The War on Poverty is on the Wrong Battlefield!

The history of Medicaid and Peach Care for Kids and how to shore up funding discrepancies has been an annual theme over the last few legislative sessions in Georgia. In 2007, in the wake of a $131 million government funding shortfall, Georgia’s Peach Care for Kids program slammed the door shut on new enrollments. The State House responded by restricting the terms for enrollment in the program while still avoiding the retroactive application of the new terms. Unwilling to see children of working poor denied medical care, Governor Perdue robbed from Peter to pay Paul and dipped into Medicaid funding to cover the difference temporarily.

In the malaise of the 2008 Legislative Session, where the urgency of drought and transportation issues reduced much of the healthcare funding debate to a waterlogged hit-and-run victim, Governor Perdue called for funding that would not hurt taxpayers while the State continued to wish upon the Federal SCHIP star. At the time, the Administration had already handed down a rule requiring 95 percent of SCHIP eligible children – including those with incomes up to 200 percent of the federal poverty limit or a little over $40 grand for a family four – to be enrolled. After all, good medical care is an entitlement.

In the dramatic shake up and exchange of management power in the much beleaguered Grady Hospital debacle, Georgians became acutely aware of funding shortages. Everything from grabbing funding from the Feds to funding through percentages of collections from traffic violators was proposed.

The main issue in providing healthcare for the working poor is whether Georgia taxpayers should be obligated to supplement the medical care of others. Ultimately, this care should be carried out by a myriad of non profit organizations, employer programs, church and other religious institutions and not be a government imposed obligation. The SCHIP program, Peach Care, and yes, even Medicaid, create a permanent dependency through assured availability. Too often there is poor oversight of the funds going out and allocation of those funds can very quickly become a political, rather than a needs-based franchise. It becomes too easy to game the system, witness ever-rising healthcare costs.

The other factor is the obsessive focus on trauma care over preventive care. According to the Georgia Department of Community Health, Georgia ranks 14th in the United States in adult obesity. No wonder we also rank 15th for the highest obesity rates for children ages 10 to 17. Governor Perdue addressed much of the need for change in focus when he signed HB 977 last year, encouraging insurance companies to offer high deductible insurance products to individuals and families.

A fundamental misconception that drives arguments for taxpayer funded healthcare programs for the working poor is the belief that this group occupies a “permanent poor” status. Consequently, the focus shifts from providing incentives to climb to another class level to maintaining status quo healthcare. It is fatalism in both principle and practice. It has existed ever since Lyndon Johnson declared his “War on Poverty” and enlisted the March of the Great Society by tinkering with the mechanics of New Deal programs like “Aid to Families with Dependent Children”.

In reality, statistical snapshots rarely distinguish between people with low current incomes and those with permanently low incomes. Three-fourths of Americans with incomes in the bottom 20 percent in 1975 were also in the top 40 percent at some point in the next 20 years. The vast majority of Americans in any income bracket are transient in those brackets. This economic truth should inspire us to fit policy with economic reality rather than a romanticized perception of the way things are.

Defining Conservatism in a Brave New World

Conservatism as a philosophy has vacillated between political parties throughout our history. The political framework of the 1870s held Democrats as the party of smaller government, lower taxes, civil rights and the like. Reconstruction Republicans would have done away with such principles. JFK championed tax cuts before the Carter Administration worked to put the traditional Conservative platform issues in the hands of Republicans and paved the way for the rise of Reaganomics. In light of the TARP funding that saw bipartisan support last Fall, many are now drawing delineations between Conservatives and the current Republican Party. In such a climate, it is important to define one’s self as a Conservative first and by their party affiliation second in order to steer a Conservative column as a true Conservative. As a Conservative, I build on what Abraham Lincoln articulated, that it involves “…adherence to the old and tried, against the new and untried.” More specifically, F.J.C. Hearnshaw identified several canons of Conservative thought, honed by Russell Kirk, with which I agree. Conservatism posits a 1) Belief in a transcendent order where it follows that all political problems are ultimately peripheral representations of moral issues. Politics are the stage act on which the theatre of ideas performs. No one was more illogical than Senator John Kerry when he said during the 2003 campaign frenzy that he “does not allow [his] personal values to influence his policy decisions.” What are policy decisions if not personal values embodied in legislative form?! Conservatism also shows 2) An appreciation for diversity of thought over a homogenized cultural system of utilitarianism and egalitarianism. 3) A belief that civilized society requires order and classes as both an irrepressible reality and a necessary social mechanism. 4) A belief that freedom and property are closely linked and that while policy should aim for equality of opportunity, it cannot insure nor should it try to insure equality of outcome. 5) Custom, convention and tradition are indispensable guides that provide a hedge against anarchy, impulsive change and the innovator’s lust for power. And finally, 6) society must adapt prudently in order to preserve itself. Conservatives stand against failed systems of government such as collectivism (socialism), romanticism (feelings without critical logic analysis), utilitarianism (which has led too often to political expediency) along with moral relativism, secular humanism and other Leftist philosophies. As Burke writes, “vainglorious man in the role of guide, equipped with a map compiled from his own abstractions, would lead society to destruction.” I am a Conservative because I stand against these distractions and hold to a belief that it is our role to manage the systems of government and society but it is beyond our ability to redeem those systems to perfection. Our role is Manager, not Savior, the mistaken notion that drives so many Leftist ideologues to waste resources in an effort to supplant Heaven on Earth.