May 12, 2011

Mitt Romney gets hit from left and right on health care

09:47 AM
By Catalina Camia, USA TODAY
Updated at 11:55 a.m. ET

The reviews are starting to come in about Republican Mitt Romney's health care plan and he appears to be getting hit from all sides of the political spectrum.

The central question seems to be: What about the law you signed as governor of Massachusetts?

Romney, a leading contender for the GOP presidential nomination, gave a preview of the speech and PowerPoint presentation he'll make today in an op-ed column for USA TODAY. In the column, he makes little mention of the Massachusetts health care plan that's a model for the federal law he says he wants to repeal.

From the influential Wall Street Journal editorial page:

The debate over ObamaCare and the larger entitlement state may be the central question of the 2012 election. On that question, Mr. Romney is compromised and not credible. If he does not change his message, he might as well try to knock off Joe Biden and get on the Obama ticket.

Romney's spokesman Eric Fehrnstrom told our colleague Susan Page that Romney is intent on looking forward, not backward, with his speech today at the University of Michigan's Cardiovascular Center.

Democrats are out to portray Romney as a flip-flopper -- a moniker that GOP presidential rival John McCain and others used on Romney in the 2008 campaign for his changing views on abortion and other issues.

"Mitt Romney doesn't even know who he is," Democratic National Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz said today on ABC's Good Morning America. He is "twisting his head into a pretzel."

The DNC mocks Romney today with its own PowerPoint presentation, reminding people that in 1994, 2006, 2008 and 2009, the Republican supported a mandate requiring most individuals to obtain health insurance -- the centerpiece of both the Massachusetts plan and the federal law signed by Obama.

The Center for American Progress sent out its own long timeline of Romney's quotes on health care and individual mandates, going back to 1994. It includes such quotes as this one, from a 2006 PBS interview:

There may be some aspects of (the Massachusetts law) that can be picked up by other states ... perhaps even some national elements that could be adopted. ...Everybody in our state has to have health insurance.

And at the Cato Institute, senior fellow Michael Tanner says about the Massachusetts plan:

RomneyCare is not a success, with a few problems, that other states may or may not want to copy. It is a costly failure for Massachusetts, and the template for the flawed vision of health care reform that ultimately became ObamaCare. Until Romney understands and admits this, his campaign will continue to struggle with the issue.

http://content.usatoday.com/communities ... eaction-/1