You know what’s a major government health care program? Medicaid. Everyone knows that! It’s super cheap government health insurance for poor people, of course! One of those liberal “safety nets” for losers, like Medicare is for the Olds. But one state legislator in Texas — he even serves on the health panel — isn’t really sure about this damn thing and wants to know what the hell is even going on.
At a hearing Thursday of the House Committee on Human Services, [Rep. Gary] Elkins and other members of the panel considered more than two dozen bills related to Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program.
Three hours into the hearing, Elkins asked: “What’s Medicaid?”
The Houston Republican continued: “I know I hear it — I really don’t know what it is. I know that’s a big shock to everybody here in the audience, OK.”
Ha ha, people elected him to public office.
Houston lawmaker asks: ‘What’s Medicaid?’ [Austin American-Statesman]
Rep. Gary Elkins asks, “What’s Medicaid?” [Burnt Orange Report]
Read More:
- John McCain Whines About Old People For Several Minutes
- Massachusetts Legislature Hurrying To Throw Random Warm Body In Kennedy's Seat
- Ciro Rodriguez Gets Mad Next To Some Delicious Chips
- Colorado Cuts Costs By Banning Medicaid Coverage of Circumcisions
- Teabaggers Oppose Cuts To Medicare and Medicaid When Polled About It, of Course
{ 70 comments }
Ha ha. It looks like all the Wonketteers are stunned into silence by this complete fricking idiot.
The only thing worse than asking this question is not asking it. But given that he’s a Texan, I’m sure he was agin it as soon as it was splained to him.
I heard this from a friend who works for a health-care related lobbying organization. I asked her whether they have to cut up his meat for him at schmooze-a-thon luncheons.
P.S. His district is comprised of similarly brain-dead suburbanites in Northwest Houston. I should know, I was in a district for brain-dead suburbanites in Southeast Houston for 18 years.
Sonny Purdue may have a point. We need literacy tests for State Legislators.
He had the balls to ask instead of pretending like he knows. Most dumbfucks would sit there and nod their heads like they understand.
That being said, why would someone be on the Human Services Committee if they don’t know what a human or a service is? Everything is bigger in Texas including the Legislative Fail.
Thank you congressman. You are awarded no points for your question and may God have mercy on your soul.
It is very important within the Republican party to get really mad about shit you know nothing about.
Apparently, the dummies are dumber in Texas.
Overheard later:
“You’re shitting me, right? The gubbiment pays for healthcare? To Old people and cripples? Seriously? Holy fuck! No fucking way I’m voting for that shit. We need the olds for our Soylent Green factories. What? What do you mean Soylent Green is just a fucking movie?!? I saw Chuck Heston doing commercials for it! Next you’re going to tell me that the US Navy didn’t build the Battlestar Galactica which is defending us from Klingons from Uranus!”
You know, they really need to stop writing the snark themselves. It’s going to get us laid off.
He skipped that chapter in “Teleprompter for Dummies.”
I’m sure his constituents feel that his love of jeebus more than makes up for his deficiencies, whatever they might be.
Who is surprised he’s a Republican from Texas? A swanky suburb of Houston. Only thing worse would have been from Midland or somewhere outside Dallas.
Has he been briefed about the Negro Prezdint?
Whacky Republicans! They just can’t tell a joke. He meant to ask, “What’s a henway?”, which would have brought guffaws from the audience.
He just needs a refresher course at the Kollege of Komedy Knowledge at Regent University. Because K is funny.
Thanks for finally picking up the Know-nothing mantle, GOP.
I’m a little embarrassed to ask, but what’s a committee?
Well surprise, surprise. Someone who does not and will never need a VITAL service is clueless in Merka. And he lives in -wait for it-Washington, DC. On,yup, OUR dollar.
“What is this sodomy business? I know every couple of weeks when I shove my cock up my wife’s asshole it comes as a great shock to her, but that’s not what all this is about, right?”
[re=271176]Mad Farmer Manifest[/re]: He’s been in the legislature since 1995. He has been nodding his head for fourteen years.
[re=271188]Joey Ratz[/re]: You nailed it. His website proudly notes his Bachelors in Theology from Southwestern Assemblies of God University.
[re=271197]magic titty[/re]: So true. If you’re a republican, you don’t need to know what a Dirty Sanchez even when performing one on a minor.
Every so often one of my students will be all: “Mr. Serolf, do you mind if I ask a dumb question.”
And I always answer: “There a no dumb questions, Timmy… just dumb people who ask questions.”
[re=271173]Jukesgrrl[/re]: I would argue that the only thing worse than not asking a question is asking a question outloud in public that could have easily been answered by a quick Google.
That said, I always mix up Medicaid and Medicare.
This guy sounds almost as smart as Jeff Sessions.
What is the Texas State Legislature? I know we’ve been meeting under this big dome thingy, but I mean, what is it?
Sure it’s a scandal and all, but sometimes the less these fuckers know about what’s going on, the less damage they can do. Just give him an issue of Gun Nuts Monthly and let him go sit in the corner.
Next he’ll be asking what Wikipedia is.
[re=271203]shortsshortsshorts[/re]: Plausible deniability.
[re=271201]shanemacgowan[/re]: It’s just a matter of believing harder. The New Agers are exactly the same as the evangelical right… they just believe in different kinds of make-believe.
Which is why I think this guy is the new Ron Paul, the Ron Paul for soccer moms, so long as Oprah keeps shilling his buddy Eckardt Tolle:
http://wilberwatch.blogspot.com
Analogy: “intelligent design” is a rebottling of “creationism” but with a new agey name; “integral politics” is a rebottling of “faith based initiatives run by incompetent people who think they’re God let’s take Iraq”
Oh hell, it’s hard enough to travel and tell people I’m from Texas, what with the Enron scandal and George Bush, but now this?
Jebus is displeased with this ingnorance of the affairs of the poor.
Oh no wait, that’s Jesus. Nobody Elkins would know.
Well at least we know the state slogan is true, ” Texas, a whole nuther place”.
Duh, obviously Medicaid is Medicare for people who have AIDS.
You got it all wrong. Dude was having a blunt-based flashback to that time he was on Jeopardy. Trebek asked him to name one government program he’d gut in heartbeat if he were elected:
“What’s Medicaid?”
At the next meeting, he intends to go with Paul Lynde for the block…..
Finally, a Texan who makes George Bush look smart.
In this case, a TELEPROMPTR might have helped.
Commenters on the Austin American-Statesman website note that Rep. Elkins is the fat-cat owner of a chain of check cashing stores in Nevada, holds a degree in “practical theology,” and is a member of the Assemblies of God. I wonder if he offers health insurance to his employees or if he believes they only need to depend on Jeebus for healthcare.
Um, what’s a Texan? I’ve heard of these beasts, but I thought they only existed in stories to frighten children
My parents are both on Medicaid.
Hah! My parents are dirty Communists.
The two main career paths for the retarded in Texas: Death row space taker-upper, state legislator.
(What, too much?)
[re=271234]loquaciousmusic[/re]: Be a good child. Give them a bath.
[re=271201]shanemacgowan[/re]: Holy crap. I thought you were making that up, but NO. Southwestern Assemblies of God University? The mind boggles.
Why ask real people? Wikipedia won’t call you a jackass for not knowing.
considering that Texas pays half the cost of medicaid…this guy is potential VP material
I don’t know what it is, but I’m pretty sure folks have been pissin’ in it for a long time but it continues to work. Unlike yer NASA thingy.
Elkins pronounced it, “Me Decade”. Hence his initial confusion.
Elkins’ follow-up question was, “Is that a law?”
1. In 2002, Elkins joined an amicus brief in the US Supreme Court. The brief stated that Texas had every right to make consensual buttsects between gay homosexuals a crime punishable by stoning and shoe pelting, or something.
2. In 2006 Elkins voted to increase the criminal penalties against child predators.
I breathlessly await the next Elkins headline.
[re=271201]shanemacgowan[/re]: A bachelor of theology, huh? From Talkin-in-Tongues U? That and learning how to say, “Shall I leave room for cream?” ought to qualify anybody for that job you’d always wanted.
[re=271234]loquaciousmusic[/re]: More likely your parents are on Medicare which, as Jim helpfully instructs us, is for the Olds, not teh Poors.
[re=271223]Atypical[/re]: We’re thinking of changing our slogan to “Texas: It’s Like Another Whole Third World Country Ruled by a Jackass-Laden Junta.
[re=271248]CorkPopper[/re]: I think it’s in Waxahachie, home of the defunct supercollider. I’ve been trying to give that area of the Lone Star State to Oklahoma, free of charge, for years.
[re=271267]norbizness[/re]: I LUV it. Course you might add Jeebus before Jackass for a little extra spice.
I imagine Rep. Elkins has been huffing Tom DeLay’s Malathion for the last 14 years.
[re=271267]norbizness[/re]: In my one and only trip to the Lone Star State, a young female cashier working at an All U Can Eat Fried Catfish place in East TX gave my husband what for when I paid for dinner while he went to the john. Her exact words were “That ain’t raht!” Such is my impression of Texas, forevermore.
The ultimate was Texas state Rep. Debbie Riddle with her now-classic statement: “Where did this idea come from that everybody deserves free education, free medical care, free whatever? It comes from Moscow, from Russia. It comes straight out of the pit of hell.”
why am i not laughing? oh right, because it hurts a lot.
Can we please ban that weirdo who keeps linking to a blog for some weird mind-control cult? Kthx.
My dad told a joke once about surgeons. They were arguing who was easiest to operate on.
Surgeon 1: Germans, because all the parts have a standard number.
Surgeon 2: Japanese, because all the parts are color coded.
Surgeon 3: Texans, because they have only two parts: their mouths and their assholes, and they’re both interchangeable.
Thanks. I’ll be here until Saturday, and remember the two drink minimum….
[re=271206]AnnieGetYourFun[/re]: Do you think he actually has a hand-held computing device? His nearest computer is probably in his kid’s room. I guess he could have called his secretary and had her look it up. (I’d bet anything they still have secretaries in the Texas legislature and I’d double down that they’re all female.)
[re=271201]shanemacgowan[/re]: This story gives me the Ass-tremblies of God. Luckily, Medicare covers that.
[re=271471]aflurry[/re]: dammit… i meant Medicaid…ruined another joke with my stupid stupid brain.
This guy has been in the House for 14 years and doesn’t have a Wikipedia entry. I bet the good people of Jersey Village don’t even know who he is, they just blindly vote for the candidate with the “R” next to his name.
That’s why Wikipedia exists. But maybe he couldn’t find it on Wikipedia because he spelled “Medycade”
Holy Shit! And all this time I thought John Culberson was the biggest idiot in Congress from the Houston SMSA. Is this twatwaffle enny kin the Elkins in Vinson & Elkins? That may be how he gets re-elected.
Yep. When I drive from Dallas to Austin and back, I drive from one sane spot to another, but I have to go through a couple hundred miles of crazy to do it. Waxahachie, with all its crazy, Waco, with its crazy times crazy, and then all the teeny towns filled with people who believe Jesus rode on dinosaurs.
You just hold your breath and turn up the Otis Redding REALLY LOUDLY on your ipod until you get to the sane areas.
[re=271218]ForTheTurnstiles[/re]: The New Agers are exactly the same as the evangelical right… they just believe in different kinds of make-believe.
Yeah, but the New Agers aren’t trying to make their retarded beliefs into the law of the land. They are not calling for a New Age Theocracy, nor do they claim that the US was founded as a New Age Country. They are just fairly harmless people with different beliefs.
Please correct me if I’m wrong.
[re=271265]S.Luggo[/re]: In 2006 Elkins voted to increase the criminal penalties against child predators
Ha! Dead give-away when you’re looking for deadbeat representatives who’ve never done anything constructive in all their time in office. They’s always tuff on crime, and always pick on the easiest, weakest and least defensible targets so they can go home & brag about how they are protecting their community. Meanwhile the pork flows to every district but theirs, unless the pork is another Wackenhut prison.
As with the silly & obscene mandatory federal sentencing laws with drugs, it’s a win-win for politicians. You look brave & tough by passing these hardon crime laws and there’s absolutely no downside because who’s going to stand up in public for criminals?
“Yes sir, I realize they are pedophiles, but don’t you think public castration, defenestration and stoning (should he/she still live) are a little over the top? No? Well, OK, let’s pass them laws. Cuz frankly we’ve been sitting on our ass collecting the public dime for years and ain’t got nothin’ to show for it.”
PS: Are we beyond bothering with the cognitive dissonance resulting from the wingtards’ anti-abortion position vis-a-vis their support for the death penalty? I rarely see the two juxtaposed these days, even here on Wonkette. Just wondering if we all just agreed to not waste our time on it, since it so fucking obviously makes no sense whatsoever.
[re=271330]chascates[/re]: Texas state Rep. Debbie Riddle
Does she have a brother named Jimmy?
This fellow is destined for greatness in the Republican party.
[re=271330]chascates[/re]: I was thinking the same thing. There IS such a thing as too much democracy.
When will Random Texas State Rep. Idiot Dude apologize for destroying America?
[re=271357]DangerousLiberal[/re]:
There’s also the one about whose brain you would want in a brain transplant.
I would want a Texan’s as it’s never been used!
What’s a Health Committee? What’s a hearing? Where are I?
Let’s take up a collection for a gift for Rep Fuckwit.
http://www.tshirthell.com/funny-shirts/dont-mess-with-texas
Everything You Need to Know About Medicaid but Were Afraid to Ask …
Rep. Elkins has been maligned for asking “What’s Medicaid?” but at least he wasn’t afraid to ask. Given that Medicad is perhaps the least discussed and least understood of government health programs, it’s time to give it the attention it deserves.
As we enter the health reform debate, it is crucial that policymakers understand the significance of Medicaid. Most reform plans, including those advanced by Candidate Obama, Senator Baucus, and the Association of Health Insurance Plans, contemplate that Medicaid will be maintained and expanded in a reformed health care system. If the goals of health reform are to be met, Medicaid will not only need to be maintained, it must be strengthened and fully integrated with other core components of the health care system. It’s time to give Medicaid the attention and support it deserves.
Read more about strenthening Medicad at http://ccf.georgetown.edu/index/index
Comments on this entry are closed.