In his second day in office, Louisiana's new Democratic governor, John Bel Edwards, signed an executive order to expand Medicaid in his state under the Affordable Care Act. As you know, Obamacare was supposed to be "job-killing," except for the part where millions of new jobs have been created in the private sector since it became the law of the land. Edwards was able to do this without the state legislature because, in its quite finite wisdom, it decided that only a governor could make the change. So now up to 300,000 people in one of the poorest states in the country can have access to the evils of government-paid health care.
You understand that, right, Louisiana? You get it, oh, sweet idiots of the Rude Pundit's home state? Right now, things suck the hair right off monkey balls down there. With oil prices swan-diving, the black gold-dependent state's getting righteously fucked and that's on top of the reaming given to Louisiana by disgraced governor and disgraced presidential candidate, the disgraceful human being, Bobby Jindal, who didn't plan for this very, very rainy day. Louisiana has one of the lowest income levels, highest unemployment, poverty, and violent crime rates, and one of the lowest life-expectancies in the entire country. Fuck, West Virginia is doing better. And we're not even getting into the effects of climate change on the state.
Now, the sad part is that if David Vitter hadn't put on diapers to fuck hookers, you'd have probably elected him and said, "Ah, fuck it" to the Medicaid expansion. And there's a good chance that you'll pull a Kentucky in four years and think, "Shit, we need to get rid of this Democrat because we're dumb and poor and want to stay that way."
Before you do that, look at what happened: You or your relatives or your neighbors just got access to health insurance. Elections have consequences. And you can piss and moan that this in some way harms Louisiana or makes people dependent on government or whatever bullshit thing you want to argue. But when your parrain gets that surgery he needs to help him walk better, maybe pause and thank the Democrat who made that possible and maybe think that he's someone who actually gives a shit about what happens to people like your parrain or tante.
Medicaid is an enormous part of Louisiana's budget - a third of it, which is what happens when your state is dirt poor. Already, about a quarter of all Louisiana residents are on the program, one of the highest rates in the nation. This is not to mention the nearly 200,000 people who get insurance through the federal ACA exchange since Louisiana never set one up or the million or so on Medicare. A big chunk of the state gets health care only because of programs set up by Democrats.
Sure, Edwards is no raging liberal. In fact, he's pretty damn conservative, especially on abortion and guns. But a conservative Democrat in Louisiana can do something that'll make thousands upon thousands of lives better, something that the Republicans there wouldn't have come close to doing. Edwards ran on Medicaid expansion and fulfilled that promise immediately. That's how the fuck you do it.
