Obamatons Versus Efficiency

If we could bring our bureaucracy into the 21st century....

Nearly a year ago, Utah Gov. Gary Herbert and his health care policy team came up with a simple way to save the state's Medicaid program a lot of money. Why not have Medicaid recipients and applicants handle their paperwork online? Using e-mail and a special Web site rather than paper, Herbert calculated, would save Utah about $6.3 million a year. "It seemed like a no-brainer to us," says the governor. 

The problem was, going paperless required a rules waiver from the Department of Health and Human Services. And that's where the idea ran into a brick wall.

"We tried for eight months to get the waiver," says Herbert. HHS delayed and delayed and delayed -- and then finally said no. "The denial we got back from the secretary of HHS was by e-mail, of all things," Herbert says, pausing a second for the listener to take it in. "The irony is rich."

What Governor Herbert doesn't understand, is that the Obama regime reserves waivers for allies.

Read more at the Washington Examiner: http://washingtonexaminer.com/politics/2011/03/while-obama-seeks-new-ideas-his-bureaucrats-stifle-them#ixzz1FdkaLa3F