More MI GOP candidates flat-out lie about the Affordable Care Act

Last night I posted about MI-11 GOP Congressional candidate David Trott, who spewed a litany of tired old bald-faced lies about the ACA.

This morning I received the following from a friend, regarding 2 Republican candidates for local/state office: Hugh Crawford (term-limited state representative, running for county commission...and hoping to swap places with his wife, who's currently a county commissioner running for his state rep seat) and Mike Kowall (state Senator running for re-election):

Last night was a candidates forum at Fox Run, the Novi retirement community. Candidates for the State House, State Senate, and County Commission were there. During the Q&A a question was raised whether the candidates supported Obamacare.

Both Hugh Crawford and Mike Kowall answered this way: "I don't like Obamacare, I would have voted against it, but I very much support Governor Snyder's Healthy Michigan Initiative, which brought the state over $400 Million in Federal Money."

Of course, Healthy Michigan is the expanded Medicaid under the ACA, but they are giving credit to Snyder to claim they now support expanded health care. Just not Obamacare.

Exactly. The "Healthy Michigan Initiative" only exists because of the ACA (and in fact is funded by the law). Repeal "Obamacare" and kiss the "Healthy Michigan Initiative" goodbye; that's 365,000 Michigan residents who'd be kicked off of their just-received healthcare coverage.

Crawford and Kowall join a long list of other Republican candidates, in both Michigan and across the country (including U.S. Senate candidates like Mitch McConnell in Kentucky and Joni Ernst in Iowa), who are trying to have it both ways: They bash "Obamacare", then try to claim that they'll protect everything that "Obamacare" (aka the Affordable Care Act; aka "Kynect" in Kentucky, aka the "Healthy Michigan Initiative" in Michigan, aka "Whatever the hell they're calling the ACA's Medicaid Expansion Program in Iowa") brings to their residents.

In other words, Crawford & Kowall, like McConnell and Ernst, are basically the worst type of hypocritical liars.

Meanwhile, just this morning I helped an old friend from my high school days get himself set up with a new healthcare policy on Healthcare.Gov (he just lost his coverage, so qualifies for enrollment even though we're in the "off season" right now).