A Heathy Prescription for America

When on the ground in New Hampshire, one of the goals will be to ask candidates direct questions, and demand straight answers. That's what retail politics is all about - facing the voters, even the out-of state voters like us. Marra and I are beginning to turn our attention to possible candidate questions, and that means candidate position discussions! Very interesting stuff for an 11 year old. So I decided to make the conversation really engaging, and start with various health care proposals out there in the political marketplace. Everyone is on the bandwagon of health care this cycle, at least until election day, so we have lots of plans to discuss.

I chose to begin with health care because it is recently in the news. Hillary just announced her proposal ("Hillarycare Redux"), and, not surprisingly, Mitt Romney held a press conference to denounce the details of her plan. In an impressive display of clairvoyance, Romney's rejection of the Hillary Plan came a full 30 minutes before Hillary even released it. No sense waiting to review the plan and comment in a productive, knowledgeable way, Mitt. That usually takes longer than a categorical repudiation, and doesn't make the evening news quite as saucy. Besides, Hillary's Plan is probably European anyway, right, Mitt?

So to begin reviewing health care plans and come up with some questions, I went to the most unbiased source I could find, The Washington Post. The Post printed a simple chart on Page A6 of the September 18th edition that compared the plans of Clinton, Edwards, Obama, Guiliani, and Romney. Apparently, no one else is running. The chart listed basic components of a health plan on the left column, and the candidate names across the top. An "x" indicated that the plan contained that basic component. Here are some highlights from the chart:

According to the Post, Romney's plan does not "seek to insure all Americans". It doesn't "require all individuals to purchase insurance". It doesn't require a tax on small business - but since it doesn't cover anyone, a tax to do so would seem excessive. It doesn't "require large employers to insure employees or pay taxes". It doesn't make "up to $15,000 of spending on health-care tax-deductible". What does it do? Tax incentives for health savings accounts. If I assume that all this is true, it begs our first candidate question: Why did you even pretend to propose a health care plan at all?

According to the Post, Obama "seeks to insure all Americans", but his method is to "require large employers to insure employees or pay taxes". My question on that would be: "How will you define yourself as a different kind of Democrat in the general election when your health care plan proposal appears to be 'tax employers, and make them pay' for the uninsured?"

Giuliani's plan is to tinker with the current tax code, too. He would "provide tax incentives for health savings accounts" and "make up to $15,000 of spending on health-care tax-deductible". The question for America's Yankee Fan...I mean, America's Mayor, would be: "According to Republican Robert Portman of Ohio, "Taxpayers now spend about 5.4 billion hours a year trying to comply with 2,500 pages of tax laws....". According to the Cato Institute, there were 526 different IRS forms as of 2002. My question - how does tinkering with the tax code and adding more complexity to it make health coverage more accessible for average Americans and solve the problem of the uninsured in America? I thought Republicans hated the IRS?"

Edwards' plan, as you would expect, does just about everything for everyone (or does everything to everyone), including calling for a tax on small business to insure employees. Simple question for Edwards: How much was your last haircut?

Hillary, Hillary, Hillary. Her proposal doesn't really matter, because the Republican talk circuit will deem it socialism, tax-and-spend liberalism run amok, Big Government, the handiwork of Tibetan lobbyists, and inspired by Vince Foster (just to get Vince Foster's name back in the news). Her big differentiator - if you like your coverage today, keep it. You would have CHOICE under her plan, a word (choice) she used repeatedly, which helped define another position of hers, all in one policy announcement - quite efficient. Perhaps Marra and I will dissect her plan at a later date.

Our search for leadership continues, one issue at a time.

JS