Obama's Health Care Shuffling Leaves Some Governors Disappointed
That was how Texas Gov. Rick Perry, also chairman of the Republican Governors Association, summed up his reaction to Obama's stand on health care in a meeting with several governors Monday. Perry said he thinks the bulk of the governors -- regardless of party -- seemed most preoccupied with concerns of the cost and restrictions that are going to happen under the new health care law.
Obama announced he'd be willing to adjust the timeline of implementing state alternative programs from 2017 to 2014. As Guy Benson and several others noted yesterday, it isn't necessarily a shift in policy (the state alternative programs allowed aren't any better than the federal ones), just timing.
"Pretty much all he did was reset the clock on what many of us consider to be a ticking time bomb," Perry said.
Perry also announced the RGA is going to establish a policy arm, headed by Governors Chris Christie of New Jersey and Haley Barbour of Mississippi, who will oversee a budget north of $1 million. Perry said he sees governors and Congress working in tandem to provide a check on the Obama White House.
He said he believes the Republican governors' efforts to solve the problems facing their states has "put this administration on its heels."