Where Is Romney On Health Care Issue

AWOL

When he does speak up he keeps talking about how great Massachusetts health care is.

Romney wrote an op-ed in USA Today about healthcare a couple of weeks ago. He said Obama needs to take it slow on healthcare. Romney also praised his own socialized healthcare plan that he signed when Governor of MA.

AWOL — wonder why?

If he is smart, he will keep his big mouth firmly shut.

There is no good answer for Mitt unless he comes out and admits that he was dead wrong in Mass, and that won't gain him any friends either.

Just let your enemies wound each other and watch the show...

Here’s where he was last week, I don’t know about today:

“Mitt Romney’s Big-Government Health Care Plan”

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2314685/posts

"I have launched our Death Councils for everyone but us and our families."

"Mass. Pushes Rationing to Control Universal Healthcare Costs (RomneyCare)
A 10-member Massachusetts state healthcare advisory board unanimously recommended
that the state begin rationing healthcare to keep the state’s marquee universal health care program afloat financially.
The July 16 recommendations, the Boston Globe explained, would result in a situation where “patients could find it harder to get procedures they want but are of questionable benefit if doctors are operating within a budget.
And they might find it more difficult to get care wherever they want, if primary doctors push to keep patients within their accountable care organization.”
The Globe stressed that the recommendations would “dramatically change how doctors and hospitals are paid, essentially putting providers on a budget as a way to control exploding healthcare costs and improve the quality of care.”
"Budget" is a more politically acceptable word for rationing.
The Globe also noted that “consumer advocates said patients are going to have to be educated about the new system.” Yes, apparently they will have to get used to having their healthcare rationed.

"Massachusetts Universal Healthcare System Breaking Down Already
When Governor Mitt Romney instituted a universal healthcare plan for Massachusetts in 2006 he proclaimed it a conservative idea.
But has it worked? Has it been successful?
For a time, many thought it might but cracks in the system are already being seen.
These cracks are instructive as a lesson on how Obamacare will crash and burn just like Romneycare is now in the process of doing.

One of the early claims that helped push Romneycare through to law was the insistence by its supporters that Emergency Room visits would fall as more and more citizens became covered under healthcare insurance.
Since ER care is far more expensive than a doctor's care, it was thought that more people with insurance would ease the overcrowding of ERs as well as lower the overall costs of healthcare.
However, a flaw in this logic has been seen throughout the state. As more people became insured, more people demanded the care of doctors. These doctors became overloaded with patients and waiting lists for doctors got longer and longer.
As a result, ERs in Massachusetts have not seen a downturn in visits. On the contrary, it seems that ER visits are actually on the upswing in the Bay State. In fact, in 2007 they were higher than the national average by 20 percent...

"Hospital patients 'left in agony'"
"Patients were allegedly left screaming in pain and drinking from flower vases on a nightmare hospital ward.
Between 400 and 1,200 more people died than would have been expected at Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust over three years, a damning Healthcare Commission report said.
The watchdog's investigation found inadequately trained staff who were too few in number, junior doctors left alone in charge at night and patients left without food, drink or medication as their operations were repeatedly cancelled.
Patients were left in pain or forced to sit in soiled bedding for hours at a time and were not given their regular medication, the Commission heard.
Receptionists with no medical training were expected to assess patients coming in to A&E, some of whom needed urgent care.
Sir Bruce Keogh, medical director of the NHS, said there had been a "gross and terrible breach" of patients' trust and a "complete failure of leadership".
The Healthcare Commission's chairman Sir Ian Kennedy said the investigation followed concerns about a higher than normal death rate at the Trust, which senior managers could not explain.
He said: "The resulting report is a shocking story. Our report tells a story of appalling standards of care and chaotic systems for looking after patients. These are words I have not previously used in any report.
"There were inadequacies in almost every stage of caring for patients. There was no doubt that patients will have suffered and some of them will have died as a result."
Julie Bailey, 47, was so concerned about the care being given to her 86-year-old mother Bella at Stafford Hospital that she and her relatives slept in a chair at her bedside for eight weeks.
She said: "We saw patients drinking out of..."

"Paramedics told: 'Let accident victims die if they want to' in new row over patient rights (UK)"
Health Service paramedics have been told not to resuscitate terminally-ill patients who register on a controversial new database to say they want to die.
It has been set up by the ambulance service in London for hundreds of people who have only a few months to live so that they may register their 'death wishes' in advance.
It is believed to be the first in the country, but other trusts around the country are expected to follow suit to comply with Government guidelines which state that patients' wishes should be taken into account, even at the point of death.
Patients' groups and doctors have welcomed the scheme, but it has met opposition from pro-life groups who say it violates the sanctity of life.
The system would come into play if a cancer patient, for example, was in serious pain and rang 999 for help to alleviate the suffering.
But if the paramedics arrived and the patient was close to death, he or she would not be resuscitated if such a request was registered on the database.
This would also be the case if a patient on the database was being transferred between hospitals, and had a heart attack.
Dominica Roberts from the Pro-Life Alliance said: 'This is very sad and very dangerous. It's another step along the slippery slope, at the bottom of which is euthanasia as we see in Holland. 'Paramedics should be there to save lives. They should not be there to let patients die. The medical profession should not agree with someone's belief that their life is worthless.'"

"National Health Preview - The Massachusetts debacle, coming soon to your neighborhood."
"Three years ago, the former Massachusetts Governor had the inadvertent good sense to create the "universal" health-care program that the White House and Congress now want to inflict on the entire country.
It is proving to be instructive, as Mr. Romney's foresight previews what President Obama, Max Baucus, Ted Kennedy and Pete Stark are cooking up for everyone else.
In Massachusetts's latest crisis, Governor Deval Patrick and his Democratic colleagues are starting to move down the path that government health plans always follow when spending collides with reality -- i.e., price controls.
As costs continue to rise, the inevitable results are coverage restrictions and waiting periods. It was only a matter of time.

They're trying to manage the huge costs of the subsidized middle-class insurance program that is gradually swallowing the state budget.
The program provides low- or no-cost coverage to about 165,000 residents, or three-fifths of the newly insured, and is budgeted at $880 million for 2010, a 7.3% single-year increase that is likely to be optimistic.
The state's overall costs on health programs have increased by 42% (!) since 2006.

What really whipped along RomneyCare were claims that health care would be less expensive if everyone were covered.
But reducing costs while increasing access are irreconcilable issues.
Mr. Romney should have known better before signing on to this not-so-grand experiment, especially since the state's "free market" reforms that he boasts about have proven to be irrelevant when not fictional.
Only 21,000 people have used the "connector" that was supposed to link individuals to private insurers."

A Very Sick Health Plan; Bay State’s ‘Grand Experiment’ Fails [RomneyCare]
"The Daily News Record, Harrisonburg, Va. - 2009-03-31 "
"For folks increasingly leery of President Obama’s plan to radically overhaul America’s health-care system,
or 17 percent of the nation’s economy, all this could hardly have come at a better time —
that is, fiscal troubles aplenty within Repubican Mitt Romney’s brainchild, Massachusetts’ “grand experiment” in “universal” health care."

"Initiated on Mr. Romney’s gubernatorial watch in 2006, this “experiment” has fallen on hard times, and predictably so.
Even though the Bay State commenced its program with a far smaller percentage of uninsured residents than exists nationwide,
“RomneyCare” is threatening to bankrupt the state. Budgeted for Fiscal Year 2010 at $880 million,
or 7.3 percent more than a year ago, this plan, aimed at providing low- or no-cost health coverage to roughly 165,000 residents,
has caused Massachusetts’ overall expenditures on all health-related programs to jump an astounding 42 percent since 2006.

So what does Mr. Romney’s successor, Democratic Gov. Deval Patrick, propose as a remedy for these skyrocketing costs?
Well, whaddya think? The standard litany of prescriptions (no pun intended) — price controls and spending caps, for a start, and then, again predictably, waiting periods and limitations on coverage.
As in Europe and Canada, so too in Massachusetts. And, we feel certain, everyone from Mr. Romney to Mr. Patrick said, “It would never happen here.”
But then, such things are inevitable when best-laid plans, with all their monstrous costs, run smack-dab into fiscal reality.

"Dem Congresswoman Admits Obama Health Care Plan Will Destroy Private Health Insurance Industry"

"Romney’s mistreatments a sick man, as Gov. Mitt Romney meets a medical marijuana patient"

Thousands of patients with terminal cancer were dealt a blow last night after a decision was made to deny them life prolonging drugs.
The Government's rationing body said two drugs for advanced breast cancer and a rare form of stomach cancer were too expensive for the NHS.
The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence is expected to confirm guidance in the next few weeks that will effectively ban their use.
The move comes despite a pledge by Nice to be more flexible in giving life-extending drugs
to terminally-ill cancer patients after a public outcry last year over 'death sentence' decisions."

"Patients Forced To Wait Hours In Ambulances Parked Outside A&E Departments
"An investigation by The Sunday Telegraph has found that thousands of 999 patients are being left to wait in ambulances in car parks and holding bays, or in hospital corridors – in some cases for more than five hours – before they can even join the queue for urgent treatment.

Experts warn that hospitals are deliberately delaying when they accept patients – or are diverting them to different sites –
in order to meet Government targets to treat people within fours hours of admitting them."

"Cancer survivor confronts the health secretary on 62-day wait (UK Socialized Medicine)
WAITING times for cancer treatment need to be cut, the Scottish Government was told yesterday.
..Cancer experts later said that patients elsewhere in Europe would be "outraged" by having to wait two months to start treatment, with most being seen within two weeks.

The current target of 62 days from urgent referral by a doctor to starting treatment has still not been met in Scotland, despite that originally being the target figure for 2005."

"Hospital patient so shocked at dirty ward she climbed out of bed to clean it herself
After 12 years cleaning care homes and private houses, no one is better qualified than Tereza Tosbell to say whether a room is spotless.
So hospital bosses should take heed of her opinion after she spent four days on a 'filthy' ward.
The mother-of-one said during her stay there was a single, brief visit from a cleaner who left dusty curtains, dirty bedframes and a messy floor.
Disgusted at the conditions, she grabbed the antibacterial fluid dispenser at the end of her bed and some hand towels from the bathroom.
She then set about cleaning her four-bed ward, at one point dropping to her hands and knees to sanitise the floor as she dragged her drip trolley behind her.
'It was shameful to see how sloppy the cleaners were while I was there. I was not prepared to put up with such conditions,'
said Miss Tosbell, a 48-year-old divorcee who was admitted to Colchester General Hospital in Essex with an abscess in her neck.."

"Kidney cancer patients denied life-saving drugs by NHS rationing body NICE (UK Socialized Medicine)
Thousands of kidney cancer patients are likely to lose out on life-prolonging drugs.
The NHS rationing body, NICE, has confirmed a ban on three out of four new treatments.
.. 'Families will be denied time together and doctors will be unable to give patients the best treatment.'."

"Girl, 3, has heart operation cancelled three times because of bed shortage (UK Socialized Medicine)
A three-year-old girl awaiting heart surgery has had her operation cancelled three times this month because of a shortage of beds.

... A hospital spokesman said that procedures would be reviewed, but the case highlights a growing problem of cancelled operations in the NHS.
More than 57,000 surgeries were postponed for non-clinical reasons, including a lack of beds, last year – 10 per cent more than the previous year."

What is Jim’s doghouse for $1,000 ?

Romney is just another version of a statest. I think he is closer to Obama than he is to Palin by far on this issue.

A lot of things have changed in the past couple of weeks. Has he said anything in the last few days?

Romney hides under rocks and has Team Romney attack handicapped children for him.

What a coward. Romney = Attacker of women and children.

"Give me what I want. I won't go away".

Late in October, The American Spectator's The Prowler revealed:
"Former Mitt Romney presidential campaign staffers, some of whom are currently working for Sen. John McCain and Gov. Sarah Palin's bid for the White House,
have been involved in spreading anti-Palin spin to reporters, seeking to diminish her standing after the election.
'Sarah Palin is a lightweight, she won't be the first, not even the third, person people will think of when it comes to 2012,'
says one former Romney aide, now working for McCain-Palin.
'The only serious candidate ready to challenge to lead the Republican Party is Mitt Romney.
He's in charge on November 5th.'"
The Prowler added: "Some former Romney aides were behind the recent leaks to media, including CNN, that Governor Sarah Palin was a 'diva' and was going off message intentionally."
The Romney supporters in the McCain campaign had access to internal polling which indicated well in advance of the November 4 election that McCain had no chance to win.
So they began working to position their man Mitt for a run in 2012. Just two days after the election,The Palmetto Scoop reported:
"One of the first stories to hit the national airwaves was the claim of a major internal strife between close McCain aides and the folks handling his running mate Sarah Palin."
"I’m told by very good sources that this was indeed the case and that a rift had developed, but it was between Palin’s people and the staffers brought on from the failed presidential campaign of former Gov. Mitt Romney, not McCain aides."
"The sources said nearly 80 percent of Romney’s former staff was absorbed by McCain and these individuals were responsible for what amounts to a premeditated, last-minute sabotage of Palin."
These aides loyal to Romney inside the McCain campaign, said The Scoop, reportedly saw that Palin would be a serious contender for the Republican nomination in 2012 or 2016, which made her a threat to another presidential quest by Romney.
Erick Erickson, who organized Operation Leper, said:
"Here’s what I think: I think there are some staffers on the McCain campaign who seriously screwed up the roll out of Sarah Palin, to which Governor Palin herself objected.
These staffers are now out trying to finish her off thinking, as typical D.C. types do, that if they don’t do it to her, she’ll do it to them. They just never understood who Palin is or what she is about."
"Likewise, I do think there are some staffers and others who expect Mitt Romney to run again in 2012,
they decided McCain could not win, and decided to undermine Sarah Palin and her chances hoping it would ingratiate themselves with Mitt Romney."

"Who's the Palin Leaker from the McCain Campaign? (Mark , Romney pimp)
National Review Online The publication of a Vanity Fair profile of Sarah Palin
appears to have opened old wounds in the McCain campaign.
... the source of the “Diva” leak was Nicolle Wallace’s husband."

"Schmidt was importuned by several of the Republican aspirants for president earlier this year.
Mitt Romney sent him an antique chair to symbolize a seat at the table."

"Romney would not say whether he’d been vetted,
but did insist that the vice presidency was a subject he had never even so much discussed with McCain,
with whom he often tangled bitterly in the primary campaign.
So I tried another tack, recalling that I had been in a car with McCain and his then aide John Weaver,
reporting a piece for V.F. in the fall of 2006,
just after McCain delivered an address at Boston College’s opening convocation.
Weaver’s phone rang, and it was someone at B.C.,
informing him that Romney’s office had just called to ask when he would be invited to speak."

"Texan helped McCain secure Romney endorsement
AUSTIN – The decision by Mitt Romney to endorse John McCain didn't just happen, of course. It took a Texan who knows something about uniting fierce political rivals.
John Weaver, Mr. McCain's former political guru, was the intermediary who initiated talks between the two sides that led to Mr. Romney's announcement of support.
...Here's how the two came to make a joint appearance Thursday in Boston: Last week, Mr. Weaver got a call from McCain aides Charlie Black and Steve Schmidt, who asked if he would help broker an endorsement.
Mr. Weaver, who had left the McCain campaign in last year's shakeup, is a longtime friend of Beth Myers, Mr. Romney's campaign manager.."

Who benefits most from Sanford meltdown? Californian (that's right) Mitt Romney

"Peeking Out From the McCain Wreckage: Mitt Romney"

"Someone's got to say it: IS MITT ROMNEY RESPONSIBLE FOR OBAMA'S VICTORY?"

"Vanity: Team Romney Sabotaged Palin and Continuing to Do So?"

"Romney Supporters Trashing Palin"

"Romney advisors sniping at Palin?"

Poor sport spoiler Romney doing what he does best:

Novak: "Fred Thompson drop-out rumors traced to Romney campaign"

Said Novak: "The rumors were traced in part to Mitt Romney's campaign,
trying to stir up strife between McCain and Thompson."

"Despite outspending his rivals by huge margins throughout the primaries,
(Mitt Romney, Carpetbagger UT,CA,MA,NH,Mexico) lost Iowa, South Carolina, Florida and California.
The only primaries he won were in Michigan, where Dad was governor; LDS states;
and a few states on Super Tuesday in which his California-obsessed rivals
couldn't spare the cash to advertise.
Only John Connolly in 1968 had a worse cash-to-delegates ratio.
And John McCain rightly did not like Romney's tactics during the primaries.
(W)hen (Romney's early leads) started slipping away, he resorted to unfair,
distorted, scorched-earth negative ads, betting that his opponents couldn't
afford to spend enough for the truth to catch up to his charges."
[Romney: A Mistake for McCain, 7/23/2008, Dick Morris]

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2313912/posts

OVER THE TOP, again, I see.

How typical. Romney, attacker of pets, women, children, and abuser of dogs,
takes both (or all four) sides of an issue.

How ROMNEY is THAT?

I am not anti-Romney. The thought hit me that I have not heard anything from Romney about this hot issue. I wanted to see if I have missed anything he may have said in the last week.

AWOL along with the rest of the GOP

One word:

DISGRACEFUL.

Make it two:

CLASSLESS.