Gingrich Uses Goodman to Defend Switch on Mandate
Newt Gingrich told ABC News he supported a health insurance mandate until John Goodman showed him a better idea:
[Goodman] essentially would give you a tax credit if you want to buy insurance, and if you didn’t want to buy insurance your share of the tax credit would go into a pool for the uninsured and if something happened to you, you’d be taken care of by the pool of the uninsured. And so you’d be in a different league in terms of how you were handled and what happened to you.
This was repeated to CNN’s Wolf Blitzer, cited in The Washington Post’s “Fact Checker” blog and noted yesterday by Reason.com.
I think it’s safe to say that many (if not most) Republicans would support a mandate if: 1) they didn’t perceive a mandate as the Democrat’s idea; 2) if the alternative was for the government to step in and provide taxpayer-funded, single-payer health care for all.
A number of Republicans would support a mandate if Congress and the President could include reforming Medicaid in the package – something that would at least slow the dramatic growth in the program in recent years.
I think it is good that Newt can change, we perhaps have a president who can’t or won’t change even in the face of failure. Another candidate who won’t admit his error. Situations change and a president must recognize and change with it even though the media will call it flip-flopping if republicans do it, but leadership if democrats change.
Smart choice on Newt’s part.
Indeed, smart choice. One of his primary selling points is that he is a solutions oriented leader, without selling out on principles.