海角大神

Did Mitt Romney stretch the truth about his health-care proposals during an appearance on NBC鈥檚 鈥淢eet the Press鈥� Sunday? That鈥檚 what some Democrats are charging Monday.

At issue is something the GOP nominee said during a discussion with host David Gregory about President Obama鈥檚 health-care reform law. Despite pushing similar state-based reforms when he was governor of Massachusetts, Romney opposes Obama鈥檚 health law, and has vowed to work to repeal it.

Romney told Gregory that he didn鈥檛 oppose the law in its entirety. He said there are parts of it that he鈥檇 like to duplicate in his own health plan.

鈥淥f course, there are a number of things that I like in health-care reform that I鈥檓 going to put in place,鈥� said Romney. 鈥淥ne is to make sure that those with preexisting conditions can get coverage. Two is to assure that the marketplace allows for individuals to have policies that cover their family up to whatever age they might like.鈥�

As to the preexisting conditions issue, under Obama鈥檚 Affordable Care Act, insurance companies can鈥檛 turn away prospective customers who already have health challenges. In return, they get lots of new customers from the law鈥檚 mandate that everyone has to have health coverage.

On NBC, Romney implied that he鈥檇 keep the first part of that equation while getting rid of the second, since he鈥檚 opposed to the individual mandate.

The problem is that isn鈥檛 the full story in regards to Romney鈥檚 position on preexisting conditions coverage. In fact, Romney is proposing something much different than the blanket preexisting conditions protections of Obama鈥檚 ACA.

Later in the day the Romney campaign issued a clarification to National Review.

鈥淕overnor Romney will ensure that discrimination against individuals with preexisting conditions who maintain continuous coverage is prohibited,鈥� a campaign aide told National Review鈥檚 Katrina Trinko.

By 鈥渃ontinuous coverage,鈥� the Romney team means just that 鈥� people who already have health insurance can鈥檛 be booted off due to preexisting conditions.

鈥淭hat鈥檚 great for an individual who gets a new job. But continuous coverage isn鈥檛 so great for the individual who has spent some time without insurance, perhaps because of difficult financial times. Continuous coverage won鈥檛 do much for you in that situation,鈥� writes Sarah Kliff on the Washington Posts鈥� Wonkblog.

Not only that, it鈥檚 already the law in most cases, points out Kliff, due to the 1996 Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act.

As to people without continuous coverage who have preexisting conditions, Romney would expand on current state efforts to cover them via high-risk insurance pools.

The GOP nominee 鈥渟upports reforms that empower states to make high-risk pools more accessible by using cost reducing methods like risk adjustment and reinsurance,鈥� campaign spokeswoman Andrea Saul told the Huffington Post in June following a Romney speech on health care.

Now, does all this mean Romney was stretching the truth during his Meet the Press appearance? According to Democrats, it does. Current state high-risk pools generally offer poor insurance coverage at high prices, writes liberal Ed Kilgore Monday in the Washington Monthly.

鈥淪o once again, Mitt makes a reasonable sounding statement in front of a large audience, knowing he won鈥檛 be forced to disclose any details or actually make sense, and only later do we find out that it鈥檚 all smoke,鈥� writes Kilgore.

Republicans, however, respond that Romney wasn鈥檛 stretching the truth. He does support covering preexisting conditions, and has a plan to do so, whether Democrats approve of it or not.

鈥淭his kind of mechanism, using high-risk pools combined with prohibitions on preexisting condition exclusions for the continuously insured, has been part of just about every conservative health-care proposal in recent years, including John McCain鈥檚 in 2008, the Ryan-Coburn alternative to Obamacare, and the congressional Republicans鈥� 鈥楶ledge to America鈥� before the 2010 elections,鈥� writes Yuval Levin on the National Review blog The Corner.