Partners, the Boston behemoth that rivals California’s Sutter Health for its ability to impose its pricing will on the local Blues plans, has bought a struggling Medicaid plan, Neighborhood Health Plan (NHP). Actually “bought” is a strong word, as it’s like one of those deals when you “buy” someone’s car by taking over the payments they can’t meet. The fascinating part is that Partners has agreed to fund 50 community clinics that provide most of the care for the Medicaid crowd that NHP insures. So is Partners’ goal to ramp those clinics up to its standard level of pricing and charge Medicaid–i.e. the state & Feds-more for the privilege? Or is the goal (as Jeff Goldsmith suggested more generally yesterday)  to import the knowledge those clinics have and get the rest of the system to run at their low cost? You be the judge…