Two programs at the McComb Rotary Club during the past 10 days weren’t meant to be related, but they had more in common than the planners and the participants could have imagined when they were scheduled.

The first was by Rep. Sam Mims V, R-McComb, who reported on this year’s regular session of the state Legislature, as well as the current off-and-on special session. Much of Mims’ talk, especially in a question and answer session, was about Medicaid.

As everyone who has been keeping up with the subject knows, there’s an impasse between the Senate and the House over how to fund a $90 million shortfall in the state’s share of Medicaid funding.

The Senate and Gov. Haley Barbour want to do it with what they call an assessment on hospitals.

House Democrats, led by Speaker Billy McCoy, call that a tax on sick folks and want to fund the Medicaid shortfall at least in part by raising Mississippi’s 18-cent cigarette tax, the third lowest in the nation.

Several members of Mims’ audience chortled when, in answer to a question, the Republican representative said he didn’t think Barbour’s history as a lobbyist for tobacco companies had anything to do with his opposition to raising the cigarette tax.

Actually, Mims may have been right in his opinion. It is true that Barbour was a lobbyist for tobacco companies, but it also is true he repeatedly has stated he’s against “raising anybody’s taxes,” although that pledge apparently doesn’t extend to hospitals. And Barbour has indicated he won’t oppose an increased cigarette tax in the next regular session of the Legislature if it is recommended by his tax study group and tied to a reduction in some other tax.

Mims also was right in assessing that the dispute is more about politics than policy.

McCoy and the House Democrats no doubt relish labeling Barbour a friend of tobacco. They also may be seeking a little retribution for the governor trying to have some of them defeated during the last election and for interfering in the election of House speaker. Republicans in the House to a person voted against McCoy, but he won any way. Now some of them seem shocked they don’t have any good committee assignments or that McCoy may be miffed at the governor.

Now fast forward to this week’s Rotary program.

Dr. David Ladden, a cardiothoracic and vascular surgeon at the Cardiovascular Institute of Mississippi, didn’t say a word about Medicaid or politics.

His topic was the Cardiovascular Institute of Mississippi and the diseases being treated there.

But in his talk, he pointed out that Mississippi leads the nation in some startling statistics. Including the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico, Mississippi ranks 52 in preventing cardiovascular disease. Some reasons for this: Mississippi has the nation’s highest rates of obesity, diabetes and smoking, all contributors to heart disease.

If smoking is making people sick and increasing the need for Medicaid, it makes you wonder why anyone would oppose raising the third lowest cigarette tax in the nation to help fund medical treatment.

One of the arguments against raising the cigarette tax to fund an ongoing program, such as Medicaid, is that it is an unstable source of revenue. Raise it too much and some people may stop smoking.

So? Wouldn’t that be healthy?

Raise it more than neighboring states and people might start going across the line and bootlegging them in. Well, don’t raise it that high. Just raise it to about what Tennessee, Louisiana and Alabama are charging.

A good guess is if Barbour and his allies in the Senate, including Lt. Gov. Phil Bryant, would give a little on the cigarette tax, the House would probably go along with whatever it takes in hospital assessments to make up the difference in what’s needed to fully fund Medicaid.

They should try it and see.