Did Pam Bondi really defend RomneyCare? I Don’t Think So….

There is some bluster going around the internets about Pam Bondi’s interview with Greta last night, suggesting that she not only defended RomneyCare, but that she will also help Romney institute it when/if he becomes president. But I’ve listened to the interview and I believe this is NOT TRUE.

I’m not a Romney supporter and I am not going to bat for him here. I just hate when misinformation gets thrown out there and people latch on to it as if it were true.

If you listen to the interview below, you’ll first hear Rush talking about the similarities between RomneyCare and ObamaCare. Greta then asks Pam Bondi, who is currently fighting ObamaCare in court, what she thinks about what Rush had just said. But for some reason, instead of commenting on what Rush said about RomneyCare, she does a switcheroo and compares what Rush said to Romney’s current plan on health care that he would implement as president. You’ll notice she uses the word “would” a lot in her answer. She’s obviously looking in the future and not in the past, which is weird, because she was asked specifically about RomneyCare.

Bondi said Romney “has the vision and experience necessary to turn our economy around and restore prosperity to our nation.”

You can speculate as to why she did that – perhaps she didn’t want to sit there and defend RomneyCare. But the way she answered the question has led people to believe she was talking about RomneyCare, and, because she said she’s been offered a job in the Romney administration helping implement his health care plan, after ObamaCare has been overturned and removed…

So  people now believe she’s going to help Romney implement RomneyCare. I didn’t hear it that way.

You can listen and decide for yourself, but that’s my take HERE. <--

**Romney has pledged over and over again that he will immediately after his inauguration give every state a waiver from ObamaCare.  He has also explained over and over the differences between RomneyCare and ObamaCare; about the things in RomneyCare that he tried to veto or were added since he left the Governorship and has explained that Massachusetts saw the option of Romneycare as a state’s right.**

Rino Gingrich is Done Before He Started - Backs Obamacare's Individual Mandate

Gingrich Backs Obamacare's Individual Mandate Requiring Health Insurance

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich said Sunday that he strongly supports a federal mandate requiring citizens to buy health insurance – a position that has been rejected by many Republicans, including several who likely will be running against him for the Republican presidential nomination.

Appearing on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Gingrich told host David Gregory that he continues to advocate for a plan he first called for in the early 1990s as a Congressman, which requires every uninsured citizen to purchase or acquire health insurance.

Gregory played a clip of Gingrich speaking during an appearance on Meet the Press in October 1993:

“I am for people, individuals -- exactly like automobile insurance -- individuals having health insurance and being required to have health insurance. And I am prepared to vote for a voucher system which will give individuals, on a sliding scale, a government subsidy so we insure that everyone as individuals have health insurance.”

Gregory asked Gingrich if he would criticize GOP presidential rival Mitt Romney, whose "Romneycare" health program enacted during his time as Governor in Massachusetts mandated that all uninsured purchase health insurance.

Gingrich replied he would not make it an issue in the campaign and said he agreed with key aspects of Romneycare.

"I agree that all of us have a responsibility to pay--help pay for health care," Gingrich said, adding, "I've said consistently we ought to have some requirement that you either have health insurance or you post a bond ..."

Gingrich also admitted that his proposal is a "variation" of the individual mandate, a key component of the Obamacare legislation President Obama signed into law in 2010.

The position staked out by Gingrich appears to be at odds with leading conservative critics of Obamacare, who argue that the law requiring citizens to purchase a private insurance policy is not constitutional.

The Obama administration is currently facing three lawsuits arguing that the federal mandate is unconstitutional, including one filed by a coalition of 26 states.

The issue is on track for a Supreme Court decision in the summer of 2012, which would make it a likely hot-button topic heading into the elections.

Conservative GOP critics like Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli say the mandate is unconstitutional because although Congress can regulate commerce, it can’t require people to engage in a particular “economic activity” just because they live in the U.S.

Conservative judicial experts have also taken exception to the claim made by Gingrich and supporters of the Obamacare law that mandating health insurance is the same as the government requirement to purchase car insurance, noting that driving a car is a privilege provided by states and not a constitutional right.

Cucinelli says that "buying auto insurance is voluntary, since you are only required to purchase it if you choose to drive on public roads. But buying health insurance under the new federal law is not voluntary, as you are required to buy it just by virtue of the fact that you are breathing. The federal government has never before in history exercised its regulatory power to require someone to buy a product or service as a condition of residence in the United States."
Gingrich, though, seemed to disagree with that notion on Sunday, though he was quick to point out the differences between his plan and the federal health law.

“In, in the first place, Obama basically is trying to replace the entire insurance system, creating state exchanges, building a Washington-based model, creating a federal system,” Gingrich told NBC’s David Gregory. “I believe all of us--and this is going to be a big debate--I believe all of us have a responsibility to help pay for healthcare …"
Romney has not come under fire for not disowning his health care plan, which has caused private health care insurance rates to skyrocket as patient services have declined in Massachusetts.

Gingrich's position quickly came under fire from several conservative blogs on Sunday.

“He tried to distinguish his mandate from the Obama mandate, but with little success,” the American Federalist Journal wrote on Sunday.
“Sandbagging your fellow Republicans in Congress and offering tacit support for a key (unconstitutional) component of Obamacare is a very strange way to begin a run in a Republican primary. Not a strong start.”

The Wall Street Journal called Gingrich’s description of an ideal healthcare plan with mandates a “pretty good description of what the Democratic Congress passed into law last year."

The Journal continued: "Beginning in 2014, most Americans who don't have insurance will be required to pay a fee, with many, depending on income, getting subsidies to help buy coverage through state-based exchanges.”

The conservative website Red State said Gingrich “won’t exactly endear him to the Tea Party crowd or the reform minded movement sweeping the GOP.”

Source: Newsmax

Important: Do You Support Pres. Obama's Re-Election? Vote Here Now!

Replicating Massachusetts’ Health Reform on a National Level

By Stephen M. Weiner, Esq.

Massachusetts’ innovative approach to health care reform, adopted in 2006, has become the focus of substantial national attention as Congress and the Administration in Washington focus intense attention on health reform.  Many federal proposals build on elements that have been implemented in Massachusetts.  Two questions are of interest in this regard: can the federal government adopt the Massachusetts approach, and, failing federal reform, can Massachusetts serve as a model for other States?

            For background, the key elements of the Massachusetts program can be summarized very generally as follows:  An individual mandate requiring most residents to have insurance; assessments on certain employers who do not make adequate insurance available to their employees; a “health care connector” that links individuals and small businesses to insurance products; and State-subsidized insurance for persons who are not eligible for Medicaid with incomes up to 300% of the Federal poverty level (the “CommonwealthCare” program).

            The individual mandate is key to achieving near universal coverage, and other components of the reform facilitate access to “affordable” coverage.  The reform’s approach is to move uninsured people into insured status, and to reduce reliance by safety net hospitals on disproportionate share and supplemental Medicaid payments by providing them an insured population in lieu of uninsured individuals.

            Many of these elements appear in the various federal proposals, including the individual mandate, the connector and imposing some form of assessment on employers.  As to other elements of federal proposals, Massachusetts does not include a public plan option, although CommonwealthCare could be viewed as a workable alternative.

            However, in creating the coalition that secured passage of the reform, political and policy leaders deliberately chose to address access first and defer dealing with how the program would be paid for.  This of course is not an option for the federal government, which is struggling with how reform will be funded.

            Massachusetts could defer the cost issue because the amount of new State dollars needed at the outset was relatively small.  This was so because of: (a) CMS’ willingness to grant a waiver allowing federal Medicaid matching funds for the CommonwealthCare subsidies; (b) the generous level of State dollars that was already flowing into the health care system through Medicaid and the State’s uncompensated care pool; and (c) the relatively larger number of large and small business that already provided some coverage for their employees.

            Of course, the economy and serious budget problems are now affecting CommonwealthCare’s financing.  This year for the first time there will be some restrictions on who can enroll, and some adjustments to available benefits.  Massachusetts did try to address health care cost through legislation in 2008, but the focus was more on long-term structural changes, such as incentives to promote more primary care physicians (one of the downsides of improving access in Massachusetts was to make worse an already bad situation of too few primary care physicians), supporting the greater use of nurse practitioners and effectively mandating that hospitals and physicians move toward adoption of electronic medical records and CPOE systems.  The legislation, however, is not generating immediate cost savings.

            In summary, Massachusetts’ program has many elements that could work at the federal level and could be adapted for use in other States.  Two critical points need to be kept in mind, however: First, the creation of a coalition that included Government (including a Republican Governor and an overwhelmingly Democratic legislature), consumer advocates, employers and insurers and the willingness of each of the groups to compromise (an individual mandate balanced against some employer assessments, for example) got the reform enacted but is not easy to replicate.

Second, as noted above, financing could be deferred because the marginal dollars needed to fund the reform initially were not so great.  (Shortly after enactment of Massachusetts’ reform, a California study concluded that implementing the same program there would cost that State an additional $12 billion.)  The key issue for the federal government is how to fund reforms.  Massachusetts may be a good model but the particular financial circumstances that existed when its reform was enacted may make the model difficult to replicate elsewhere.

Stephen M. Weiner serves as President of the national nonprofit HealthWell Foundation (www.healthwellfoundation.org), which provides financial assistance to underinsured patients coping with serious and chronic conditions.  He is also Chair of the Health Law practice for Mintz Levin and has over thirty years of health care experience as a policy maker, educator and attorney.

Source:  Physician News Digest

There are many better options out there that do not include:

• a public option that will lead to a single payer socialized medicine
• rationing
• duty to die aspects for seniors
• forced mandates for all physicians to perform abortions
• government being involved in what should be doctor-patient decisions
• a national database giving government access to everyone’s health records

What we need is

• regulation and over-sight by the government… of Insurance Companies, Big Pharma, the AMA and no more
• overhaul of Medicare, Medicaid, Veteran’s Health, Indian Reservation Health (government has done a terrible job with these programs… and that should speak for itself)
• tort reform
• allow companies and individuals to go across state lines to purchase insurance
• allow individuals and and small business to form co-ops to purchase insurance.
• portable health insurance
• attention and a stop to fraud in all the government-run programs and by the insurance companies and Big Pharma
• no more exclusion by insurance companies of people who have pre-existing conditions.

In 2012 Preview, Pawlenty Takes Aim at RomneyCare

In today's Washington Post, Tim Pawlenty has an op-ed urging Washington to learn from health care reform experiences at the state level. Not surprisingly, he touts reform efforts in Minnesota, but it's also noteworthy that he takes aim at the Massachusetts overhaul that was led by Mitt Romney (though he doesn't mention Romney by name). Not that Pawlenty is a free market puritan on health care -- he supported SCHIP, for example -- but the disastrous results of Romney's health care plan in Massachusetts could prove a big obstacle for him during the 2012 Republican primaries in which at the moment, he's viewed as the very early frontrunner.

Romney has tried to have it both ways on health care. On the one hand, he points to health care as an example of his ability as an executive to get things done, yet at the same time he blames the Democratic legislature for changing his original plan (even though he signed it with changes, knowing that he wouldn't be around to oversee its implementation and that his successor would likely be a Democrat). He wants to take credit for the fact that his plan expanded coverage, but doesn't want to accept blame for the endless wait times for doctors, skyrocketing costs and the fiscal crisis that went along with that expanded coverage. He claims that his plan is a free market alternative to a government takeover of health care, and yet it's a plan that expanded Medicaid rolls, forced individuals to purchase insurance or pay a tax, and had government provide subsidies to people to purchase a government-run insurance on a government-run exchange. Anybody worried about life under ObamaCare should not be a fan of RomneyCare -- other than the absence of a government plan in the exchange, both plans are structurally very similar.

By Philip Klein on 8.3.09 @ 10:20AM

Posted:  True Health Is True Wealth

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