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Don Gaetz's Former Hospice Company Accused Of Medicare Fraud

Club Med-icare

Another company associated with a Florida Republican has been accused of Medicare fraud, but this time it doesn't involve Gov. Rick Scott.

Nope, this time it's not the Governor, it's the Senate President Don Gaetz, whose former company Vitas Hospice Services and Vitas Healthcare Corp.  the U.S. Justice Department alleges “misspent tens of millions of taxpayer dollars from the Medicare program since at least 2002." (Is there a secret club for these guys somewhere that we aren't aware of?)

Gaetz sold the company in 2004 to its current owner, Cincinnati-based Chemed, and reportedly no longer owns any shares or has any affiliation with the company. Chemed operates hospice services in 18 states including Florida.

The suit, filed on the eve of the final day of the legislative session, alleges that the Chemed and its hospice subsidiaries defrauded Medicare by billing Medicare for patients who were not eligible for hospice care, and for charging Medicare for crisis care given to patients who either didn’t need it or never received it.

Gaetz, R-Niceville, who was elected to the Senate in 2006, said through a spokeswoman late Wednesday that the DOJ complaint involves issues that occurred after he left the company.

Rick Scott was never charged with Medicare fraud, but his former company received the largest fine for Medicare fraud in history.

If there is such a club for alleged Medicare fraudsters, they must not only have a secret formula for billing, but they're really bad at math. Last time I checked my calendar, 2002 came before 2004, when Gaetz sold the company. He may claim to have "left" the company before this occurred, but he still owned it during that time.

Charging Medicare for crisis care given to terminally ill patients who either didn’t need it or never received it? Classy!

But then the Gaetz family is nothing but classy. After all, upon passing the “Timely Justice Act,” which makes it even faster and easier to execute prisoners by cutting short the time for death penalty appeals, Don's son, and House Rep. Matt Gaetz had this to say:

“Only God can judge. But we can sure set up the meeting.”

So quick to judge! If these allegations are true, may justice be just as swift in this case, but something tells me Gaetz's lawyers will take all the time they need, and then some, to defend him and the company.

When it comes to Republicans in the alleged Medicare Fraudsters Club, and the Florida Capital, membership has its privileges. 

Related articles

Thrasher: "No Fallout From Doing Nothing On Medicaid," Unless You Count The Sick And Dying

FL House Gives Scott An Unconstitutional Bill In Exchange For An "Ethics" Law?

It's A Miracle! $23 Billion Of Scott's Faked Medicaid Estimate Suddenly Go Missing

Miracle, Or Maniacal?

What a difference a day and some simple math makes when people who can count and read call you out on your blatant attempt to prevent the poor from getting access to health care, right Gov. Scott?

When you use numbers that are tremendously exaggerated that you know are wrong when the true estimates are out there and easily available, well that's just bound to happen. Especially when you're notorious for vowing to defeat health care reform and for running a company that's in the textbooks for a record breaking fine for Medicare fraud. Gosh, it almost makes one think the governor isn't all that bright and assumes the rest of us from the average voter, to members of Congress, to officials at the White House are all equally dim.

Scott was called out for his knowingly false estimate of a $26 billion cost to taxpayers over 10 years for Medicaid expansion, and almost overnight, $23 billion just "dissappeared" from tricky Ricky's revised estimate.

It's a miracle! 

And thus concludes today's episode of "Yes, Florida Governor Rick Scott Really Thinks You're That Stupid."

Tune in for the next episode:

"Rick Scott Pretends He's Too Busy To Join Other Governors In Gun Conversation With Vice President Joe Biden." Including bonus cameo of Neil Cavuto interviewing Scott on FOX-GOP-TV, who somehow managed to squeeze him in.

Scott Pushes Misleading Medicaid Numbers, Hints At Holding Education Funding Hostage?

Governor Rick Scott, the man who shuns nearly all dealings with the media in favor of the one-sided approach, tried it again over the weekend, writing an op-ed for the Tampa Bay Times to push misinformation on the upcoming state Medicaid expansion prior to a meeting with the Secretary of Health and Human Services, Kathleen Sebelius.

In his piece, he began with a story of his own family's struggle over caring for one of his brothers, and recounting a Shriners Hospital For Children that "came to the rescue." Probably a hint towards the Republican Party's approach to health care suggesting those in need should rely on some sort of charity as opposed to government programs like Medicaid, of which Scott has made clear he is not a fan.

From that op-ed, Scott wrote the following on Medicaid costs:

There are two key questions driving our consideration of this issue: How will we pay for it, and will it decrease costs and improve quality and access to health care for Florida families?

Today, Florida's Medicaid program provides health care to more than 3.3 million Floridians. That means that one in six Floridians have their health care coverage provided by tax revenues of the remaining Floridians, and Medicaid is approximately 30 percent of our state budget. The cost of Medicaid has been growing at 3 ½ times the growth rate of the state's general revenue for years. This crowds out our ability to invest in K-12 education, state universities and other priorities.

Growing government is never free. Florida's Agency for Health Care Administration recently reported that adding people to Medicaid under the new law would result in a total cost to Florida taxpayers of more than $63 billion over 10 years. The report also pointed out that the federal government has a long history of dramatically underestimating the cost of government programs.

Two things jump out here. The larger one is Scott's claims on the costs to taxpayers: $63 billion over 10 years. The Times wrote a follow up of their own on these claims, and pointed out Scott's fuzzy figures:

This figure is just plain wrong. In August, state economists estimated that Medicaid expansion would cost Florida taxpayers $8 billion over 10 years. It's ridiculous to think that cost estimates have more than tripled since the summer. In fact, Florida legislative staff charged with estimating the cost to the state of the Medicaid expansion question the accuracy of the $26 billion figure. In an email exchange, the budget chief of the House Health Care Appropriations Subcommittee and Amy Baker, the Legislature's chief economist, tell a staffer at the Agency for Health Care Administration that the agency's figure makes a faulty assumption that the federal government won't cover the cost of the Medicaid expansion to the extent the law requires.

Scott has his own opinion on the wisdom of government covering health care for the poor, but he doesn't get to make up his own facts on what it would cost. Expanded Medicaid is a bargain for the state. Sebelius should be wary of the governor's inflated numbers, and Scott should use Monday's meeting to get all of his questions answered and find a way to make this work for Florida.

I'm sure no one will ever be able to persuade Rick Scott to use actual facts when it comes to his idea of the government's role in taking care of it's citizens, especially when it comes to health care. After all, his former company holds the record for the largest fines ever for Medicare fraud, a fact Scott has conveniently removed from his bio, not to mention that he took the fifth 75 times in just one deposition in another court action involving the same company. Unfortunately for Scott, as inconvenient as those facts may be, they remain facts. Scott hasn't fooled the Times in this case, and he won't be fooling Secretary Sebelius either.

Nice try.

The other point that jumped out at me had nothing to do directly with Medicaid, but Scott nonetheless managed to slip it in there anyway. It was his mention of the high cost "consequences" of his magical Medicaid numbers:

This crowds out our ability to invest in K-12 education, state universities and other priorities.

As Floridians well know, Scott has done his best to slash education funds beginning with his first budget and continuing with cuts to higher education along with encouraging "bargain basement degrees." Last year he tried to pretend those first budget cuts never happened by putting a fraction of those cuts back in when it proved damaging to his approval ratings, or the lack thereof. He thought no one would notice those facts either.

Again, nice try.

Now that he remains so unpopular, even though it's two years out, Scott is trying to remake his image as he pins his hopes on reelection. It wouldn't be much of a stretch to assume he plans to put more distance between himself and his education gutting history. Not only has he tried to place blame on the Republicans in the legislature for his cuts, do we assume that now he will also use Medicaid funding and the President's health care law as a scapegoat for his incompetence, and that Floridians are stupid and won't notice that as well? Worse yet, does he plan more education cuts if he's forced to follow the law as intended rather than rewriting the rules to suit himself?

If so, good luck with that. Floridians won't forget, and most aren't that naive.

They know the true scapegoat hasn't been banished to the wilderness, it's running for reelection in 2014.

New Ad Links Mitt Romney and Rick Scott Over Medicare Fraud

 

Medicare Fraud Lawsuit Filed Against Bain Company In Tampa During RNC

On the same day that Vice Presidential nominee Paul Ryan was lying to the RNC about the cuts that President Obama made to Medicare, which actually cut fraud and abuse, a company owned by Bain Captial was embroiled in a lawsuit in Tampa involving the company's alleged fraudulent and illegal practices involving Medicare.

The company, Ameritox, is suing one of its competitors, Millennium Laboratories, a company that provides drug testing services for health care professionals. In Millennium's counterclaim, the filing  alleges that Ameritox has engaged in unlawful schemes designed to maintain and enlarge its business and increase the value of the firm for the venture capital firms that own and control it at the expense of Millennium and the American public.

From the lawsuit:

Ameritox’s most disturbing conduct involves encouraging health care providers to order testing based on the patient’s insurance coverage, not on the basis of medical necessity, a practice that financially benefits Ameritox but works to the detriment of patients and certain third party payers, most notably including the federal Medicare program. This practice has enriched Ameritox’s owners and investors, including Sterling Partners, Bain Capital Venture Partners, LLC, and Sequoia Capital at the expense of the American people. 

These tactics are nothing new for Ameritox: The company has a long and continuing history of offering illegal kickbacks to physicians for referrals. Ameritox’s improper inducements include, but are not limited to, placing personnel in the offices of Ameritox’s customers in violation of state law prohibitions on such placement; providing free or below- market point-of-care testing cups to generate extra revenue for practitioners who use those cups to perform billable testing; and offering other various inducements and kickbacks to practitioners and their medical practices, including gift cards, meals, computers, and office parties.  Ameritox’s fraudulent and illegal practices are pervasive and undertaken as part of a scheme to increase its revenues at the expense of Millennium, other competitors, patients, and the United States. 

Ameritox is notorious for engaging in fraudulent business practices to gain an unfair competitive advantage. In fact, Ameritox currently is operating under government oversight as a result of a Department of Justice (“DOJ”) investigation, which covered an approximately six-year period of time and charged that Ameritox paid kickbacks to induce health care providers to refer Medicare business to Ameritox. Despite being subject to a five- year Corporate Integrity Agreement with the Office of the Inspector General for the Department of Health and Human Services (“OIG”) and promising to change its ways, Ameritox has continued to engage in unlawful and anti-competitive conduct in Florida, California, Texas, and throughout the country that is designed to harm Millennium. 

Ameritox engages in illegal behavior by changing its testing recommendations to physicians based on insurance coverage. Ameritox’s bottom-line driven strategy includes encouraging health care providers to order tests for patients based on whether their insurance coverage provides lucrative reimbursement instead of based on medical need. Thus, Ameritox pushes frequent testing for patients covered by Medicare or other favorable insurance plans but discourages physicians from testing uninsured patients or patients who do not qualify for reimbursement from third-party payers for such tests. 

The filings allege that Ameritox offers financial incentives that flout anti-kickback and unfair financial inducement laws, and that Ameritox continues practices challenged by the DOJ and disallowed in several states.   

In 2010 a laboratory in Texas agreed to pay $16.3 million for a civil settlement with the DOJ: 

A Texas laboratory agreed to pay $16.3 million in a civil settlement with the U.S. Department of Justice.

The settlement is a notable achievement in a continuing campaign against health care fraud in the Tampa Bay area, Robert O’Neill, U.S. Attorney for the Middle District of Florida, said in a statement.

The settlement addresses allegations that Ameritox LTD paid kickbacks to providers in order to induce them to refer Medicare business, according to a statement from O’Neill’s office.

The federal government will receive $15.5 million from the settlement. The rest will be split among various states.

The federal share of the settlement will provide a $3.4 million payout to a former Ameritox sales representative, Debra Maul. Maul filed suit in the Middle District of Florida under the qui tam (whistle blower) provisions of federal legislation that allows private citizens with knowledge of fraud against the government to bring a lawsuit on behalf of the United States and to share in any recovery.

Practices by Ameritox also came to the attention of The Agency for Health Care Administration in 2011, which issued an order to Ameritox, saying that it had to stop sending specimen collectors/processors to physicians’ offices immediately. By doing so, wrote Karen Rivera, a laboratory licensure unit supervisor at AHCA, Ameritox was violating the anti-kickback statute of Florida law.

Ameritox also sued a low wage working grandmother when the doctor's office she worked at fired Ameritox because they weren't happy with their work. The office switched to another laboratory. Because they were happy with the work Pamela Rockwell did, they recommended her to the replacement company which hired her.

Saying she violated a non-compete agreement, Ameritox sued her, claiming that she had "trade secrets." Rockwell feared losing her job due to the lawsuit, a job that pays only $11.50 an hour.

Bain Capital continues to make a profit at the expense of the companies it gobbles up, and at the expense of those who work for them. In the case of Pamela Rockwell, they compound the misery by suing them, while putting them out of a job. Yet Mitt Romney campaigns on his experience at "job creation" and attacks those who point out the human costs of the ways he does business.

At the same time Paul Ryan was in Tampa giving misleading information on Medicare cuts that would cut down on fraud and waste, Mitt Romney's former company was benefiting from those very things. The Medicare cuts that Paul Ryan's plan include, the very same as Obama's, would go back to the companies themselves and not to the benefit of patients as Obama's will.

Last night when Mitt Romney made his nomination acceptance speech, he said this:

Paul Ryan and I understand how the economy works, we understand how Washington works, we will reach across the aisle and find good people who like us, want to make sure this company deals with its challenges. We’ll get America on track again.

Calling the country a "company" may have been a mere slip, but old habits die hard. Mitt Romney himself says, after all, that he wants to run the country like a business. If he succeeds, he'll put profits over people and government services. 

That may be good for companies, but not for Americans.

Correction: In 2010 a laboratory in Texas agreed to pay $16.3 million for a civil settlement with the DOJ. The original post mistakenly said 2012. I have corrected the date above.

Romney, Scott, HCA, Bain and Unnecessary Heart Surgeries

Well, here's another thing Mitt Romney and Rick Scott have in common beyond their knowledge of Medicare fraud issues: Rick Scott's former company HCA and Bain Capital, Romney's former company share a little history of their own.

HCA uncovered evidence that some cardiologists at several of its Florida hospitals were unable to justify many procedures they performed.

In summer 2010, a troubling letter reached the chief ethics officer of the hospital giant HCA, written by a former nurse at one of the company's hospitals in Florida.

In a follow-up interview, the nurse said a doctor at the Lawnwood Regional Medical Center, in the small coastal city of Fort Pierce, had been performing heart procedures on patients who did not need them, putting their lives at risk....

...In less than two months, an internal investigation by HCA concluded the nurse was right.

“The allegations related to unnecessary procedures being performed in the cath lab are substantiated,” according to a confidential memo written by a company ethics officer, Stephen Johnson, and reviewed by The New York Times.

It gets worse:

But the nurse's complaint was far from the only evidence that unnecessary — even dangerous — procedures were taking place at some HCA hospitals, driving up costs and increasing profits.

HCA, the largest for-profit hospital chain in the United States with 163 facilities, had uncovered evidence as far back as 2002 and as recently as late 2010 showing that some cardiologists at several of its hospitals in Florida were unable to justify many of the procedures they were performing. Those hospitals included the Cedars Medical Center in Miami, which the University of Miami now owns, and the Regional Medical Center Bayonet Point in Hudson, near Tampa. In some cases, the doctors made misleading statements in medical records that made it appear the procedures were necessary, according to internal reports.

The article goes on to give examples of the consequences of some of those unnecessary heart surgeries when they were performed, one in which a patient nearly died from a punctured blood vessel and a near-fatal irregular heartbeat.

From the company who, under Gov. Rick Scott had the largest fine in the history of Medicare fraud, you would think they would avoid doing something like this, but apparently not HCA.

HCA said in a statement: “When the company becomes aware of a situation in which we might have a reimbursement obligation, we assess, with outside resources, what our reimbursement obligations might be.”

HCA also declined to show that it had ever notified patients, who might have been entitled to compensation from the hospital for any harm.

Some doctors accused in the reviews of performing unnecessary procedures are still practicing at HCA hospitals.

The cardiologists say the reviews of their work did not accurately reflect the care they provided, and HCA says the reviews “are not, by any means, definitive,” according to an emailed response by the company. HCA says it took whatever steps were necessary to improve patient care. It also said “significant actions were taken to investigate areas of concern, to bring in independent reviewers, and to take action where necessary.”....

...The need to root out Medicare fraud — billing for unnecessary procedures, for example — is high for all hospitals....

But the pressure is even greater for HCA. In 2000, the company reached one of a series of settlements involving a huge Medicare fraud case with the Justice Department that would eventually come to $1.7 billion in fines and repayments. The accusations, which primarily involved overbilling, occurred when Rick Scott, now the governor of Florida, was the company's chief executive. He was removed from the post by the board and was never personally accused of wrongdoing.

What does this have to do with Mitt Romney and Bain Capital? Well, glad you asked:

HCA exemplifies the trend. In 2006, HCA was taken private by a group of private equity firms, including Bain Capital, the firm co-founded by Mitt Romney, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee. (By that time, Romney was no longer a partner in Bain.) By mid-2010, the private equity owners were eager to start cashing out of their investment. While HCA prepared for an initial public offering of its stock that took place in 2011, it borrowed to pay the private equity firms $4.3 billion in dividends.

The ability to take these financial steps hinged on HCA showing continued robust profit growth at its hospitals.

And for that the company turned, in part, to cardiac care.

You can read the entire article here.

This from a pair of "run government like a business" politicians who also vow to end "ObamaCare" at all costs. Unfortunately the costs are paid by the patients at the expense of corporate profits. Businesses operate for profits to benefit their shareholders. Like former shareholders and current ones alike who also want to run the government.

Yes, Rick Scott and Mitt Romney will have all sorts of things to chat about when they come together in Tampa later this month at the RNC. Scott has already begun the transformation of Florida, Inc., and Romney really, really wants to become the CEO of America, Inc. Of course, he has no intentions of showing voters exactly what his bottom line is. That's why he's hiding his tax returns.

So voters have to ask themselves a serious question before they vote in November:

Do they really want to become the victims of Mitt Romney's bottom line? Look how that's working out in Florida. So far.

And look how it worked out for this man:

 

Mitt Romney And Rick Scott May Have More Good Reasons To Avoid Each Other

Florida Governor Rick Scott made a little noise recently that he would like to make a speech at the upcoming Republican Convention in Tampa in August, and why not? His state is hosting the convention and Scott would get to bask in the glow of recognition while introducing the nominee of his party, and goodness knows Scott loves the attention. However, Mitt Romney has been avoiding him ever since he got into the race.

With only about a month to go, he still hasn't been invited. Unfortunately for old Pink Slip Rick, that's not an oversight. When asked about a role for Gov. Scott at the convention, RNC Chairman Reince Priebus said potential speakers were "yet to be determined." Here's his money quote on Scott:

“I mean he’s the hometown governor,” Priebus said. “I’m sure he’s got, I’m sure he’s got plenty, uh, you know, I’m sure there’s a welcome, you know, there’s a lot of protocol there too, so I don’t want to get into the details because I don’t know what the answer to that is yet.”

I think I speak for many when I say "well, uh...well.....OUCH!"

In other words, the Republican Party seems to feel that Rick Scott and his bottom feeder approval ratings would only add more damage to the train wreck that is the GOP, and "protocol" or not, "Rrrrrreince" Priebus would probably rather be abandoned in the python-infested Everglades than follow it by extending an invite to Rick Scott.

Of course, he's not the only one. Mitt Romney has been to Florida around 53 times, and not once has he appeared in the immediate vicinity of Rick Scott. Polls showed that Scott's unpopularity would be bad for Romney, but I don't think that's the only reason. 

I've noticed for quite a while now that Rick Scott and Mitt Romney have a lot in common, and the more we learn about Romney, the more similarities there seem to be.

As I was scanning through the recently released opposition research file on Romney from the McCain campaign in 2008, I came across another similarity, one I had heard referenced months ago but had forgotten about. It's this one:

Back in 1997 there was a man who worked with a company in the medical/health care industry, and that company wound up breaking records for the largest fines for Medicare fraud in U.S. History. Yes, that was Rick Scott, and his company Columbia/HCA, a story that Floridians are well aware of. In spite of the Medicare fraud going on in his company, Rick Scott claimed he had no idea what was going on at the time, and he was never charged. Still, Scott was forced to leave, and he walked away a very rich man.

But just about a year before the Columbia/HCA investigation, there was another man and another company that held the title for highest Medicare fraud fine in U.S. history, the record soon to be broken by Scott and famously written up in textbooks.

That was Mitt Romney:

Romney Was Board Member Of Company Fined Over $100 For Medicare Fraud – At The Time, It Was The Largest Criminal Fine For Health Care Fraud In History

Romney Sat On Board Of Damon Clinical Laboratories, A Bain Capital Portfolio Company Fined Nearly$120 Million In 1996 Due To Medicare Fraud.

“A Needham clinical laboratory agreed yesterday to pay $119 million in criminal and civil fines after pleading guilty to charges that it defrauded the nation’s Medicare system by seeking reimbursements on millions of dollars worth of unnecessary blood tests. … Damon Clinical Laboratories Inc. admitted it tried to boost its profits by submitting the unnecessary tests. The company, the government said, misled doctors into ordering the tests, ensuring that they would be covered by Medicare, the federal health care program for the elderly.”

(Kimberly Blanton, “Needham Lab Fined $ 119m For Fraud,” The Boston Globe, 10/10/96)

Romney Was On Damon’s Board Of Directors While The Fraud Took Place – He Initially Claimed He Was Unaware Of Any Criminal Investigation.

“Mitt Romney, former Republican challenger to US Sen. Edward M.Kennedy, who was a member of Damon’s board, said he was unaware of any investigation. … Romney said that[Damon’s then-CEO Robert] Rosen told the board in about 1992 ‘that all current practices at the company were now in conformity with government regulations and that in the past there may have been practices which would not be deemed appropriate.’”

(Kimberly Blanton, “Needham Lab Fined $ 119m For Fraud,” The Boston Globe, 10/10/96)

“Made Large Profits … From A Criminal Scheme To Fraudulently Bill The Federal Medicare System…”

 “[Romney] and his venture capital firm made large profits from the 1993 sale of a Needham medical testing company whose robust revenues were generated in part from a criminal scheme to fraudulently bill the federal Medicare system for unnecessary blood tests.”

(Frank Phillips, “Romney Profited On Firm Later Tied To Fraud,”

The Boston Globe, 10/10/02

So it may be Rick Scott's glaring unpopularity that has Mr. Priebus, and the Republican party trying to find a delicate way of telling the Governor of Florida why they think it's best if he keep a nice, long, safe distance from the RNC. (Antarctica, perhaps.) Maybe even for the remainder of election season? 

But for Mitt Romney it may also be that when people think of Rick Scott, the words Medicare fraud naturally follow, and who knew, Romney shares yet another little-known similarity with Scott. I imagine it's kind of like looking in the mirror. Two venture capitalists (or as Scott's pal, and Mitt's bettin' buddy Rick Perry calls it: Vulture capitalists) who like to cut corners, make huge profits, and who were both associated with companies that are forever documented in the annals of  Medicare fraud. Talk about bad branding....

Just one more item on the list of what caused John McCain and his crew to run for the hills, or rather Alaska, and take their chances with, gulp,  Sarah Palin. 

And much like Palin, Rick Scott and Mitt Romney are two more disasters the GOP invited to the party, and now they can't get rid of them.

Rick Scott Wants Sick, Poor And Uninsured Floridians To Stay That Way, Refuses To Implement "Obamacare"

Once Again, Rick Scott Thinks The Law Doesn't Apply To Him

Contrary to what he said just days ago, Florida Governor Rick Scott said last night he refuses to comply with President Obama's Affordable Care Act, which was upheld by the Supreme Court this week. He says he won't expand it's Medicaid program which largely benefits the poor and the elderly, the most vulnerable people in need.

This will hardly come as a surprise to many in Florida as Scott has made a practice of cutting nearly everything that would help the poor, the sick, the homeless, children, homeless veterans, and the elderly, just to name a few. It's also no shock that he would turn down money and anything that creates jobs just because it comes from President Obama.

What may cause you to take a step back, think for a minute, think for a few more and then attempt to twist your mind into the equivalent of a brain pretzel in order to see it is his reasoning for doing so.

This is what he told Greta Van Susteren last night on FOX-GOP-TV:

"We're not going to expand Medicaid because we're going to do the right thing."

Scott doesn't go on to elaborate what the "right thing" would be, just assures you he'll do it. Which means "doing the right thing" is basically telling the poor, sick and the elderly they can die destitute before he'll comply with "the wishes" of President Obama no matter what the Supreme Court says. Rick Scott seems to think laws don't apply to him when he disagrees with them. Just ask judges. Instead Scott makes use of mythical math, magical thinking, and his overblown ego combined wtih good old fashioned arrogance to thumb his nose at the President, the Supreme Court, Floridians and the law.

"We're not going to implement Obamacare in Florida, we're not going to expand Medicaid because we're going to do the right thing," Scott said Friday night during an interview on Fox News. He also said the Medicaid expansion would cost Florida taxpayers $1.9 billion a year, but it's unclear how he arrived at that figure. Emails sent to Scott's staff were not immediately returned Saturday.

Scott said the state will not expand the Medicaid program in order to lower the number of uninsured residents, nor will Florida set up a state-run health exchange, a marketplace where people who need insurance policies could shop for them.

"We care about having a health care safety net for the vulnerable Floridians, but this is an expansion that just doesn't make any sense," he told Fox host Greta Van Susteren.

What doesn't make sense are Scott's excuses. Never mind that the state could get around $2 billion. Never mind that it would extend coverage to those with low incomes. Never mind that Florida is third in the nation with the highest percentage of the uninsured and drives costs higher for all of us. Never mind that along with that federal money comes job creation.

Never mind that it would save lives.

The former Columbia/HCA hospital chain owner, who should understand all this quite well, says Florida "can't afford" to implement the Medicaid expansion:

"I don't know how we're ever going to be able to afford it," Scott said. "Look at how tough our budgets are."

"Look how tough our budgets are" says the man who makes budget cuts with such relish that he has personalized red Sharpies made just for the occasion, surrounding himself with human shields in the form of the very school children who are some of his biggest victims. Every time Rick Scott merely says the words "tough and budget" the neediest among us is sacrificed as funds are shifted elsewhere.

It must take great deal of self control for Scott to keep a straight face to say "we just can't afford it" on camera. But hey, budgets are tough and numbers are even harder for Scott. Especially the ones that don't add up. There would be a lot more money in the budget if Scott didn't hand out $1 billion contributions in corporate welfare on our behalf tax cuts for "job creators" for jobs he can't justify, while cutting unemployment benefits at the same time.

Nope. Scott has his own "math" and in part controls the numbers, but says "we can't afford" the Medicaid program. Instead, he'll just "do the right thing." He can give tax cuts for the next three years to a business in exchange for jobs that may never materialize, but won't give a penny to the poor even if their lives depend on it.

Well, guess what Governor Scott? Their lives depend on it.

Just as he ignores numbers he doesn't like, Scott seems to think laws that everyone else has to live by don't apply to him and his "kingdom." When the Affordable Care Act became law, Scott said he wouldn't implement the law in Florida. He said "It's not the law of the land. I don't believe it will ever be the law of the land."

It was the law then and it's the law now, and what's Scott doing about it? He's sitting there in Tallahassee with his Rick Scott Sharpies wearing his Rick Scott custom made alligator big boy governor boots, pretending he's "Supreme Executive" of "the land" where laws don't apply and where people die every day without health insurance, talking tough saying he won't implement the Affordable Care Act and you can't make him! And why?

Because it's "Obamacare" that's why!

Mitt Romney's Deep Medicare Cuts Would Hurt Florida Seniors

Mitt Romney's Medicare plan is similar to the Ryan plan, but with even deeper cuts. The Ryan plan would end Medicare as we know it and replace it with a "voucher," (read: Coupon) leaving seniors to fend for themselves, shopping around for health insurance with that yet to be determined voucher. Since Romney plans to repeal "Obamacare" that would mean no more protection from pre-existing conditions. For a senior, that would mean having to search all over again for insurance that would even cover them, period. (Romney has yet to divulge many specifics, but for more on what his proposed budget cuts would require, you can take a look here.) 

Mitt Romney's Medicare plan would basically mean: You're on your own. 

 

 

Rick Scott, Mitt Romney, And Medicare Fraud

One of these things is much like the other?