Republicans don't have a problem with liars!

David Dewhurst Texas’ Liar Extraordinaire

Posted on October 30th, 2010 by iwaller

 

David Dewhurst has pulled the typical scam on Texans with his false campaign ads.  Facts on the issues prove Dewhurst can lie and manipulate with the best politicians in Texas.

Dewhurst has not kept Texans safe; he was complicit with Rick Perry in removing the names of more than 2,000 illegal immigrant sex offenders from the public statewide database because they were deported.  Dewhurst also allowed deported drug traffickers to keep their Texas issued drivers licenses and his office has done little to secure the Texas border.

Dewhurst has lied, along with his man buddy Perry, about balancing Texas budget, shifting money from the ‘Rainy Day Fund’, telling Texans he did not use money from the government’s stimulus, when in fact he sought and received $14 billion from the federal government in an attempt to balance the budget which is required by state law.

According to the State Comptroller’s office, Texas requested and was allocated almost $20 billion in federal stimulus funds from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.  

So while Dewhurst slams the federal government in public, behind the scenes he has his hand out.

With all the money Dewhurst took from the federal government, he has failed in the past 8 years to fund children, schools and teachers who desperately sought his help.  However he never acknowledges President Obama’s recovery act gave tens of billions of dollars to help Texans in a time of a record setting economic crisis.

If it was not for the stimulus, public schools, college students, state employees, the poor and needy children, public workers, the sick and the hungry would be decimated because David Dewhurst and Rick Perry have abandoned them.

I am no fan of big government but it was the Federal Government who saved the jobs of teachers, firefighters, police officers and helped to keep Texas families and children above water with unemployment assistance; it was not David Dewhurst!

The American Recovery and Investment Act provided Texans: (provided by Susan Combs, Texas Comptroller dated 10/24/10)

• $6,351,231,240.16 for education (teachers, study programs, education for homeless, scholarships, Head Start, trainee programs, educational grants)
• $340,671,802.83 for energy (energy research, Energy Efficiency & Conservation Block Grants, state energy program, etc)
• $ 398,131,791.00 for environment (Habitat Conservation, Grants for Clean Water, Grants for Drinking Water, Conservation Research and Development)
• $ 6,574,625,510.13 for Human Services (Nutrition Assistance Program, Emergency Food Assistance, Homelessness Prevention and Rapid Re-Housing, Vocational Rehabilitation
  Grants, Foster Care Title IV-E, Adoption Assistance, Child Care And Development, Emergency Contingency Fund, Health Information Technology, Prevention and Wellness)
• $ 1,153,259,976.00 for Housing & Human Development (Grants to States for Low-Income Housing Projects, Weatherization Assistance, Community Services Block Grants)
• $ 3,995,657,224.33 for Labor (unemployment insurance, social security, adult & youth programs)
• $ 418,299,754.90 for Public Safety (defense, National Guard, Violence against women & child internet protection)
• $ 120,655,112.61 for other (broadband, engineering grants, etc.)

Another lie David Dewhurst is telling Texas families is his ad about ‘Obamacare’, scaring people about it “raising premiums”, “raising taxes” and not allowing Texans to “choose their own doctors.”  All Dewhurst lies!

According to the 2010 Census Bureau report, Texas leads the nation in the number of uninsured.  In 2009, the rate of uninsured Texans jumped from 24.55% in 2004 to 26.1%.  The national average of uninsured was 16.1% in 2009.   Read the full report. Read HCFAT commentary on the report.

The Affordable Care Act: Immediate Benefits for Texas:

• Small business tax credits.  293,000 small businesses in Texas could be helped by a new small business tax credit that makes it easier for businesses to provide coverage to their workers and makes premiums more affordable
• Closing the Medicare Part D donut hole. Last year, roughly 237,000 Medicare beneficiaries in Texas hit the donut hole, or gap in Medicare Part D drug coverage, and received no extra help to defray the cost of their prescription drugs, the new law continues to provide additional discounts for seniors on Medicare in the years ahead and completely closes the donut hole by 2020. 
• Support for health coverage for early retirees. An estimated 207,000 people from Texas retired before they were eligible for Medicare and have health coverage through their former employers.  Beginning June 1, 2010, a $5 billion temporary early retiree reinsurance program will help stabilize early retiree coverage and help ensure that firms continue to provide health coverage to their early retirees
• No Lifetime Limits. Insurance companies will no longer be able to place lifetime limits on the coverage they provide, ensuring that the 11.8 million Texas residents with private insurance coverage never have to worry about their coverage running out and facing catastrophic out-of-pocket costs.
• No dropping coverage. Insurance companies will be banned from dropping people from coverage when they get sick, protecting the 1.1 million individuals who purchase insurance in the individual market from dishonest insurance practices.
• Removes pre-existing conditions. Insurance companies will not be able to exclude children from coverage because of a pre-existing condition, giving parents across Texas peace of mind.
• Removes annual limits. Insurance plans’ use of annual limits will be tightly regulated to ensure access to needed care.  This will protect the 10.6 million residents of Texas with health insurance from their employer, along with anyone who signs up with a new insurance plan in Texas.
• Creates appeals process. Health insurers offering new plans will have to develop an appeals process to make it easy for enrollees to dispute the denial of a medical claim.
• Choose your own doctors. Patients’ choice of doctors will be protected by allowing plan members in new plans to pick any participating primary care provider, prohibiting insurers from requiring prior authorization before a woman sees an ob-gyn, and ensuring access to emergency care.
• Extending coverage to young adults. Beginning on or after September 23, 2010, plans and issuers that offer coverage to children on their parents’ policy must allow children to remain on their parents’ policy until they turn 26, unless the adult child has another offer of job-based coverage in some cases. This provision will bring relief to roughly 161,000 individuals in Texas who could now have quality affordable coverage through their parents.
• Affordable insurance for uninsured with pre-existing conditions. $493 million federal dollars are available to Texas starting July 1 to provide coverage for uninsured residents with pre-existing medical conditions through a new transitional high-risk pool program, funded entirely by the Federal government.
• Strengthening community health centers. Beginning October 1, 2010, increased funding for Community Health Centers will help nearly double the number of patients seen by the centers over the next five years. The funding could not only help the 318 Community Health Centers in Texas but also support the construction of new centers.
• More doctors where people need them. Beginning October 1, 2010, the Act will provide funding for the National Health Service Corps ($1.5 billion over five years) for scholarships and loan repayments for doctors, nurses and other health care providers who work in areas with a shortage of health professionals. This will help the 12% of Texas’s population who live in an underserved area.
• New Medicaid options for states. For the first time, Texas has the option of Federal Medicaid funding for coverage for all low-income populations, irrespective of age, disability, or family status. 

While health insurance companies have continued to pillage Texas families with continuing to increase insurance premiums, Dewhurst sat on the side lines becoming complicit in a for-profit scheme costing Texans millions and abandoning children and seniors.

Dewhurst along with his buddy Perry like to brag that while other states are hurting, Texas is creating jobs.  But a recent report from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics tells the real story, that Texas has the highest share of minimum wage workers in the nation, over 90% of them are classified as low economic status, minimum wage jobs.  

From 1999 to 2008 Texas schools took in 659,000 more students, but one out of three students is walking out of Texas high schools without a diploma.  So while Dewhurst has abandoned Texas students, thankfully the Federal Government stepped in to bring some hope into a very dire situation for Texas families.

U.S. Rep. Lloyd Doggett  recently proposed a bill that requires Texas to maintain education spending levels through 2013 to qualify for funds under the job protection bill, which means no reduction in the percentage of state money spent on public education during that period. Doggett is trying to prevent a replay of last year, when the Dewhurst and the Texas Legislature used $3.2 billion in federal stimulus money to plug a budget deficit rather than hire more teachers and expand school programs.  Dewhurst is threatening a lawsuit, (of course he is), because the bill would force Dewhurst to keep money in education and not divert it away from Texas school children.

David Dewhurst is a career politician who is bad for Texas and our families representing only big business and corporate America while turning his back on the proud citizens of our state.