Contempt For Rural America Creates Health-Hazard Zones

[Milchshake]

Ongoing in; Hating the Rural Voters You Need Electorally

All liberalism tried to do was expand Medicaid. Which turns out is a way to help fund rural hospitals, and rural nursing homes. Governors in places like Oklahoma and Iowa are doing their best to roll back medicaid. Medicaid is also imperiled by block grants that the Trump Administration is pushing. Alaska is reeling from the severe Medicaid cuts proposed by its new Republican governor, Mike Dunleavy. Now Dunleavy reportedly wants the state to become the nation’s first voluntary block grant victim.

Maine voters famously had to pass their Medicaid expansion themselves. Only to have the governor they also elected, to thwart them at every turn.
Nebraska voters also passed their Medicaid expansion themselves. Only to have the governor they also elected, to thwart them at every turn.

‘Who’s going to take care of these people?’
As emergencies rise across rural America, a hospital fights for its life

Employees crammed into Tina Steele’s office at Fairfax Community Hospital, where the air conditioning was no longer working and the computer software had just been shut off for nonpayment.

“I want to start with good news,” Steele said, and she told them a food bank would make deliveries to the hospital and Dollar General would donate office supplies.

“So how desperate are we?” one employee asked. “How much money do we have in the bank?”

“Somewhere around $12,000,” Steele said.

“And how long will that last us?”

“Under normal circumstances?” Steele asked. She looked down at a chart on her desk and ran calculations in her head. “Probably a few hours,” she said. “Maybe a day at most.”

The staff had been fending off closure hour by hour for the past several months, ever since debt for the 15-bed hospital surpassed $1 million and its outside ownership group entered into bankruptcy, beginning a crisis in Fairfax that is becoming familiar across much of rural America.

More than 100 of the country’s remote hospitals have gone broke and then closed in the past decade, turning some of the most impoverished parts of the United States into what experts now call “health-hazard zones,” and Fairfax was on the verge of becoming the latest.

The emergency room was down to its final four tanks of oxygen. The nursing staff was out of basic supplies such as snakebite antivenin and strep tests. Hospital employees had not received paychecks for the past 11 weeks and counting.

[PosPosPos]

Here's the funny part: those voters will still vote Republican come the next major election.

There's nothing anyone can do to save these idiots from themselves, just quarantine them off and let them earn Darwin awards for the sake of the rest of civilization.

[Dontrike]

You get what you elect for, hopefully some good can come at the end of this but this is why you don't elect Fu kers that hate healthcare.

[Kaleredar]

They're being convinced that welfare queens in the coastal cities sucking up money and illegal immigrants stealing their jobs are the source of all their problems.

[Wyrt]

They're the political version of anti-vaxxers.

[Smauldy]

Here in Alabama, we're closing rural hospitals left and right due to the governor's(he was forced to resign in disgrace due to an affair)choice a few years ago where he refused to expand medicaid to "make a political point."

However, the rural voters will continue to vote Republican against their own best interests due to the "God N Guns" mentality.

[Spectral]

Is it a moral imperative for the residents of more populous areas to subsidize hospitals in rural areas that don't actually have enough demand for a full service hospital? I don't think that's actually obvious at all. One of the downsides to living rural is that you won't have access to things that scale better with population centers. We don't actually have unlimited funds and it's not clear to me why the residents of cities are obliged to fund the ever-increasing expenses of rural hospitals on a higher per capita basis than what their own urban hospitals receive.

[Togashii]

They vote for people who gut their healthcare, then cry about it? Too fucking bad and I hope they suffer long and hard. Because they are getting exactly what they wanted.

[Draco-Onis]

As others have said this is what these people vote for, it's not on us to save them from themselves.

[Doctor Amadeus]

Don’t care. If they voted Trump they picked this.

[Adam Jensen]

Maine voters famously had to pass their Medicaid expansion themselves. Only to have the governor they also elected

He was not the governor the people elected. Almost 60% of Maine voted for someone else. Unfortunately, that someone else was two someones. As such, LePage was immensely unpopular among Mainers and the will of Maine, the will of that 60% frequently clashed with LePage.

LePage had a strong following, those who voted for him, but while the Dems did not have such a strong following (which is why he won), those who voted independent identified better with the Dems than the Republicans.

So don't word this like we were going against a guy who's principles we voted for. Because the majority of Mainers didn't.

[beanman12345]

The only people I feel for are the employee's who hadn't been paid in 3 months. But these people are in demand and can come to the blue states where we will happily pay them to keep us healthy.

[Milchshake]

He was not the governor the people elected. Almost 60% of Maine voted for someone else. Unfortunately, that someone else was two someones. As such, LePage was immensely unpopular among Mainers and the will of Maine, the will of that 60% frequently clashed with LePage.

LePage had a strong following, those who voted for him, but while the Dems did not have such a strong following (which is why he won), those who voted independent identified better with the Dems than the Republicans.

So don't word this like we were going against a guy who's principles we voted for. Because the majority of Mainers didn't.

Independents throwing away their votes which always helps a reactionary get elected.... for the nth time.

How many times does this need to happen before independents learn the lesson? At some point independents need to own up to this.

Basically their contempt for the Fence Post Voting and 2 party politics … causes them to lose out on policies they really want. Which leads to more contempt.

Self ownage on a loop.


Also these same voters keep electing Susan Collins is another point against them. Dunno how Maine voter logic spins her always winning.

[Adam Jensen]

Independents throwing away their votes which always helps a reactionary get elected.... for the nth time.

How many times does this need to happen before independents learn the lesson? At some point independents need to own up to this.

Basically their contempt for the Fence Post Voting and 2 party politics … causes them to lose out on policies they really want. Which leads to more contempt.

Self ownage on a loop.


Also these same voters keep electing Susan Collins is another point against them. Dunno how Maine voter logic spins her always winning.

Well, they came to their senses and voted in Ranked Choice Voting to avoid this from happening in the future.

[Z-Man]

Lower taxes, fewer services, own the libs. Close enough hospitals and they won't need to pay that socialist health insurance, too.

(I swear, once the rural elite figure out city folk drive cars, they'll start digging up their roads.)

[Ivanstone]

Independents throwing away their votes which always helps a reactionary get elected.... for the nth time.

How many times does this need to happen before independents learn the lesson? At some point independents need to own up to this.

Basically their contempt for the Fence Post Voting and 2 party politics … causes them to lose out on policies they really want. Which leads to more contempt.

Self ownage on a loop.


Also these same voters keep electing Susan Collins is another point against them. Dunno how Maine voter logic spins her always winning.

Elliot Cutler got 36% of the vote in 2010. He only got 9% in 2014. In either case those are relatively strong showings for an independent. Barbara Merrill won 20% of the vote in 2006.

Maine likes their independents. Senator Angus King is also an independent. He also won two terms as Governor whilst being an independent.

Ok, they finally got buttfucked by LePage but its not like they have this history of shitty little spoilers stealing votes from better candidates.

[jeezusisacasual]

Here in Alabama, we're closing rural hospitals left and right due to the governor's(he was forced to resign in disgrace due to an affair)choice a few years ago where he refused to expand medicaid to "make a political point."

However, the rural voters will continue to vote Republican against their own best interests due to the "God N Guns" mentality.

Want to know the difference between Alabama and my home state Wyoming? You guys atleast have good food.

This is further reason as to why we need a nationalized healthcare system to help those who do not even understand the lack of availability will cause them going forward. The funny part is even here when i speak of various social programs they tend to agree and think well that sounds like a union in how it works the pricing system. But they honestly think that the Republicans will do it for them its insane.

[Kallisto]

They vote for people who gut their healthcare, then cry about it? Too fucking bad and I hope they suffer long and hard. Because they are getting exactly what they wanted.

All that needs to be said about these people.

[NoiseTank13]

You get what you vote for.

I'd say let Darwin take care of things, but I also know the current Republican establishment will just demand the dirty coastal elite to come bail out their constituents like they always do.

[Sunseeker]

I mean, I hate to be cruel but I live around these people. They'll complain about the gubbermint not giving them their welfare/ssi/ssdi/handouts with one cheek and then turn around and vote for every politician who champions privatizing everything and cutting public services.

They're idiots. Plain and simple. They're hypocrites and they're idiots. And they're getting what they're voting for.