#ncga: Jones St. RATS move on Dale Folwell
Dale Folwell was an outspoken, passionate conservative during his time in the North Carolina House. He ran for — and won — the position of state treasurer in 2016. One of the top constitutional responsibilities of the treasurer is to administer the state health plan.
Folwell oversaw the employment security commission for Pat McCrory, and got that sorry mess straightened out. He has a record of straightening out messes. So why not let him take a crack at the over-extended state health plan, and try to save the taxpayers some money while he’s at it?
The state employees association — whose members are most affected by whatever Folwell does — is all FOR letting Folwell work his magic on the health plan.
The treasurer mainly wants to implement some transparency — get providers to tell the health plan exactly what they’re billing state employees. Folwell is also willing to allow the providers to keep a healthy markup on their billings — just not the astronomical gouging-territory percentages they’ve been getting from the health plan over the years.
Sound reasonable? Yeah. SO, what’s the problem?
The hospitals and other providers — who line legislator campaign coffers very generously are not happy with being forced into fiscal responsibility with OUR MONEY. They’ve banded together to fund a vicious, falsehood-laden PR campaign against Folwell and his plans for the state health plan. We’re also being told that an aggressive search is on for a primary opponent for Folwell.
The hospital association has stepped things up by reaching out to some of the legislators they’ve purchased over the years. A new bill clipping Folwell’s wings and restricting his ability to change the way the health plan is administered has been introduced in the House. The weasels who put their names on it as sponsors? Julia Howard (R). Josh Dobson (R – International Man of Legislative Mystery). William Brisson (R). Gale Adcock (D).
The proposed legislation calls for a “legislative study” of the state health plan designed to drag on well past the 2020 elections. Hopefully, for the sponsors, their hand-picked challenger to Folwell will have knocked the incumbent treasurer off by that time. 
You can include the names of Speaker Tim Moore and Rules chairman David Lewis on this legislation too. (NOTHING, and I mean NOTHING, happens on the House floor without their blessings.)
Sponsoring and /or Voting for THIS basically says you care more about sleazy, illicit special interest cash from lobbyists than you do about the folks you claim to care about and represent back home.
We’ll be watching to see who else has the guts to put their name on — or vote FOR — this flaming bag of poo.
This is a true embarrassment to the House GOP. The GOP is supposed to be for truth and transparency. They are also supposed to protect our tax dollars. How On God’s Green Earth can you be against transparency?
DUH, it is called pay to play. Please take a look at theses Legislature’s Campaigns. See who has given big donations.
Don’t believe the garbage spouted about this will hurt Rural Healthcare…… These same people voted down a Rural Healthcare Study on CON. Rural Healthcare is already in dire straits caused by the restrictive CON Laws. Once again, these laws protect the hospitals, not the consumers.
This is going to HURT the party moving forward. We are often are own worst enemies. This infighting and power play has got to STOP. We look like a group of clowns while the Dems are sticking together like glue.
Oh, Bev, how true! I get so frustrated and angry when Republicans behave like sleeze-bags. Thank God for Dale Folwell, and a pox on all RINOs! They’re worse than Democrats. Democrats are open enemies. RINOs are snakes in the grass, and if you fail to see them for what they are in time, they’ll bite you badly! It’s a shame we can’t just put a tatoo on their foreheads to warn real constitutional conservatives away from them! Yuck!
Rep. Greg “Medicaid” Murphy (RINO-Pitt) is a waterboy for Vidant, and has been a big pusher of this attempt to strip authority from the State Treasurer, but I guess running for Congress, he is trying to escape the limelight for his liberal actions.
Every Republican who interferes with Dale’s mission in any way needs to be primaried. In the mean time, can ANYONE explain why there is an objection to transparency (other than fraud and corruption in the medical profession?) Maybe Medicaid Murphy can explain it to us.
The only “risky schemes” I see are those proposed by the paid minions of the hospital monopoly special interests. Let Treasurer Folwell do his job.
The Republican legislators in Raleigh had better get their affairs in order very soon on this and other things. The public is not going to put up with much more.