Texas has been a leader in fiscal conservatism for the last decade and is poised to become a leader in health care reform over the next few years. Texas is a member of the multi-state lawsuit concerning the unconstitutionality of the health care law, and Governor Perry has voiced concerns about the law’s effect on Texas Medicaid. But recently an old rival of Texas, long ago left in the dust, has taken a different approach.
California has begun to move faster towards implementing the health care law than any other state, and the Obama administration has commented on their hope for California to be lock step behind them in this course of action. One would think that with a precarious budget, mounting debt, a chronically underfunded pension fund, and an inefficient Medicaid program that California would have learned its lesson by now.
While California is leading its citizens down the same path of government recklessness and irresponsibility, hopefully Texas will maintain its status as a national leader.
-Spencer Harris