Shelby County GOP

[Edit 6/9: I doubt Shelby County GOP, or any of the Alabama GOP delegation in Washington, or any of the Republican candidates in the Alabama Senate election, has interest in anything I have to say about health care, let alone engage in discussion with me. I will nonetheless use this blog entry as a platform for a multi-part discussion driving off my previous discussion of health care that is linked below.]

Dear Shelby County AL GOP,

You tweeted the below tweet, which gives a link to 'Free' Government-Funded Health Care, by Robert Weissburg, dated June 6, 2017, published in American Thinker on line magazine.

'Free' Government-Funded Health Care https://t.co/AbWx6VgbXp #alpolitics

— Shelby County AL GOP (@ShelbyCountyGOP) June 6, 2017

I think intelligent and honest discussion of health care would be in the interest of Alabamians.

I have been endeavoring to initiate such discussion in this blog, which discussion can be accessed by starting at Health care and following links to other blog entries.

I think Rep. Palmer, other members of the Alabama delegation in Washington, and the candidates in the Alabama Senate race have not been responsive to engaging in intelligent and honest discussion about health care.

Would the Shelby County GOP be willing to engage in a health care discussion with me?

Such discussion could be done by Shelby County GOP in the person of an interested, willing and knowledgeable officer or other member, or an outsider whom Shelby County GOP is in a position to call on to participate in discussion.

I understand if Shelby County GOP is unwilling to engage in discussion; however, since Shelby County GOP took upon itself to tweet a link to the aforesaid article on Twitter using the #alpolitics hashtag, it is fair to ask Shelby County GOP to engage in discussion growing out of the same.

Thank you for your attention to this.

Part I (6/11) Honest and intelligent discussion
The Montgomery Advertiser published today, Alabama Senate race: GOP candidates differ on proposed Medicaid changes, by Brian Lyman.
The article evidences honest and intelligent recognition by the candidates that there is a significant correlation between the amount of funding for Medicaid and the quantum and benefits of health care services that are received by persons served by Medicaid, subject to there being room for making Medicaid a more efficient program so that the same quantum and benefits of health care services may be delivered for a lesser amount. It would seem very problematic, however, to quantify in advance how much can be saved by greater efficiency, and even difficult to measure the same after the fact. Hopefully the candidates will be honest about this to the voters, and eschew the dishonesty of Tom Price and Donald Trump in this regard.
This extends to CBO scoring. Such scoring generally makes projections about future events and projections about the future are generally problematic. It is fine to point out instances when CBO scoring in the past turned out imperfectly and maybe very imperfectly. By the same token, all projections about future events are problematic, and those attacking CBO scoring need to subject their own projections to scrutiny. I will return to this particularly regarding assertions and projections about health insurance premiums and deductions being reduced in the future.