Global warming sells everything

I've written a fair amount about how the City of Portland's 1 percent tax on sales by mega-companies, which is supposed to somehow be fostering "clean energy," is really just a slush fund from which the city commissioners dole out pork to their favorite "nonprofits." The grant recipients supposedly use the money for something like new heat pumps, but money's fungible, and they can divert what they otherwise would have spent on such equipment to whatever they want, including their executive director's mortgage payments. Not to mention moolah they get for vague purposes like "workforce training" and heaven knows what all else. It's to save the planet, don'tcha know. The big retailers don't squawk too much about it; they just pass the tax on to consumers.

Well, the city isn't the only one playing this game. This week I see that the Oregon health department, of all people, is now going to start handing out "climate devices" to the poor, on the theory that if they have better furnaces and refrigerators, and air conditioning, people will be healthier.

Eligible OHP members may qualify for a new benefit to receive devices that provide healthy temperatures and clean air such as air conditioners, heaters and air filters, as well as mini refrigeration units for storing medications. Portable power supplies to operate medical equipment (i.e., ventilators during power outages) may also be available as a new benefit. 

The state is first extending eligibility for climate devices to people who are experiencing life transitions and often face social injustices. This includes people who are: currently or previously involved in the child welfare system; homeless or at risk of becoming homeless; transitioning to dual eligibility for Medicare and Medicaid; adults and youth recently discharged from Institutions for Mental Disease (IMDs) or released from incarceration within the last year. Members must not live in a group setting or shelter and need to have access to consistent and safe power to use these devices. Climate resources must also be part of a member’s health need or treatment.

The new climate-related benefits are part of Oregon’s federally funded expansion of OHP coverage to include health-related social needs (HRSN) services, which can help maintain health and well-being, but are not traditionally thought of as medical services.

Can you imagine how much graft will be involved in this? It boggles the mind. And how are they evaluating the effectiveness of these handouts? Will they be monitoring how the money is actually being spent, and where the devices are actually being used? Who's making a fortune selling this equipment? 

You don't want to ask. You really don't. It's Salem. The answer is going to be bad.

The con here is pretty brazen, and pretty open-ended. You can draw a line from climate change to just ahout any kind of welfare system you want. And make no mistake, the politicians and bureaucrats around here definitely will, for as long as they can get away with it. Forget "It's for the children." The amount of money – your money – that they can divert "for the climate" is virtually unlimited. Kiss it goodbye.

Here we have a city where you can't get an ambulance, you can't get elective surgery because there are no anesthesiologists, drug addicts are O.D.'ing and dying on the streets in record numbers, the bad boys at the medical school are taking over the clinics and hospitals (eliminating protections against malpractice in the process), and this is what the health department is busy with? Handing out free refrigerators to guys getting out of prison? Great, whatever.