under the new law, individuals purchasing their own insurance must buy HMO policies. Preferred provider plans (PPOs) -- which give you more ability to choose your own doctors and treatments -- are not allowed (Section 65).
That's a lie. Section 65 DOES NOT force people into HMO's. Read it for yourself. I posted it earlier for your convenience.
All residents must have health coverage (Section 12) and all employers with more than 10 workers must assume ultimate financial responsibility if employees or their immediate family members need expensive medical care and can't pay for it (Sections 32, 44).
That's also untrue. This only happens if employers fail to offer their employees the option to purchase catestrophic coverage with payroll deductions. There is no requirement that the employer pay any of the premium, just that employees be allowed to use a payroll deductions to pay for insurance. Thus this won't cost a cent for any employer who chooses not to contribute to the preimum.
The only reason for this rule is to make sure that everyone has the opportunity to deduct their insurance premiums from their federal taxes.
I know it's kind of silly to give payroll deductions preferential tax treatment, but Mitt Romney didn't write the federal tax laws. But blaming Romney for things he had no power over seems to be EV's trademark.
Read pages 22 and 27-33 of the following legal analysis:
http://www.mintz.com/newsletter/2007/EBEC-Alert-MHCRA-Guide-02-07/MHCRA-Emp-Guide.pdf
The key phrase:
"To satisfy the Cafeteria plan regulation, the plan must, at a minimum, provide access to one or more medical care coverage options in leau of regular cash compensation."
In other words, the employer can simply deduct the premiums from the employees paycheck, costing the employer nothing.
This is just plain not true, as I explain in post 319, using the analysis of a highly respected MA labor law firm as my source.
You may want to incorporate some of that analysis on your Freeper pages to counter this new piece of misinformation making its rounds throughout the blogsphere and the MSM.
The source is Betsy McCaughey, former lieutenant governor of New York, who is chairman of the Committee to Reduce Infection Deaths, in the Wall Street Journal. Take it up with them.
I'm amazed, frankly, that the Romney campaign needs high-priced MA lawyers to back their spin.