Candidates Diverge On Health Care Remedies (1994: Santorum for individual mandate)

The Morning Call ^ | May 2, 1994 | Ann Wlazelek

[JimWayne]

Santorum and Watkins would require individuals to buy health insurance rather than forcing employers to pay for employee benefits.

[SeekAndFind]

RE: Santorum and Watkins would require individuals to buy health insurance rather than forcing employers to pay for employee benefits

Require means what?

Buy or be fined? Or BUY without having to force your employer to subsidize you ?

There’s a big difference.

Did Santorum support FINING or JAILING an individual who refuses to buy health insurance?

[JimWayne]

“Require” always means that there will be a fine. In 1994, the GOP view was that individual mandate is the way to go.

[SeekAndFind]

Are you sure Santorum supported FINING an individual who refuses to buy health insurance?

If someone refuses to pay a fine, then what? Isn’t confiscation of property or jailing the next logical consequence?

I do know that many Republicans did not want businesses that could not afford to pay health insurance to be FORCED to pay it for their employees and many want employees who work for them to be REQUIRED ( as in IF YOU WANT TO, then DO IT without compulsion ) to pay for it on their own.

They however want this to be free in such a way that COMPETITION reigns so that costs drop.

Better check on this because if this detail isn’t true it will be slander on Santorum’s record.

I find it hard to believe that Santorum would support a mandate that would FINE ( or threaten to jail ) people for refusing to act on something.

[PieterCasparzen]

Romney is the worst in terms of healthcare.

Romney should be the one attacked for his statist Romneycare.

Once he’s out of the contest, then the rest can be picked apart.

By the way - Romney supported hundreds of billions in bailouts.

I am attempting to post NO negative about any other candidate besides Romney until he is out.

If the Republican establishment elects him, his Presidency will blow up in their face as in all likelihood he will preside over an economic disaster.

Euro economic disaster will be affecting the U.S. and Mitt would simply do the bidding of his big capital masters, which would be to save them at the expense of the U.S. taxpayer.

One can only hope that it would end the Republican party and give rise to a new party with a real Constitutional conservative and social conservative platform.

IMHO, Romney = epic fail.

[TitansAFC]

Ping of interest.

It seems Santorum was not “always against an individual mandate” in his term of service......

[CharlesWayneCT]

So, Newt supporters oppose Santorum becuase they think Santorum agreed with Newt on individual mandates, only a decade or more EARLIER than Gingrich did?

What did Santorum believe in THIS century? We know Newt supported mandates.

[Mariner]

"“Require” always means that there will be a fine. In 1994, the GOP view was that individual mandate is the way to go."

Yep, it was a nearly universal position in the GOP and was their counter to single-payer.

It's actually MORE correct than the Dim single-payer model and further from the Constitution. You COULD make a weak case that the Commerce Clause allows single-payer. You can't even make a WEAK case for Individual Mandate.

[Mariner]

"Romney is the worst in terms of healthcare."

Let me open by saying I detest Romney as much as Obama and will not vote for him.

That said, Romney's position was that a STATE can implement an Individual Mandate but that the feds cannot. This keeps with the constitution and is not unlike a requirement for auto insurance.

Most of the other GOP candidates supported the Individual Mandate at some point in their career...and that is in direct opposition to the Constitution.

Romney was NOT the worst and has never been the worst. Anyone who ever supported EITHER the Individual Mandate at the Federal level...or single payer...those folks were the worst.