I never heard of Andy Biggs until Tuesday. Turns out, he's Chair of the Arizona Senate Appropriations Committee, a position he was elevated to after serving four terms in the State House. This week his Appropriations Committee, a GOP-dominated gang of mean-spirited whelps, carried out what the media are calling the "Tuesday Night Massacre."
That's a good term for it. In addition to passing a slew of racist laws that Arizona Republic columnist E.J. Montini called "SB 1070 on steroids," they also voted to dismantle the state's health care program and eliminate the Arizona Board of Regents, the governing body for the state's large and important university system. We used to think of Senator Russell Pearce as just a big bigoted buffoon; now that he's Senate President, we're getting a taste of how his vicious anti-everything nativism dominates state policy.
Senate Bill 1519 is the piece of trash that eliminates the Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System (AHCCCS), which is the state's once-admired Medicaid program. If it's approved by the full legislature and signed by Governor Brewer, Arizona will become the first state in the nation to eliminate Medicaid. We'll forfeit at least $7 billion in Federal aid; throw more than a million children, elderly, and disabled off the rolls; shut down many hospitals; and eliminate countless health care industry jobs. I'm getting really sick of this state being "first" in all kinds of bad shit.
Doctors, midwives, chambers of commerce, and hospital administrators spoke against SB 1519 at the hearing. They estimate that without Federal aid, the $2 billion state program will be able to cover 50,000 - 100,000 people, instead of the 1.8 million AHCCCS currently serves (half of them children). Do the math. This bill will send Arizona back to the 1930s ... at best. Even Republican Senator Rich Crandall said if SB 1519 is signed this session, not one rural hospital in the state will be open by year's end.
So who is Andy Biggs, the GOP Senator from Gilbert who sponsored SB 1519, which replaces AHCCCS with a scaled-down, privatized program? In Thursday's New Times, Stephen Lemons has a great story about the very wealthy Mr. Biggs, which provides some insight into why he doesn't give a good goddam about the less fortunate:
He's not rich through any sweat of his brow. He's not self-made. Hell, he didn't even inherit his fortune. Instead, he hit the jackpot. Quite literally. You see, in 1993 Biggs won the American Family Sweepstakes, the one Ed McMahon and Dick Clark used to shill for back in the day.
You read that right: he won $10 million from Ed McMahon's post-Johnny schtick. Andy's not worried about his health care, that's for sure. When asked why he sponsored a bill that completely eliminates Arizona's Medicaid program -- a move even Governor Jan Brewer does not support -- Biggs said it's because AHCCCS is "socialized medicine." When asked why he's willing to shut down hospitals and throw health care providers into the unemployment lines, he said it's because they work for "socialized medicine." I guess he just doesn't like collectivism. That's odd, ain't it, since winning a sweepstakes like Biggs did is socialism to the nth degree: put in a dollar, and everyone else gives you theirs.
Lemons captured the banter between Senators Biggs and Crandall, who stressed the economic devastation SB 1519 would cause:
"[What] I inferred from what you said is, socialized medicine brings jobs," he told Crandall. Biggs then went on to lecture everyone about why socialized medicine is bad.... "Here's the way I take what you said. Socialized medicine is what our healthcare system is. Without it, it collapses. Without that, then business doesn't come to Arizona. Right?"
That's exactly right, said AHCCCS Director Tom Betlach:
"Talented doctors, nurses and others in the health care field would flee the state." Link
Makes no difference to Biggs. Because we're using taxpayer dollars at all to subsidize care, recruit businesses, pay doctors, or strengthen the economy, it's a bad thing. Socialism!! As Lemons correctly notes, our State and Federal health care programs are about as far from genuine "socialized medicine" as you can get. But that doesn't matter to Biggs: that people receive any care or service from the social compact is one step away from a marxist redistribution of wealth (of which he has quite a lot to spread around). Biggs prefers a health care system for the poor and disabled that "charges premiums" -- you know, the kind he can afford.
Andy Biggs had some equally mean-spirited company on the Appropriations Committee in the form of Senator Ron Gould, who's been known to quote scripture during hearings and claims to be a Christian. When asked about the high numbers of people who would be without health care if SB 1519 passes, Gould said (as his savior Jesus Christ would no doubt say as well), "I have no sympathy for people who don't pay their way in life." Yeah, those damn lazy-ass ingrates who didn't win $10 million.
How did Andy Biggs attain the most plumb job at the legislature -- Chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee? Arizona's most famous dog-whistler and current Senate President Russell Pearce gave Biggs the very seat he used to occupy. So it comes as no surprise that the $10 Million Man shares all of Pearce's wingnuttiness: He consistently supports tough abortion laws, expansive gun rights, loose (read: "nonexistent") environmental regulations, anti-brown immigration policies, and GLBT restrictions. Here's a hold-your-nose taste from Biggs' interview with The Arizona Conservative:
I hold to the ideals and principles that inform the Republican Party platform: protection of individual liberty, fewer taxes, fewer business regulations, smaller government.
I have sponsored legislation that passed out of the House and Senate which would have penalized organizations which are involved in environmental terrorism against farmers, ranchers and businesses.
[W]e failed the families of Arizona when the Senate rejected a measure encouraging Congress to pass the Federal Marriage Amendment.
I support the initiative to repeal Clean Elections.
Well, shit, if I had a free $10 million, I wouldn't need the support of Clean Elections either. There you have it, the Chair of the legislature's most powerful committee. Andy Biggs: just like Russell Pearce ... only with a big cardboard check from Ed McMahon.