John Oliver has been very clear: He wants nothing to do with the 2016 election until its events become relevant to American lives.
Which is why Sunday’s episode of “Last Week Tonight” focused on the 2015 election and the issue that, in Oliver’s opinion, we are ignoring: the Medicaid Gap.
“There are American lives at stake here,” Oliver said. “Because a number of these elections could determine whether hundreds of thousands of people remain in or even fall into what’s known as the Medicaid Gap. I know that sounds like a terrible clothing chain where you can buy khaki hospital gowns sewn by children in India, but, amazingly, it’s even worse than that.”
Put simply, the Medicaid Gap, according to Oliver, is when citizens make too much money to qualify for Medicaid, but not enough to afford healthcare costs.
“So, on Tuesday, even if you don’t live in a state holding an election, spare a thought for the people who do because the results may ultimately affect the health of half a million people,” Oliver said. “And of course, one ridiculous looking animal.”
Watch the segment, from HBO, below:
That ain’t the only one but it ranks high on the list.
Plus, he uses the word ‘we’ like it means all of ‘us’ and basically it means the Republican candidates, Party and their establishment.
A full blown Obamacare minus the blocking and hold backs by the Repubs would include fixes for everything. ‘We’ would really like that and realize the need but ‘we’ have a Congress that works against ‘us’ and for a minority of lunatics.
John Oliver rocks but he can’t get caught up in that, ‘both sides do it’, laziness.
My local tv news was pointing this out in a brief segment they had on the coming rising cost of insurance. A self employed guy’s insurance was going up substantially from an already kind of high cost, but he made too much for medicaid. And if he doesn’t get it he faces stiff fines.
The best part was at the end of the segment when he pointed out the GOP candidate didn’t buy insurance for his business because he couldn’t afford it, and took government grants to rebuild it, and he said “that should ring a fucking bell.”
At some point, maybe John Oliver will understand that for the most part the people in these Medicare Gap states generally vote Republican, and always will. Elections do have consequences, and right now these people are LIVING their consequences. It certainly sucks to be them, yet in my new way of thinking, this is precisely how our system of Democracy works. Remember, Obamacare is still barely at a 50% approval rating, even by those currently accessing benefits. People are very ignorant, and you really can’t save them, i.e. Kansas.
And what about those in the Medigap who don’t vote Republican? Do they not matter? They are certainly not the majority of voters anywhere.