U.S. Rep. Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., is asking a question that should have been answered before her peers in the House of Representatives approved a health care bill Saturday night. The fact that a majority of lawmakers voted in favor of the bill before getting answers such as that sought by Capito is disturbing, to say the least.
Capito was one of 215 members of the House who voted against the health care bill. Unfortunately, they were outvoted by 220 lawmakers, including Reps. Alan Mollohan and Nick Rahall, both D-W.Va.
As we have pointed out, unnecessarily hasty action on the bill was demanded by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif. The slim majority of lawmakers who went along with her seemed to see nothing wrong in voting on a bill without understanding its potential ramifications.
Capito and others who voted against the proposal believed more time should be provided to investigate the nearly 2,000-page bill. One question on Capito's mind is how approval of the measure would affect the state of West Virginia.
One provision in the bill would expand the federal-state Medicaid program. Washington would pay 91 percent of the cost of growth. States would have to cover the remainder.
Capito has asked the state Department of Health and Human Resources for an estimate of the burden the bill, if enacted, would place on West Virginia taxpayers.
Medicaid already costs the state about $545 million a year. That represents about one-fourth of the total cost of the existing program. Clearly, allowing more people to sign up for Medicaid could be a very expensive proposition.
Neither Mollohan nor Rahall seem to have worried about that. Apparently it was not a decisive factor in the thinking of the two other Mountain State members of the House, or 218 of their peers.
All 220 of those who voted in favor of the bill did so because Pelosi and other liberal leaders in the House told them it was a good idea - not as a result of careful examination of the measure.
Capito and others who decided they could not vote in favor of the proposal without knowing more about its costs and benefits were right. Rushing to follow Pelosi's orders and vote for a bill that could dump a gigantic new burden on the backs of West Virginia taxpayers is, quite simply, wrong.