Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels, one of the many not-yet-running-officially Republicans running for President, is doing what most Republicans in his position are doing these days: bashing the Democratic health care reforms, and suggesting that the law that codified them is one of the worst pieces of legislation in American history.
Daniels, whose GOP cred comes mostly from his budget-cutting ways in Indiana and his time as President Bush’s budget director, took a stab at leveraging his policy wonkiness to offer up his own solutions to what his party sees as the Obamacare mess. His plan? Drop those pesky mandates and send the states more federal money.
Of course the best fix, Daniels says, would be for someone to just put an end to this whole health care reform thing.
From an op-ed in today’s Wall Street Journal:
“Many of us governors are hoping for either a judicial or legislative rescue from this impending disaster, and recent court decisions suggest there’s a chance of that,” he wrote. “But we can’t count on a miracle — that’s only permitted in Washington policy making.”
Barring the miracle, Daniels offers up a few suggestions on fixing the law he calls “a massive mistake” that is only appealing if “you’re in favor of a fully nationalized health-care system.”
Daniels’ changes include the laundry list of Republican problems with the law. Drop the mandates, cut the benefit guarantees and push “consumer-driven plans.” Daniels also suggests the feds pony up some more taxpayer cash to states working to implement the health care law.
States should be “reimbursed the true, full cost of the administrative burden to be imposed upon us, based on the estimate of an auditor independent of HHS,” Daniels wrote in the Journal.
The term-limited Indiana governor sent his suggestions to Health and Human Services Sec. Kathleen Sebelius. Daniels says his proposals will cut the costs of the health care reform law, and will prevent states from bearing the burden of implementing it.
The changes he suggests will also keep the latent socialism of the bill Obama signed at bay, Daniels wrote.
“Most fundamentally, the system we are proposing requires Washington to abandon most of the command-and-control aspects of the law as written,” the op-ed reads. “It steers away from nanny-state paternalism by assuming, recognizing and reinforcing the dignity of all our citizens and their right to make health care’s highly personal decisions for themselves.”
Read the whole op-ed here.
