are many people trying to keep their heads above water who cant afford pricey private coverage. Amazingly Republicans are able to garner support from some of the very people that would be helped by Medicaid expansion by labelling it a welfare program. Blaming all those nefarious "lazy leechers" for running up the cost of health care by running to the emergency room for a splinter. 

I worked with a young single mother once who would take her child to the emergency room when it was sick. At first, I thought to myself, "she's wasting taxpayer dollars." Then I realized this was a young girl with no husband, parents or grandparents to help and advise her. If  I was alone and my baby had a fever and wouldn't stop crying, I'd call a taxi and go to emergency too. I guess we Democrats have something called empathy that is not part of the vocabulary of the Republicans. They are very near sighted, not able to see the enormous costs of leaving people uninsured and without preventive medicine. 

Now, we really have to redouble our efforts to replace Gov. Lepage with a Democrat. This seems to be the only way to get health care to tens of thousands of deserving Mainers.