Letters to the Editor

Readers write: Letters to the editor, June 30, 2015

Odd dissent from Roberts

I am ecstatic that the Supreme Court has upheld marriage rights for gay folk and on solid grounds (the 14th Amendment). If two adults freely pledge their lives to each other, they are married and that marriage should be recognized.

But did Chief Justice Roberts in his dissent truly call this "disheartening" to "those who believe in a government of laws not of men?" Only yesterday he said that allowing Obamacare subsidies only for state-run exchanges also meant that subsidies would be allowed for federal exchanges because "the context and structure of the act compel us to depart from what would otherwise be the most natural reading ..." Or , translated: "words don't always mean what they say."

Roberts reminds me of a quote sometimes attributed to Winston Churchill. He asked a woman if she would sleep with him for five million pounds and she said she would.

"How about five pounds?"

"What kind of woman do you think I am?"

"We've already established that. I'm trying to haggle the price."

Pam Siegfried

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Anchorage

Expanding Medicaid won’t fix Alaska’s broken system

Kudos to Phyllis Jost for asking what Medicaid providers think of Medicaid expansion (Letters, June 24). I've accepted Medicaid (as a board certified psychiatrist) since 1990 but can no longer afford to do so. The State of Alaska and its "vendor" Xerox haven't paid claims accurately since 2012.

I've spent countless hours listening to excuses like "That's a known problem: We'll deal with it when we get around to it," while their incompetence drags on and on. Xerox makes excuses and the Department of Health and Human Services enables it. I get numerous calls daily (including patients denied care by the Anchorage Community Mental Health Center, a state and federally government subsided agency) trying to find a doctor who will take Medicaid. When the State of Alaska won't take insurance provided by the State of Alaska, that should be a wake-up call. I can't continue to shift the cost of "Medicaid free care" to my other patients, just to cover Medicaid overhead: That isn't fair.

Alaska Medicaid is so broken that expanding it is absurd. A Medicaid card won't get you psychiatric care in this state (even with state employed psychiatrists), and I doubt it's any different for any other medical care. Deal with the Medicaid Xerox nightmare before expanding it.

Merijeanne Moore

Anchorage

The views expressed here are the writer's own and are not necessarily endorsed by Alaska Dispatch News, which welcomes a broad range of viewpoints. To submit a piece for consideration, email commentary(at)alaskadispatch.com.

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