Tennessee Tea Puppet opposes gov't-run programs, says Medicare is "better" [View all]

[brentspeak]

I don't know what kind of "engineer" this guy could possibly have been -- maybe helped engineer Skylab, the Hyatt Regency Hotel walkway, or the space shuttle Challenger.

http://www.nbcnews.com/politics/elections/rebuke-tennessee-governor-koch-group-shows-its-power-n301031

In Rebuke of Tennessee Governor, Koch Group Shows Its Power

NASHVILLE-In December, Tennessee Gov. Bill Haslam, a Republican, got the deal he wanted from the Obama administration: Tennessee would accept more than $1 billion in federal funding to expand Medicaid, as allowed for in the Affordable Care Act, but Obama aides would allow Haslam to essentially write staunchly conservative ideas into the program's rules for the state. He dubbed the reformed Medicaid program "Insure Tennessee."

But the state's chapter of Americans for Prosperity, the national conservative group whose foundation is chaired by controversial billionaire David Koch, argued Haslam was just trying to trick conservatives into implementing Obamacare in their state by giving it a new name. AFP campaigned aggressively Haslam's plans for the next six weeks, even running radio ads blasting GOP state legislators who said they might vote for it.

On Wednesday, Haslam's bill died in a committee of the Tennessee state senate. The vote was one of the clearest illustrations of the increasing power of AFP and other conservative groups funded in part by the Koch brothers.

snip

"I'm skeptical of government-run programs," said Louis Stans, a retired engineer who was part of the AFP group. Medicare, Stans said, was "better" and he had "paid into it my whole life."