In radio interview, Gov. Andrew Cuomo bemoans bloggers and 24-hour news cycle

24-Hour News Cycle Makes Government More Transparent, An Aspect That Gov. Cuomo Apparently Dislikes

In a radio interview conducted this morning by John Catsimatidis, Gov. Andrew Cuomo complained about the scrutiny that social media, bloggers, and the 24-hour news cycle place on elected officials, a problem that his father, former Gov. Mario Cuomo, never had to face.

Gov. Cuomo's just whining that some blogs can't be led like sheep to re-write his campaign press releases. @thomaskaplan @JCats2013

— StopNYMRT (@StopNYMRT) March 16, 2014

“I don’t believe it raises the quality,” Gov. Cuomo said during the radio interview. “As a matter of fact, I think it lowers the quality, but it increases the frequency. These 24-hour blogs. Everybody’s in a competition. They have to get it up first. They have to get it up fast. So you have this constant chatter, that is not necessarily the most credible, the most insightful. But it’s constant and that dictates a rhythm to the governmental dialogue, which again is fast, and quick and facile, but not necessarily intellectual or correct.” (via The New York Daily News)

Bloggers are notoriously difficult to control. Each one is independent, and bloggers strenuously defend their autonomy. Perhaps this independence is a cause of concern for Gov. Cuomo. The armies of lobbyists and campaign consultants employed by elected officials and big business interests are always calling newspaper, radio, and TV reporters to control the daily talking points that elected officials want to see advanced in the mainstream media. But bloggers generally find the motivations of the backroom class of political insider operatives more suspect than mainstream media reporters, who are more resigned to go with the flow. Witness how reporters basically failed to vet -- and refused to accept responsibility for vetting -- Bill de Blasio in last year's mayoral race. If it weren't for bloggers, nobody would have covered the shady, undeclared lobbying that corrupted the race for New York City Council speaker.

But for bloggers, few would read information, for example, about how Gov. Cuomo's Medicaid Redesign Team has been a front group to make wholesale cuts to healthcare by closing entire hospitals, a furtherance of austerity measures begun by former Republican Gov. George Pataki's Berger Commission, a view you wouldn't get from, say, Anemona Hartocollis, the metropolitan healthcare reporter for The New York Times. A Web site administered by the housing activist and blogger John Fisher contributed to the years-long, grassroots effort to vote former City Council Speaker Christine Quinn out of office. The Atlantic Yards Report blog has published a wealth of information about the real estate corruption and community betrayals that took place in the furtherance of Forest City Ratner's zone-busting development for the Atlantic Yards section of Brooklyn. And many mainstream reporters are said to check in daily on the Queens Crap blog for news tips that regularly show up as full-fledged reports on local New York City TV news broadcasts. Since bloggers aren't afraid to tell the political truth, no matter how unflattering it may be to elected officials, the followers of certain political blogs will actually learn about how voters get short-changed by the shortcomings of the political expediency that elected officials practise.

• RELATED : You Could Die Waiting In A New York City Emergency Room (NYC : News & Analysis)
• RELATED : Good Government Group Lashes Out At Cuomo Over Interfering With Moreland Commission (NYC : News & Analysis)

How does @NYGovCuomo explain longer EMS transport times to communities affected by @NewYorkMRT hospital closings ? @JCats2013 @Azi

— StopNYMRT (@StopNYMRT) March 15, 2014

But the steadfast independence of bloggers hasn't stopped politicians from trying to control bloggers. Concerned about parental backlash to administration attacks on charter schools, New York City Mayor de Blasio recently announced an effort to subvert bloggers' independence by spoon-feeding parent bloggers with campaign-styled messaging on his universal pre-kinder program. Mayor de Blasio had to scurry into the arms of parent bloggers after he angered the City Hall press corps by restricting their access to him, hiding appointments from his public schedule, and by walking away from reporters' questions. His predecessor, former Mayor Michael Bloomberg, was king of his own media empire, and he didn't need bloggers. Hence, Mayor Bloomberg once derided all bloggers as lawless partisans.

This is a breaking-news post. Please check back for possible updates.

Contrasting "Narratives" on Medicaid, Hospital Budget Cuts Under Obamacare

#Gov1%, Hospital Budget Cuts, Medicaid Redesign Team, Stephen Berger, and GOP-Controlled States Take Toll on Life-Saving Emergency Care

Dr. Herbert Pardes, who used to lead New York-Presbyterian Hospital as president and CEO, earned $4.3 million in 2010, boosted by a $339,101 SERP payment. That came on top of a $6.8 million SERP payment that vested in 2008. (SERPs up! Hospital execs win big : Deferred plans boost chiefs' 'longevity pay' by millions of dollars * Crain's)

Dr. Pardes gave an interview on Channel 13 today, where he sounded pretty desperate to spin a win-win situation for patients under Obamacare. But there was a competing article published in The New York Times on the same day as his interview. The article showed that cuts to hospital budgets, caps on Medicaid, and refusals to expand Medicaid, and hospital closings was leading to serious life-threatening healthcare emergencies. Yet, Dr. Pardes remained ignorant of public health disaster caused by the wave of hospital closings instigated by Gov. Andrew Cuomo under Stephen Berger's Medicaid Redesign Team.

HERBERT PARDES: … I think to his credit, the Governor in New York did a good job in terms of putting a cap on the Medicaid budget. And he worked collaboratively with the providers and brought the cost down substantially.

So, the whole story isn’t beautiful, but there are parts which are.

RICHARD HEFFNER: But you’re saying, I gather … and that’s a beautiful point, if, if I understand correctly … that service is not going down, costs are not leveling because people are being less well served.

PARDES: Well, that’s exactly the kind of combined focus that people should undertake. Which is to say, bring costs down, but not at the expense of a clinical care of the patients. And we feel very strongly about that. So wherever we’ve taken out costs and there’s another part to this story, which is New York Presbyterian simply taking out costs … we’ve done it, but protected the clinical care aspect of our hospital. So … (More about the Dim Future of American Medicine * Thirteen.org)

If uninsured or underinsured patients have no insurance under Obamacare because Republican-led states opted out of expanding out of Medicaid, how do Obamacare supporters explain the draconian, scorched-earth campaign by Gov. Andrew Cuomo and Wall Street banker Stephen Berger's efforts to close hospitals, which are used as safety net care by the poor, before primary care is set up as a replacement ? Conveniently, it always goes unsaid how the closing of emergency rooms, full-service hospitals, and trauma centers will impact patients' likelihood of survivals (their healthcare outcomes) in life-threatening medical emergencies, when the next nearest full-service hospital or trauma center is further away ?

… A government subsidy, little known outside health policy circles but critical to the hospitals’ survival, is being sharply reduced under the new [Obamacare] health law.

The subsidy, which for years has helped defray the cost of uncompensated and undercompensated care, was cut substantially on the assumption that the hospitals would replace much of the lost income with payments for patients newly covered by Medicaid or private insurance. But now the hospitals in states like Georgia [, which like other Republican-led states, refused to broaden Medicaid after the Supreme Court in 2012 gave states the right to opt out, ] will get neither the new Medicaid patients nor most of the old subsidies, which many say are crucial to the mission of care for the poor. ...

… The cuts in subsidies for safety-net hospitals like Memorial [in Georgia] — those that deliver a significant amount of care to poor, uninsured or otherwise vulnerable patients — are set to total at least $18 billion through 2020. The government has projected that as much as $22 billion more in Medicare subsidies could be cut by 2019, depending partly on the change in the numbers of uninsured nationally.

The cuts are just one of the reductions in government reimbursements that are squeezing hospitals across the country. Some have already announced layoffs. In Georgia, three rural hospitals have closed this year. … (Cuts in Hospital Subsidies Threaten Safety-Net Care * The New York Times)

New York’s Ongoing Blackout: Hospitals in Lower Manhattan (Pro Publica) * St. Vincent’s Is the Lehman Brothers of Hospitals (New York magazine) * Governor Cuomo’s Medicaid cuts may kill 10 city hospitals (The New York Post)

LICH Supporters -- Don't Vote On Budget Until "Gov. 1%" Cuomo Saves LICH !

After 10 NYC Hospital Closings Since 2006, Gov. 1% Wants To Close More Hospitals ! What ?

Long Island College Hospital supporters are sponsoring a Change.org petition to save LICH. The sponsored include these New York State legislators : Assemblywoman Joan Millman and State Senator Daniel Squadron.

In conjunction with State Senators Velmanette Montgomery, Kevin Parker, Martin Malave Dilan, Diane Savino, Martin Golden, John Sampson, and Eric Adams -- and State Assembly Members: Alan Maisel, Joseph R. Lentol, Peter J. Abbate Jr., James Brennan, Alec Brook-Krasny, and Felix Ortiz.

These LICH supporters should not vote on Gov. 1% Cuomo's state budget until he save LICH -- and until both legislative houses hold a full hearing on the single-payer bill. Even after the 10 hospital closings, which have taken place in New York City since 2006, this year's state budget put together by Gov. Cuomo behind closed doors does not include a bailout for SUNY Downstate.

Show your support of LICH by signing this petition : Governor Andrew Cuomo and NYS Health Department Commissioner Dr. Nirav Shah : Keep University Hospital Brooklyn at Long Island College Hospital open