[RC] Fwd: Best of the Web Today - October 19, 2011

[David R. Block]

Title: WSJ.com - Best of the Web Today Mail HTML - 1 colmn

The trouble with Romney. David "Anyone who thinks he has a better idea of what's good for people than people do is a swine."--P. J. O’Rourke -------- Original Message -------- Subject: Best of the Web Today - October 19, 2011 Date: Wed, 19 Oct 2011 16:45:05 -0400 From: WSJ.com Editors <acc...@interactive.wsj.com> Reply-To: opinionjour...@wsj.com To: david.r.bl...@verizon.net   Online Journal E-Mail Center    October 19, 2011 -- 4:40 p.m. EDT See all of today's editorials and op-eds, video interviews and commentary on Opinion Journal. VIEW TODAY'S FULL COLUMN FORMAT THIS COLUMN FOR PRINTING ObamaCare's Heritage The think tank, the individual mandate and the trouble with Romney. By JAMES TARANTO advertisement At last night's CNN debate, Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich sparred over the paternity of the illegitimate child eventually adopted by Barack Obama: Romney: Actually, Newt, we got the idea of an individual mandate from you. Gingrich: That's not true. You got it from the Heritage Foundation. Romney: Yeah, we got it from you and the Heritage--you got it from the Heritage Foundation and from you [sic]. Gingrich: Wait a second. What you just said is not true. You did not get that from me. You got it from the Heritage Foundation. Romney: And you've never supported? Gingrich: I agree with that, but I'm just saying, what you said to this audience just now plain wasn't true. Romney: OK. Let me ask, have you supported in the past an individual mandate? Gingrich: I absolutely did, with the Heritage Foundation, against HillaryCare. Romney: You did support an individual mandate? Gingrich: Yes sir. Romney: Oh, OK. That's what I'm saying. We got the idea from you and the Heritage Foundation. Gingrich: OK--little broader. Romney: OK. The Democratic propaganda site ThinkProgress joined in, tweeting a similar tu quoque in defense of ObamaCare: "FACT: Basis for socialist Obamacare, the individual mandate, originated with right-wing Heritage Foundation #truth." Is it the #truth? Yes, but it's a little more complicated than the ThinkProgs let on. Heritage did put forward the idea of an individual mandate, though it predated HillaryCare by several years. We know this because we were there: In 1988-90, we were employed at Heritage as a public relations associate (a junior writer and editor), and we wrote at least one press release for a publication touting Heritage's plan for comprehensive legislation to provide universal "quality, affordable health care." As a junior publicist, we weren't being paid for our personal opinions. But we are now, so you will be the first to know that when we worked at Heritage, we hated the Heritage plan, especially the individual mandate. "Universal health care" was neither already established nor inevitable, and we thought the foundation had made a serious philosophical and strategic error in accepting rather than disputing the left-liberal notion that the provision of "quality, affordable health care" to everyone was a proper role of government. As to the mandate, we remember reading about it and thinking: "I thought we were supposed to be for freedom." The plan was introduced in a 1989 book, "A National Health System for America" by Stuart Butler and Edmund Haislmaier. We seem to have mislaid our copy, and we couldn't find it online, but we did track down a 1990 Backgrounder and a 1991 lecture by Butler that outline the plan. One of its two major planks, the equalization of tax treatment for individually purchased and employer-provided health insurance, seemed sensible and unobjectionable, at least in principle. VIEW TODAY'S FULL COLUMN FORMAT THIS COLUMN FOR PRINTING  ALSO ON THE EDITORIAL PAGE • Arthur B. Laffer: Cain's Stimulating '9-9-9' Tax Reform • Your Cash for Their Clunkers • Jon Huntsman: 'Too Big to Fail' Is Simply Too Big  OPINION VIDEO CENTER Opinion: Obama's Virginia Problem Larry Sabato on President Obama's Virginia tour and falling poll ... Opinion: Obama in the Dumps James Taranto on President Obama's dismal political ... See all Opinion Videos TODAY'S MOST POPULAR: OPINION 1. Opinion: Arthur B. Laffer: Cain's Stimulating '9-9-9' Tax Reform 2. Opinion: Douglas Schoen: Polling the Occupy Wall Street Crowd 3. Opinion: Best of the Web Today: 'I'm the President' 4. Opinion: Your Cash for Their Clunkers 5. Opinion: Mortimer Zuckerman: The Exasperation of the Democratic Billionaire MORE TO UNSUBSCRIBE DIRECTLY from this list, click here. Your request will take effect within 48 hours. TO VIEW OR CHANGE any of your e-mail settings, click here. 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