OUR VIEW: Anyone who views Obamacare exchanges as a gold-mine shouldn't be in charge of creating the rules for health exchanges.
Governor Hickenlooper has now badly botched appointments to two boards. Yesterday, it was the news that both top donors to his campaign and disgraced Adams County Sheriff Doug Darr were appointed by Hickenlooper to the Gaming Commission, after he summarily removed all of the previous members for voting for a tax cut for casinos.
Today it's Michael Booth of The Denver Post pointing out some serious conflicts of interest from Hickenlooper's appointments to the newly-created health-insurance-exchange board.
From the damning article:
"Four of the board's nine members are executives with managed-care or insurance companies likely to benefit from the many Coloradans who will buy insurance and care through the exchanges. Hundreds of millions of dollars in state spending and new federal subsidies are in play as the board designs the exchange.
…Eric Grossman, the TriZetto vice president appointed to the board by Gov. John Hickenlooper, recently wrote an article exhorting health-insurance executives, "There's gold in exchanges — here's how to stake your claim."
You can practically smell the corruption emanating from this mess. Executives are simply not going to vote against their company’s (and their own) financial interests, especially ones that smelled the blood in the water as soon as the idea was proposed. A Hickenlooper spokesperson said there was nothing inherently bad about the appointments, though they admitted to not knowing about the “gold-mine” statement prior to the appointment.
Real bang-up job on vetting. Has the Hick admin heard of The Google or The Internets?
This is like appointing the sitting President of Lockheed Martin to the Defense Acquisition Board.
Whether you love or hate exchanges, we don’t know of anyone who would want it to become a vessel for corporate welfare.
Hickenlooper may be sitting pretty politically for now, but with continued bad decisions like this, he will see his poll numbers fall fast.
But God forbid anyone from the oil and gas companies sit on their oversight board. Too corrupt, you see. Hypocrites.
Experts are credible. Except when they’re tied to “big oil.” This health insurance exchange is a sham and it has been from the start!
Usually I am with you guys, but this blatant attempt at distorting the record and is just going WAY too far for me.
A. Everywhere in the article does it prove that a MINORITY of the board has “supposed conflicts of interest”, which is all according to the staff writer at the Denver Post (I will let their recent “record” speak for itself), add to the fact that the Booth article completely clears up on of the conflicts AT THE END OF IT’S OWN STORY!!!!
B. Since when do you so-called “Republicans” attack having the best available expert appointed to boards and commissions where innovation is actually encouraged??
C. God knows what kind of message you are sending to these crazy tea-bag activists about “Denver Post” corroborated corruption theories (since they all wear tin-foil hats and dodge black helicopters on the weekends already)
D. Since when do free thinking Republicans go after professional experts who know how to make the system work! We are a party built around innovation and ROI! I would much rather have somebody who knows how to make this type of program work for everyone involved versus a professional bureaucrat or someone with a regulatory background (which is the only other alternative)
SHAME ON PEAK!!!
How do you rationalize a business interest who says he’s got a bullet proof plan to make loot off of Obamacare actually building the program? This whole thing seems like it’s set up to turn into corporate welfare for insurance companies — on top of all the other bad stuff intuitively wrong with Obamacare.
You could get healthcare experts, even industry folks, who no longer run companies looking to make loot. At least industry folks who haven’t already talked about gaming the system.
since I actually CARE about making the system work for everyone involved! …ya know, because I WANT professional innovators responsible for knowing where all the angles are…you socialist pig.
He is one person with one vote on the commission.
I agree,Underground. Both sides are being hypocritical here. Republicans cry when industry experts aren’t allowed on the Oil & Gas Commission, but they scream corruption when the Health Care Exchange is involved? Democrats are doing the same thing on the opposite side. Each side needs to pick a story and stick with it. Stop cherry-picking your positions based on the industry.
Wrong — the oil and gas commission doesn’t dole out government cheese by setting terms of taxpayer reimbursement etc.
If an oil and gas commissioner wrote a column “how to game the permitting process and get rich”, you can bet he wouldn’t be long for the commission.
the bottom line is Hick botched the pick with Grossman, and unlike most predecessors, his appointments are more controversial than they should be. Let’s also not forget Ellen Golombek’s appointment to head the Dept of Labor/Employment.
That said, unlike his gaming commission and Golombek appointment, thankfully his dangerous picks are in the minority here. westernreserve, you are correct that the liberal machine would scream bloody murder if an oil and gas commission nominee had said something comprable.