Thursday, July 14, 2011

Kasich's Red Herring: SB5 on Healthcare

Red Herring:   The reader's suspicions are thus misdirected, allowing the true culprit to go (temporarily at least) undetected. 

O.K.  I smelled something fishy!  Yesterday on the Morning Joe, our esteemed Governor Kasich made an appearance tauting his first six months in office.  He claimed to be a "get-it-done" type governor. After all, Kasich was elected because people did not feel Strickland was moving the state in the right direction fast enough.  Yet, when questioned about his low approval rating (most polls have him rated in the 30% positive category) , Kasich simply suggested that the polls are not accurate.

Kasich suggested that Ohio has reigned in government spending with no new taxes.  He moved on using his anti-union rhetoric against Ohio's public workers.  Interestingly enough, Kasich cited one small part of the 500 page SB 5 legislation.  He claimed that Ohio's public employees average 6% health care premiums while private sector employees pay 23%.  Kasich said everyone should pay the same amount for healthcare. Here Kasich is attempting to mislead viewers with this red herring comment:

1.  Public employees do not average 6% health care premiums.
2.  Public employees average less compensation than private counter-parts...and it is sometimes made up by favorable healthcare premiums.
3.  Instead of higher compensation, public employers have found it more cost-effective to keep health care premiums lower instead for employees.
4.  If there is an issue with premiums, public employees would be willing to sit down and NEGOTIATE a different contract.  

John Kasich successfully utilizes the red herring persuasion technique.  Instead of discussing what SB 5 really does to public employees, and the labor unions which support them, Kasich creates a false argument based on a faulty premise...  Smart...Creative... But highly inaccurate. But then again I do not think Kasich has risen to his political position by accident, and he is banking on half-truths to rule the day in his attempt to balance the state budget on the backs of Ohio's local government.

The question is, why didn't John Kasich come clean and tell viewers what SB 5 is really designed to do?



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