Monday, September 26, 2011

Fayetteville Observer Chucks Truth Under the Bus




I’m beginning to believe that all newspapers in North Carolina are liberal rags. The Charlotte Observer published an editorial by the Fayetteville Observer entitled, “State Budget Chucks Many Services Under the Bus”. And here is how this article leads off:

Which of North Carolina's schools for the deaf do you plan to close? Or would you prefer to shut down a school for the blind, instead?

The choice is real, but don't complain. At least you were offered a voice this time. So which will it be? The Eastern North Carolina School for the Deaf, in Wilson, or the North Carolina School for the Deaf, in Morganton? No dawdling, because if neither is chosen you can kiss the Governor Morehead School for the Blind goodbye.

That isn't conjecture. It's the law - our newly right-sized, fiscally responsible state budget.

Are you shocked? Are you shamed? Poor little deaf and blind kids are about to be denied an education by those evil republican state legislatures.

I can hear it now: Are there no prisons? Are there no workhouses?

But what the scumbag editors at the Fayetteville Disturber didn’t tell you is that these three residential schools have only 220 students. That is about 73 students per school. Would it not be cost effective to consolidate? Apparently, not to the spendthrifts at the Fayetteville Disturber.

Let’s explore this feigned outrage even further. Not only is the North Carolina GOP children haters; they also despise the mentally ill:

There was a warning of another sort when, earlier this year, the federal government ordered the state to stop using Medicaid to warehouse people with mental illnesses among the residents of elder-care homes. There was a deadline, now past. If those homes lose their Medicaid eligibility, both the mentally ill and many seniors will be left with nothing.

Unfortunately, that was only the insult, not the injury. Along with public schools and the pre-kindergarten program, lawmakers had already targeted funding for mental health programs as well. These are the same programs that have been struggling to restore stability to a system that has been reeling from poor judgment and insufficient resources for a decade.

Let's tally up. That takes care of the mentally ill, the poor, the elderly, the sick, preschoolers, K-12 students and ... Oh yes: Will it be the visually impaired, or the hearing-impaired?

Do the editors at the Disturber consider fraud poor judgment? I know perpetrators consider taxpayer largess to be insufficient, as would many bank robbers. Many of these “warehouses” have been committing fraud since the inception of Medicaid:

As many as 1,200 mentally ill adults, scores of them living in the Lake Norman area, could be forced out of assisted-living facilities as the state tries to enforce a Medicaid rule concerning mental health care centers.

The rule requires assisted-living facilities with more than 16 beds have no more than half of their residents diagnosed with a mental illness. The rule is decades old, but the state is now asking the homes to comply or fall under the designation of “institution of mental disease.” Mentally ill residents in those facilities cannot receive Medicaid funding.

To comply with the state’s new initiative, officials say assisted-living facilities will have to kick out mentally ill residents into an already overstretched mental health system that is not prepared to handle the deluge.

“It’s a disaster in the making,” said Deby Dihoff, state executive director of the National Alliance for Mentally Illness, “because we’re catching up with decades of neglect in the housing options for the mental ill at a time when there are few beds and no money to increase those options.”

The Medicaid law, passed in 1965, had the provision regarding assisted-living facilities. North Carolina, however, looked the other way and allowed the mentally ill to fill those beds because it eased waiting lists and opened up beds in its psychiatric hospitals across the state, said Amy Hart, owner and administrator of Hunter Village assisted-living center in Huntersville and Crown Colony in Mooresville.


Looked the other way? They were defrauding the taxpayers! And I want to know what these teat suckers consider mentally ill. I have hundreds of examples of people, companies, and hospitals who’ve screwed over the citizens of this state via Medicaid. And I wouldn’t doubt that many of these “warehousers” have committed their share of padding the books. Hell, what am I saying they committed fraud!

But what is the law to the editors of the Fayetteville and Charlotte Disturbers. They only care about scoring political points and redistributing the wealth.


Read more: http://www.charlotteobserver.com/2011/09/25/2637573/state-budget-chucks-many-services.html#ixzz1Z6bMupHq

http://www.alldeaf.com/current-events/91596-north-carolina-school-deaf-jeopardy-closing-once-again.html







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