U. S Congressman Garret Graves, R-LA, appearing before the East Baton Rouge Parish Republican Women’s group on Tuesday, August 25, 2020.
U. S. Congressman Garret Graves (R-LA) was the guest speaker at the East Baton Rouge Parish (EBRP) Republican Women’s meeting of Tuesday, August 25, 2020. Graves praised President Trump’s wisdom of, “spending millions today to avoid spending billions tomorrow” on Louisiana flood mitigation projects. Let’s take a look at Graves’ itemization of those projects and his praise of the President for ensuring they have been funded:
Congressman Graves touts Louisiana flood mitigation projects funded over the last several years and praises President Trump for ensuring they are funded and being wise to spend “millions today rather than billions tomorrow.”
Graves also was quite blunt about his feelings about President Trump’s Twitter habits and one other action of President Trump for which Graves expressed disdain, but he then emphasized that the alternative of Democratic nominee Joe “you awake” Biden makes Trump the clear choice. Here’s video of Graves expressing those sentiments:
Graves expresses disdain for President Trump’s Twitter habits and one other specific episode which Graves said was “not okay,” but then stressed that, despite those shortcomings, President Trump is the clear choice to lead the U. S. for the next four years, and he provided his rationale for why that’s the case.
CLICK HERE for Congressman Graves’ presentation in its entirety.
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State Sen. Barrow Peacock as he sponsored an amendment to remove collateral source from the recently-passed tort reform initiative in Louisiana. His colleague, Sen. Sharon Hewitt, would later explain the move as the football equivalent of a flea flicker with the intent all along to add collateral source language back in when the bill went to conference committee, thus leaving staunch tort reform opponents to essentially have it crammed down their throats with no ability to oppose the language’s inclusion in the bill.
One Sound Off Louisiana subscriber, Craig Mills, who is arguably Louisiana’s strongest advocate for major adoption reform in Louisiana after he alleged he was a victim of an adoption scam, closely followed our features on tort reform in Louisiana. He was particularly intrigued by our feature on collateral source and the extreme degree that Louisiana’s trial lawyer cabal went to in order to keep that aspect of tort reform from becoming law in Louisiana.
The trial lawyers’ resolve to keep collateral source the way it is in Louisiana is best illustrated by Sen. Sharon Hewitt’s revelation that, as outlined on the preceding link, House Speaker Clay Schexnayder and Senate President Page Cortez felt they had little choice but to engage in the football equivalent of a flea flicker and remove the collateral source language from the bill with the full knowledge that they would add it back in conference committee with no time remaining for it to then be removed again. Senate President Cortez called upon Sen. Barrow Peacock to serve as halfback in that football flea flicker move as illustrated by the following seven-second video of Peacock removing the collateral source provision of the bill on Monday, June 22, 2020.
State Sen. Barrow Peacock removes “collateral source” from HB-57 on the Senate Floor on Monday, June 22, 2020.
Don’t let the words “collateral source” sound complicated because it’s not. The important thing to remember is that Louisiana’s present collateral source provisions essentially legalize the deployment of what amounts to otherwise-fraudulent collections entailing hospital billings for traffic accidents. Accident victims in Louisiana have, for years, through the Louisiana trial lawyer cabal, been compensated for accidents based on hugely-inflated hospital billings vis-a-vis the amount actually paid to the hospital by a health insurance company, which is often a tiny fraction of the amount billed. The lawyer and the accident victim simply pocket the difference, which is then passed on to us in the form of outrageous automobile liability insurance premiums! That makes it about as simple as we know how to make it.
Texas too had a similar system in place until that state enacted tort reform years ago. In at least one instance, Mills, who has extensive experience with hospital billings as a result of his own vocation, has provided us with recent news of a proposed class action lawsuit in Texas wherein alleged straight-up fraud entailing allegedly-inflated hospital billings has been deployed to bilk auto insurance companies and potentially the victims themselves out of the difference between the allegedly-inflated hospital billings and the amount companies like Blue Cross and Blue Shield would approve and pay. Basically the suit alleges that the billing partner and hospital simply told victims it was mandatory to bypass the health insurer altogether or else the claim would not be paid!
While that angle offers a different twist in that it’s the hospital and a billing partner which are seeking to benefit, there’s nothing to keep a similar scheme from being deployed wherein an added “incentive” is introduced to the victim (naturally, explained away so as to appear innocuous, of course) to simply go along with the whole arrangement so that everyone ends up with a piece of the “fraud pie,” all to the detriment to the auto insurance company. From the preceding feature:
A proposed class action lawsuit pending in a Texarkana federal court accuses the company that operates Wadley hospital and a medical billing company of violating state law and engaging in fraud in auto accident injury cases.
“However, during the screening process, defendants had in place their unlawful system, which upon identifying plaintiff as having been involved in an automobile accident, listed defendant MRA as the ‘Primary insurance.’ Further, defendants’ unlawful system omitted plaintiff’s health insurance plan as the source for payment, listed her as ‘Self Pay,’ and further coded her financial status as ‘Legal,'” the complaint states.
After being treated, Williams’ bill came to $9,750.79. The complaint alleges that amount is higher than the total of what Blue Cross would have been required to pay through its contract with the hospital plus the amount Williams would have been responsible for out-of-pocket in co-pay and deductible. The complaint alleges MRA and Steward are guilty of charging a higher price for services than allowed by Williams’ coverage under her Blue Cross policy.
The complaint alleges that after Williams’ lawyer sent a letter to MRA in February 2019 directing them to bill her health insurance, MRA responded by claiming the medical coverage “will not process” if services were rendered subsequent to an auto accident. The complaint alleges the response amounts to a full admission of the “deceptive scheme” of falsely declaring health insurance will not cover auto accident injuries, intentionally not billing health insurance plans and seeking payment of an inflated bill from the patient or a third party.
The complaint asks the court to declare the billing practices violate Texas law, for an injunction halting the conduct, for restitution of monies collected in violation of Texas law, for damages and certification as a class action.
So, once Louisiana’s tort reform collateral source provision kicks in on January 1, 2021, we’ll all have to keep a close eye out for situations similar to the preceding Texas matter, lest auto liability insurance rates continue to be through the proverbial roof in Louisiana.
We express sincere appreciation to Mills for his tip on this development in Texas, and we look forward to updating subscribers on his ongoing efforts to reform the adoption industry in Louisiana to help ensure other prospective adoptive couples are not scammed in a manner similar to the way in which he alleges that he was scammed.
If you would like to be added to our Sound Off Louisiana email list to be notified of future posts, simply go to our home page and scroll to the bottom (mobile devices) or to the top of the right-hand column (desktops). Supply your email address within the subscribe box. You’ll then receive an automated email from Word Press, and all you have to do is click on the blue “confirm follow” bar contained within that email, and you’ll begin receiving great posts such as the preceding one above.
Louisiana Legislative Auditor Daryl Purpera, who was recently called upon by Gov. Edwards to attest to the relative accuracy of the Louisiana Department of Health’s COVID numbers in light of an increasing number of local law enforcement and emergency-preparedness officials who are openly challenging the accuracy of those numbers.
Over the last month or so, a growing number of local law enforcement and emergency preparedness officials have openly questioned the accuracy of the COVID numbers being released by Gov. John Bel Edwards’ Office through the Louisiana Department of Health. The number of local folk questioning the numbers’ accuracy became large enough that The Advocate chose to rely upon Louisiana Legislative Auditor Daryl Purpera to counter their claims.
Based upon the following 71-second recording of former Louisiana Governor’s Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness (GOSHEP) Deputy Director Mark DeBosier’s commentary regarding his ability to get Purpera and his office to “put their fingers in their ears, close their eyes…..and we make sure there’s no fingerprints on it,” we openly question just how much faith the public should place in Purpera’s on-the-fly attestation of Gov. Edwards’ COVID numbers:
Former GOHSEP Deputy Director Mark DeBosier brags of his ability to get Purpera and the Legislative Auditor’s Office to “put their fingers in their ears, close their eyes…..and we make sure there’s no fingerprints on it.”
DeBosier certainly doesn’t provide very compelling evidence of the Louisiana Legislative Auditor’s independence. We repeatedly offered Purpera the opportunity to appear on camera to defend his office regarding DeBosier’s commentary, and he declined every invitation we extended. Furthermore, one of Sound Off Louisiana’s subscribers with integral knowledge of Purpera’s operations who insisted upon maintaining anonymity made the following comment regarding DeBosier’s statements on the audio file above):
The LLA and his staff do thorough work and they rarely leave a stone uncovered. They also produce accurate reports and their findings are spot on. Problem arises is that their initial reports are released only to a select few for review and “editing”. It is at this point that politics come into play and the findings contained within these reports are highly edited and the majority of the unfavorable findings, which are the one that truly point out the corruption, are edited out of the reports prior to their release to the public. Just another way to deprive taxpayers of any truly independent oversight.
For those who want detail entailing what the issue at hand was when DeBosier made his commentary, feel free to CLICK HERE. For those who chose to read the material at the preceding link and for our long-time subscribers, many will recall that FEMA contracted monitor Corey delaHoussaye sued the Louisiana State Office of Inspector General (OIG).
The latest on that litigation is that OIG filed (under seal) a Motion for Summary Judgment, and oral arguments for that Motion are scheduled for Tuesday, September 29, 2020. We’ll be there to report on the outcome of the OIG’s motion, and we’ll provide a feature alerting our subscribers of its outcome.
If you would like to be added to our Sound Off Louisiana email list to be notified of future posts, simply go to our home page and scroll to the bottom (mobile devices) or to the top of the right-hand column (desktops). Supply your email address within the subscribe box. You’ll then receive an automated email from Word Press, and all you have to do is click on the blue “confirm follow” bar contained within that email, and you’ll begin receiving great posts such as the preceding one above.
