In the last two weeks, political commentators have expressed doubts over President Obama's time frame for health-care reform. Meanwhile, even some Democratic lawmakers appear to be getting cold feet. In response, Obama is relentlessly pitching his plan. He has spoken about health care on eight out of the last nine days, and he's scheduled to hold a town-hall meeting on the topic this Thursday. Former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney is one of the few politicians in the country with first-hand experience of steering major health-care reform through the legislative process. The reforms he enacted in Massachusetts have been criticized for being costly, but they've also managed to extend coverage to a significant number of uninsured people. By 2007, the proportion of uninsured people in Massachusetts was the lowest in the country.
I spoke to Romney about his experience with health-care reform this morning. His cautionary words for Obama? Slow down. Here are some excerpts from our conversation:
What do you think needs to happen over the next couple of weeks if President Obama's deadline for health-care reform is to be met?
I think the president ought to hit the reset button. I think it is critical that he have the participation, involvement, and support of people on both sides of the aisle, as well as people in various sectors of the health economy. If we are going to have a dramatic shift in the nature of so large a part of our economy, then it needs to be something that has been thoroughly vetted and has received great support. Out of a desire to move very quickly, while his support is highest, he has skipped the critical steps of educating, involving, and evolving his own plans to meet the perspectives of the great majority of our citizens.
It sounds like you are encouraging the president to slow down. Aren't there risks in delaying?
He's in a very difficult position. We faced a very similar question [in Massachusetts] as we began our process. We spent over two years putting together a health-care plan and then building support for it on both sides of the aisle—working with hospitals, providers, doctors, business groups, labor groups, advocates for the poor. We involved all of these parties, and it took a long time, but what we ended up with was a bill that passed the legislature— if you combine the House and the Senate—198 to 2.
What lessons can be gleaned from your experience in Massachusetts?
After we crafted the architecture of our plan, the first person I went to was Ted Kennedy. He and I met numerous times, and what we fashioned was not perfect in either one of our eyes. But we worked together, because only together could we know that we would have the support of all the parties necessary to make it work.
The states are laboratories of democracy. Well, our state passed a bill. It's been in place now for several years. Have they studied it? Have they spoken with the Republicans and Democrats in Masssachusetts? Have they spoken with hospitals? Doctors? Have they sent the GAO there to take it apart to see what is working well and what is not? Nobody has given me a call, except Republicans. I’ve received no calls from Democrats saying what do you think about it? What would you do differently if you were to do it today? There’s a whole series of things I’d do differently. And yet, there seems to be such a rush to act. I understand that President Obama wants to get this done in his first term, but more important than getting it done in the first year is getting it done right, before he is out of office. There is time here to get it done right.
In terms of the reform proposals before Congress, what do you see that you like and dislike so far?
I'm not happy that the president wants to provide a so-called public option. There is no need for the government to become an insurance company. I'm convinced, as many before me have said, that this is a step towards a single-payer system; that it will result in billions, if not hundreds of billions, of subsidies down the road and a new entitlement, which is one of the last things America needs right now. On the other hand I am happy that he is actually working to reform health care. It's important for us to get everyone insured. It's important that there be an effort made to reduce the excessive inflation in the health-care sector.
How well do the current proposals deal with reducing costs?
The legislation has almost nothing to do with cost reduction. Nothing I have seen in the bills that are being discussed by the Democratic leadership suggests that there will be a significant change in health inflation.
This is an extraordinarily important topic and one for which there is a great deal of information around the world. Normally, if this were private enterprise, you would spend a great deal of time with brilliant analysts, looking at alternatives, evaluating lessons from foreign places, and perhaps even experimenting with some alternatives before unleashing them on the entire U.S. economy. Health-care reform is a matter that should be focused on allowing our citizens to have better health at more reasonable cost, as opposed to being thought of as a political success or failure. We really can't afford a lot of trillion-dollar mistakes.
What do you think the president's message to the American people should be?
I don't presume to give the president advice. I can say that the campaign promise that President Obama made to work on a bipartisan basis and to change the atmosphere in Washington is something that I think America is still hoping to see, particularly in health care. It is just not consistent with his original vision to anticipate jamming through a piece of legislation that has numerous flaws, and that can only receive the support of his own party if members of that party have had their arms twisted into knots. That is not going to be the right kind of answer to America's health-care needs.
