Here's giving Obama a little credit re: the jobs bill.

[county worker]

Since I have been criticizing Obama for what I think is watered down bills coming from Congress I thought I would give equal time to praising him.

This is about the portion of the jobs bill going to Medicaid. I work for an alcohol, drug and mental health services department in a county in California so I have first hand knowledge of the following.

Medicaid is money paid to states for medical services provided to citizens, generally adults but at times children also. It is a form of health insurance for low income persons. In the 70's and 80's states passed on to counties their responsibility to provide services. The term used to describe it was realignment. In CA the medicaid money paid to counties to provide services is called Medi-Cal. The Medi-Cal reimbursement was 50% of the cost of the service provided. The other 50% came from state sales tax and vehicle license fees, State and Federal Grants and county general funds.

In Oct of 2009, the reimbursement was raised to 61.59%. The new 11.59% came from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act or stimulus money. It was scheduled to end in 12-31-10. The new jobs bill extends that until 06-30-11.

Since counties cannot operate in a deficit situation our expenses must equal our revenue.

The stimulus money meant that we could offer more services to people with alcohol and drug problems such as pregnant women, first time offenders etc. We could also treat more poor people with mental health problems. We could also offer more services to homeless people.

Our budget for our fiscal year 10-11 did not include six months of the extra 11.59% because it was slated to end in Dec, 2010. Because of the jobs bill it will not end until 06-30-11. So we can offer more of the above services than we had budgeted for. The money is not used for admin or overhead costs only costs of services.


So Obama will be helping more people in our county to get mental health services, homeless services and drug and alcohol problem services.

[global1]

1. Thanks For Telling Us - I Bet MSM Won't Be Telling This To Us.....

they only pile on him for Bush's foibles.

[OHdem10]

2. Here is another important point which should be more emphasized.

For years the Multinational Corps. have been subsidized
for sending jobs overseas. Part of JKerry's platform as
Pres. Cand., was to get rid of this subsidy.

FINALLY, they have taken these subsidies away from Business
and are using the funds to pay for this jobs bill for Middle
Class. This is huge and no one discusses it. This is the
sort of Communications failure for which I fault Gibbs.

The Bill has been paid for and does not add to the deficit.

[Beetwasher]

3. Yup, I Posted A Story About This The Other Day, It Was Pretty Much Ignored

This will effect my organization as well in a very positive way.