Just when you thought nobody could make Chris Christie look tea party, who comes strolling into the room but Ohio Gov. John Kasich -- the 16th (and let's hope final) major Republican candidate in the 2016 presidential election.
I'll bet you knew Kasich leaned a little left of the GOP party line, but did you know what a cheerleader he's become for Obamacare and Medicaid expansion? All he needs is the pompoms, the megaphone and the uniform.
“He’s not scared to tell the base where they’re wrong,” said John Feehery, a Republican strategist who served as a leadership aide in Congress during Kasich’s tenure. “I don’t think the ideological base is in love with Kasich ..."
Kasich, 63, hasn’t ruled out a pathway to citizenship as part of an overhaul of immigration laws. Which gets him into trouble in Ohio's conservative neighborhoods. He also backs the Common Core educational standards, anathema to a growing number of Republicans. But neither of those issues are what makes him stand out like a gator in a petting zoo.
It's Obamacare and Medicaid expansion and, boy, is it ever.
By all reports, as governor since 2011, Kasich bypassed the Buckeye State's Republican-controlled Legislature and embraced the plank of Obamacare that expands Medicaid to provide health care to low-income, working-age adults with no kids and no disabilities.
In short, Kasich has been in love with Medicaid expansion for at least the last two years. And Watchdog.org's Ohio-based reporter Jason Hart has practically made a career of telling the world about it.
Hart says wait til the TV debates -- he's going to get clobbered: "The media have given Kasich a pass on Obamacare funding claims debunked by the Congressional Research Service," he writes. "Republican primary candidates won’t."
Here are some of Hart's comments in his 10-part series, "Kasich's Obamacare Roadshow":
- "Embrace Obamacare, or throw the mentally ill in prison. According to Kasich, those are a state’s only options."
- "Kasich’s Obamacare expansion cost $3.7 billion in its first 17 months and is already $1 billion over budget. Enrollment is much higher than projected, and so are costs per enrollee."
- “'While traveling to other states, the governor spends a lot of time being Obamacare’s chief lobbyist,'” Tarren Bragdon, president and CEO of the free-market Foundation for Government Accountability, told Watchdog.org."
- "Montana lawmakers enacted Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion after Kasich slammed Republican critics during a January campaign stop, and Kasich repeated many of the same talking points in Georgia ..."
- “'Kasich lies ... Obamacare robs from the Medicare promise for Ohio seniors and those with disabilities to pay for Medicaid expansion,” (Foundation for Government Accountability's) Bragdon said. "Obama has used Kasich as a rhetorical lifeline for his unpopular 2010 health insurance law for more than a year.
- "During the disastrous roll-out of the Obamacare exchange website HealthCare.gov, the president repeatedly pointed to Kasich’s Medicaid expansion as proof Obamacare was working."
Kasich has been compared to former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush. Both men command -- and in general get -- the party's respect, period. But Bush 1) has a more cerebral approach to the issues, while the Ohio governor wears his emotions on his sleeve and 2) -- here's the big one -- Bush has since 2013 vehemently opposed Medicaid expansion, treating Obamacare generally like a plan he would repeal and replace.
Polls show Kasich, who launched a short-lived presidential bid in 1999, has work to do. In a Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll last month, only 25 percent of Republican primary voters said they could see themselves supporting him; 42 percent didn’t know his name.
The unapologetic, virtually never wishy-washy Kasich is unlikely to walk back any of his positions, least of all Obamacare or its subset, Medicaid expansion. He has told those who question his Medicaid stance that “when you die and get to the meeting with St. Peter, he’s probably not going to ask you much about what you did about keeping government small. But he is going to ask you what you did for the poor.”
Nevertheless, down the road, when he climbs up on the debate stage -- unless there's a severe change in the GOP climate -- this Lucy will have some 'splainin' to do. Trust me on that.
Reach Nancy Smith at nsmith@sunshinestatenews.com or at 228-282-2423. Twitter: @NancyLBSmith
