I was disappointed twice this week in regards to the health care plan that was announced by the Hillary Clinton campaign.
The first disappointment was how Senator Clinton's plan, though well thought out, was studiously conservative and cautious, and shied away from tackling some of the most glaring problems of the current system, like reducing the incentives for waste, fraud and excessive profits. Indeed, most commentators who have studied it say it it modeled after Mitt Romney's plan in Massachusetts, which in turn was modeled after the plan Republican Senator John Chafee proposed as an alternative to Hillary's plan in 1994. In other words, it appears Senator Clinton has proposed a Republican plan for health care reform. It's hard to blame her for this approach; as we have seen this week, the Republicans were just waiting to pounce on whatever she proposed as "Hillary Care II" or the usual ideological war cry, "socialized medicine". Her plan seems more designed to avoid criticism than to really tackle the glaring problems of our current system. Still, given the political realities of how politicians from both parties are owned by the drug and insurance companies, it may be the best we can do.
The second disappointment was the latest chapter in how my fellow Mormon, Mitt Romney, reinforced his well-earned reputation as being willing to say anything to pander to the Right. Despite the fact that Clinton's health care plan is basically modeled after the Massachusetts's system, he was first out of the gate with the typical Republican Noise Machine name calling. Joe Klein of Time.com had the following comment:
"Mitt Romney is already blasting Hillary Clinton's new health care plan--which resembles nothing so much, in its broad outlines, as the individual-mandate plan that Romney himself passed in Massachusetts. The intellectual dishonesty is just staggering; how sad to see a smart, pragmatic and essentially moderate politician continue to embarrass himself in this way." How different this guy is from his father, who basically lost the nomination for President in 1968 because of his courageous opposition to the Vietnam War.
One question I continue to ask my LDS Republican friends. Which guy most resembles Brigham Young: Mitt Romney, who has gained a reputation for changing his political values more often than his underwear, or Harry Reid, who tells you what he thinks and if you don't like it, you can go live with the devil in hell? I know who gets my vote.
2 comments:
I am not gay. I have never been gay.
Dear Steve,
Do you really want my answer? I will give it to you, but first I want to share the following:
I believe that it is all too common for politically active people (folks like you and me) to get so caught up in partisanship that we allow it to pull us down into a pattern of taking cheap shots at the other side. I thinks it is related to that moral disconnect you have mentioned previously. Apparently, because it is politics, we somehow rationalize that we are only playing the game the way it has been set up to be played. But, I believe that we are mistaken to think this way.
Has Governor Romney taken cheap shots at Senator Clinton?
Did you just take a cheap shot at Governor Romney?
Has Senator Clinton taken cheap shots at Senator Obama?
Has Senator Reid taken cheap shots at President Bush?
Have I, as wonderful as I am, taken ever so slightly cheap shots at you?
I think we all know that the answer is yes to each of these questions. Whatever particle of truth we may like to believe lies behind such personal attacks, deep down we all know that there is also something inherently unjust and false in what we do. Shame on us!
Now, in all fairness, who do you think has taken more cheap political shots during his lifetime? Harry Reid or Mitt Romney? Who is more likely to have made a career of "playing the political game the way it has been set up to be played," calculating his positions, parsing his comments, digging a pit for his neighbor, unfairly characterizing his opponents. I think we all know the answer if we really think about it.
I like both of these gentlemen, and I wish them both well. But, I find no basis for your assertion that Senator Reid is somehow more like Brigham Young than Mitt Romney.
I believe that Mitt Romney has demonstrated his personal style is actually one of great frankness. We all witnessed it by way of that famous hidden video shot of him at that radio station in Iowa. But, I believe that he has also had it drilled into him that he must be extremely disciplined because of what happened to his father.
George Romney was the Republican front runner. In an unguarded moment during an interview on a local Detroit television station he said that the CIA had brainwashed him about Vietnam. His comment was eventually picked up by the opposition and the national press, effectively sinking his presidential campaign and opening the way for Richard Nixon to meet his destiny with history.
Now, looking back, we are left with the following questions: Did that particular kind of frankness serve the country well? Or, in hindsight, would it have been better for everyone if George Romney had been a little more disciplined and stayed on message?
No matter how you or I would answer that question, I think it is obvious that this episode made a profound impact upon young Mitt Romney. He learned some kind of a lesson, and like it or not, he is employing what he learned.
The bottom line is that Governor Romney is a very intelligent person, a talented leader, a great manager, and a fine man with noble principles. Despite efforts by his opponents to falsely portray him as being a rudderless political opportunist, his track record in office paints a more convincing image of a man of principle who is willing to fight for what he believes is right -- not unlike a certain Brigham Young.
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