The PPACA (aka ObamaCare) was based on Mitt Romney's Massachusetts Health Care Plan. Both plans attempt to socialize health care through state run"health exchanges."
ObamaCare simply imposes RomneyCare on all states.
The heart of ObamaCare is a network of health exchanges regulated and partially funded by the Federal Government. The exchanges are implement at the state level.
RomneyCare is a network of health exchanges regulated by a non-elected entity called a compact, then implemented at the local level.
They are the same thing in form and function.
Mitt Romney simply promises a symbolic repeal of ObamaCare followed by an nationwide implementation of the same plan. Mitt Romney admitted this in an interview with Meet the Press earlier this month.
I read Mr. Romney's Health Care Plan. It is not free market health care. The plan begins:
"Mitt will begin by returning states to their proper place in charge of regulating local insurance markets and caring for the poor, uninsured, and chronically ill.:
The idea that the STATE is in charge of caring for the poor, uninsured and chronically ill is a STATIST ideal. It is not a free market ideal.
For the state to provide these things the state must charges taxes to provide these things!
The Romney plan does not get the Federal government out of health care. His plan says:
"The federal government’s role will be to help markets work by creating a level playing field for competition. "
This really isn't that much different than the role the Federal Government had in ObamaCare. The Feds had more enforcement power and more direct control in enumerating health benefits. Under Romney, the footprint of the Federal Government is only slightly reduced. The major funding for Medicare and Medicaid will come from the Federal Government in the form of block grants and the Feds still have a boot on the throat of the state.
My greatest disappointment with the Romney plan is that the plan operates under the false assumption that pooled insurance is the only possible way to pay for health care.
True free market reform would start with the realization that the problem with our health care is our use of group funding for individual consumption. A true free market would make the individual, not the State or insurance pool the primary focus of health care.
The Romney plan simply tries to rebrand ObamaCare with only a token (and temporary) reduction in Federal Control. The Romney plan is a statist solution with the State at the center of health care.
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