Mitt Romney's Troubles Show Republican Party is Out of Ideas on Health Care

In 2006, then Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney signed a landmark health care reform bill which brought universal insurance to all Massachusetts residents. The late Senator Edward Kennedy called it “a shot heard round the world” and Romney himself boasted that “Every uninsured citizen in Massachusetts will soon have affordable health insurance and the costs of health care will be reduced.”

While most governors would be proud of passing legislation that provided affordable health insurance for millions of their state’s residents, Mitt Romney has been under pressure from conservatives to repudiate his signature legislative accomplishment.

Romney, who is seeking the 2012 Republican nomination, had been praised during the 2008 Republican primary by many conservatives for showing leadership on the issue and the having the ability to “take some good conservative ideas, like private health insurance, and apply them to the need to have everyone insured.”

So what’s changed from 2008 to 2011? In 2010, President Barack Obama signed into law a health care reform bill explicitly based on Romney’s health care reform. Almost every Republican Senator and Congressman voted against it. What had previous been a model for applying “good conservative ideas” suddenly became the “crown jewel of socialism.”

So now what do Republicans think we should do about the problems of the uninsured and rapidly rising health care costs? Romney recently gave a speech defending his record. While it was a very interesting speech, with an excellent defense of the individual mandate, conservatives are still unconvinced. And while the 2010 GOP position of “Repeal and Replace” on health care reform has led to lots of votes on “Repeal” we’ve seen absolutely nothing in the way of “Replace”

The biggest idea we’ve seen out of the Republican Party has been their plan to privatize and slash Medicare, which would only lead to more uninsured Americans and faster health care cost growth. As Ezra Klein notes here, the fact that health care has become Romney’s biggest liability is perverse considering that he is one of the only Republican candidates to accomplish significant reform on the issue.

Unfortunately, until Republicans stop focusing on scoring political points against the President and begin taking seriously the problems Romney faced when he passed his health care reform in Massachusetts, the Grand Old Party will continue to be lost on this important issue.

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