Newt Gingrich - Health Care

Summary

Congressman Gingrich has consistently spoken against the arrogance of a centralized government planning in health care. He also advocates for numerous measures to reduce government control of health care. Congressman Gingrich has stated that the government can't be trusted with a credit card, can't even give away money effectively, and government would rather pay crooks than manage efficiently.

 To address problems in Medicare and Medicaid, Congressman Gingrich advocates for cracking down on crooks that steal from the system. He supports block granting medicare and medicaid to the states, change the Medicare and Medicaid reimbursement models to take into account the quality of the care delivered, and reward health and wellness by giving health plans, employers, Medicare, and Medicaid more latitude to design benefits to encourage, incentivize, and reward healthy behaviors. He opposed the Paul Ryan plan as too big of a jump. He stated that he opposed right wing social engineering as much as left wing engineering.

Shortly after leaving Congress in 1999, Speaker Gingrich started the Gingrich Group. In 2003, that group founded a group called the Center for Health Care Transformation. That entity is dedicated to influencing government in the area of health care and touts its connections in government and its ability to get its solutions in place. Companies pay to join the group and the group gets those company's products in front of the proper politicians. This could be electronic records and data management or any number of health care related items.

The Center for Health Transformation operates by charging fees from $20,000 to $200,000 to be members. Members of the group have included drug maker Johnson & Johnson (JNJ), health insurer Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association, the nation's largest insurer - WellPoint Inc. (WLP), U.K. drugmaker AstraZeneca Plc (AZN), Pfizer Inc. (PFE), and the drug industry's trade group the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA). During time that this group took money from these groups, Congressman Gingrich met with current lawmakers in efforts to infleunce them to pass the Medicare Prescription Drug Plan known as Medicare Part D.

Numerous Congressman have stated that Congressman Gingrich's actions during this time were equivalent to that of a lobbyist in that he urged Congressman to vote in favor of legislation through the presentation of facts and ideology describing the package as conservative. Congressman Gingrich maintains that he has always supported Medicare Part D and that he was only acting as a citizen activist. He maintains that he has done no lobbying at any point in his career.

This group also lists a 9 step strategy that includes developing "a new system of health justice." The site describes this term as the need to restructure the lawsuit system for health care to get more of the money from litigation into the hands of the patient and out of the lawyers, and to speed up the lawsuit process.

In April of 2006, Congressman Gingrich issued a "Newt's Notes" memorandum through the Center for Health Transformation that supported the recent passage of Governor Romney's MassCare plan in Massachusetts. The statement, also claimed that it supported the goal of the program of 100% coverage. During the 2012 campaign, Congressman Gingrich has asserted numerous times that Governor Romney's plan did not work for Massachusetts and proved that Congressman Gingrich was more conservative that Governor Romney.

Up until 2009, Congressman Gingrich supported a health care plan that consisted of an individual mandate requiring people to purchase insurance coupled with the government paying subsidies to the poor so that they could purchase health insurance with that money. This plan is identical to the two core components of MassCare or RomneyCare and ObamaCare. In a 2008 speech, Congressman Gingrich proposed a plan that included an individual mandate or requiring each person to purchase a bond instead of insurance. He asserted that there were numerous people making more than $75,000 a year that were choosing not to purchase health insurance and betting that the government would pay their bills if they got into an accident or got sick. He asserted that these irresponsible people were the reason that a mandate or a bond was needed. 

On May 15, 2011, Congressman Gingrich repeated this problem and solution in an interview with Meet the Press. Reasserting that the problem was people making more than $75,000 a year refusing to purchase insurance and the solution was a mandate or bond coupled with government subsidies to the poor, Speaker Gingrich stated that he would not use Governor Romney's MassCare plan as a point of attack. The folowing day, Congressman Gingrich's campaign released a video stating that he was opposed to the Obamacare mandate, that he believed that it was unconstitutional, and that he would work to repeal it.

Since that time, Congressman Gingrich has asserted that he supported a mandate in the 1990s when the Heritage foundation proposed it in response to HillaryCare. He eluded to being against the mandate since that time when he states that he realized it was unconstitutional and unrpoductive.

Congressman Gingrich strongly opposed the 2009-2010 health care reform legislation. In numerous articles, he described the plan as a government takeover of health care and stated that the program would not create better health care or lower prices. He called upon President Obama to veto the legislation, cited the differences between the promises President Obama made and the plan itself, noted the numerous bribes involved in the legislation, and noted that it was not read by Congress prior to being voted on.

Congressman Gingrich opposes the public option and has stated that if such a program was created, then the rules would be skewed to give the public option an uneven playing field. 

As part of his 2012 Presidential run, Congressman Gingrinch has outlined the following plan:

1. Make health insurance more affordable and portable by giving Americans the choice of a generous tax credit or the ability to deduct the value of their health insurance up to a certain amount and by allowing Americans to purchase insurance across state lines, increasing price competition in the industry.
2. Create more choices in Medicare by giving seniors the option to choose, on a voluntary basis, a more personal system in the private sector with greater options for better care. This would create price competition to lower costs.
3. Reform Medicaid by giving states more freedom and flexibility to customize their programs to suit their needs with a block-grant program similar to the successful welfare reform of 1996.
4. Reward quality care by changing the Medicare and Medicaid reimbursement models to take into account the quality of the care delivered and incentivizing beneficiaries to seek out facilities that deliver the best care at the lowest costs.
5. Reward health and wellness by giving health plans, employers, Medicare, and Medicaid more latitude to design benefits to encourage, incentivize, and reward healthy behaviors.
6. Stop health care fraud by moving from a paper-based system to an electric one. Health care fraud accounts for as much as much as 10 percent of all health care spending, according to the National Health Care Anti-Fraud Association. That's more than $200 billion a year. Compare this to the 0.1% fraud rate in the credit card industry thanks to its high-tech information analysis systems.
7. Stop junk lawsuits that drive up the cost of medicine with medical malpractice reform.
8. Speed medical breakthroughs to patients by reforming the Food and Drug Administration.
9. Inform patients and consumers of price and quality so they can make informed choices about how to spend their money on care. Patients have the right to know this information, but finding it is virtually impossible.
10. Invest in research for health solutions that are urgent national priorities. More brain science research, for example, could lead to Alzheimer's Disease cures and treatments that could save the federal government over $20 trillion over the next forty years.

Medisave Acconts

On November 8, 1993 Congressman Gingrich spoke on the House floor about his support for Medisave accounts.

•Mr. GINGRICH. Mr. Speaker, as we prepare to begin the debate on health care, I would like to call your attention to an article on health care reform written by Merrill Matthews, Jr. Mr. Matthews is the health policy director of the National Center for Policy Analysis and the ethicist for Richardson Medical Center in Dallas, TX.

•Mr. Matthews' analysis addresses the growing concern about patient autonomy under the health care plan proposed by the Clinton administration. Mr. Matthews argues that the plan proposed by the administration, which will force Americans into a system based strictly on Government-run managed competition, further removes the patient from the decisionmaking process because the majority of health care decisions will be based on the cost of the procedure, rather than patient input. Presently, Canadians are experiencing the effects of a cost-based system in which patients can expect to wait months for procedures ranging from CAT scans to heart by-pass surgery. In the Canadian system, patient choice is restricted because the Government, rather than the people, controls the costs.

•In contract, Mr. Matthews goes on to assert that a plan including medical savings accounts, often referred to as Medisave, is the only health care proposal that respects individual choice and places control in the hands of the consumers. He contends that Medisave accounts allow for patient automony, while at the same time, advocating savings and prudent health care decisionmaking. Moreover, Mr. Matthews argues that Medisave accounts encourage people to make more responsible health care decisions because it is their money that is being spent. This is a sharp contrast to the current system in which the money of a third party is being used to pay for health care needs.

•In the coming months, the health care debate will be the focus of attention for all Americans. It is my hope and desire that, above all, we remember that this is America . We are not Canada, we are not Germany, our society is unique and is founded upon the principles of individual liberty for all of its citizens. As we determine the health care plan that is best for this country, let us focus not on curing what is wrong with America , but rather resolving this dilemma with what is right with America --individual liberty and choice.
Though medical ethicists disagree on a number of issues, on one point almost all concur: Patients who are conscious and competent should have control over their bodies in medical decisions. That means that nothing should be done to the patient without `informed consent.' However, the concern that medical ethicists show for patient autonomy has been absent from the recent political debate over health-care reform. Indeed, a number of proposals--including President Clinton's--move in precisely the opposite direction.

Only one health-care reform idea before Congress incorporates sound economics and actually encourages patient autonomy: medical savings accounts

The primary justification given for moving away from patient autonomy is that patients do not have the knowledge or emotional stability to make intelligent decisions about medical care or the ability to receive conflicting medical opinions. But this justification runs counter to what most ethicists believe about informed consent.

Medical schools, for example, establish committees known as institutional review boards to oversee research on humans. One of the board's primary concerns is that researchers develop an informed competent document that explains in terms a layman can understand the reason for the research, what the researcher expects the patient to experience and gain, and what the researcher hopes to learn or accomplish by the experiment.

The board assumes that it is possible to make this information clear and under-standable to a patient and that most patients, even for fairly esoteric procedures, can make a reasonably informed decision about whether to consent.

When it comes to standard health care, however, many people in the health policy community do not believe that patients, even after consultation with their physicians, can make informed decisions.

The president's proposal, for example, is based in part on moving most Americans into health maintenance organizations, where `managed care' increasingly has come to mean interference in the doctor-patient relationship.
 

•A patient can receive drugs or treatments and perhaps never learn that there were better, more expensive alternatives that were not used because an insurer did not want to pay for them. In effect, medical ethics has succumbed to medical economics, as paternalism is given precedence over autonomy.

•Les Aspin learned this fact the hard way. When he became secretary of defense, he needed additional vaccinations because of his expanded international travel itinerary. His physicians gave him a vaccine slightly more risky than one that would have cost $1.55 more, and Mr. Aspin ended up in intensive care as a result. To my knowledge, he was never asked if he would be willing to pay $1.55 out of pocket to avoid the risk.

•Or consider the case of Sen. Bob Dole's prostate cancer. Most managed-care plans see little medical benefit in a cancer blood test known as prostate-specific antigen, and therefore do not routinely provide it. Fortunately, Sen. Dole had the opportunity to make his own decision and opted for the test in 1991. It led to a biopsy and the surgery he contends saved his life.

•While a Canadian-style system of national health insurance gives the patient a free choice of physicians. The ultimate power for decision making is in the hands of a health-care bureaucracy that determines how much money will be allocated to each health-care facility. People who need heart bypass surgery or a brain scan may have to wait months before it is their turn. Patients are allowed to make very few choices about what type of health care they receive, because the government--rather that the patient--controls the money.

•Medical savings accounts, often referred to as Medisave accounts or medical IRAs, respect autonomy and put power into the hands of the patient. No other health-care reform no proposal can make that claim. That makes medical savings accounts the most ethical proposal for health-care reform now available.

 

•These accounts would help to reverse the convoluted incentives operating in the American health-care system. Under our current third-party-payer system, the vast majority of patients pay only a small fraction of their medical bills. The bulk of the expense is paid by insurers, employers and the government. This has led to systematic overuse by consumers who see little reason to limit the amount they are spending of someone else's money, and by health-care providers who have little economic reason to weigh the cost vs. the benefit of a medical procedure. `To stem this overuse, third-party payers are moving to restrict or deny the choices of their clients.

By contrast medical savings accounts minimize the role of third-party payers by giving people the opportunity to set aside money each year in a special, tax-free account to pay for small medical bills, while using high deductible, catastrophic insurance to cover major expenses. For example, instead of the employer providing $4,500 for a family policy, the employee could take $1,700 of that money and buy a catastrophic policy with a deductible of $2,500 to $3,000. He then would deposit the premium savings of $2,800 in the Medisave account.

Medical savings account funds could accumulate and be used for health expenditures before or after retirement, or they could become part of the estate at death. Deposits could be made by employees or by their employers, but the medical savings account would be personal and portable and would belong to the employee.

Medisave accounts would permit people to pay for most health care expenditures with their own money, encouraging them to become more prudent shoppers. They would have an incentive to avoid waste but would not be denied needed care because of a lack of funds. For most medical decisions, no one would come between the physician and the patient.

It is likely that medical savings accounts would impose a greater burden of responsibility on the physician to inform the patient about alternative therapies and their costs. Similarly, Medisave accounts would impose a greater burden of responsibility on the patient to be a more informed and rational consumer.

But then, that's the ethnical thing to do.

Center for Health Transformation

After leaving Congress in 1999, Speaker Gingrich founded the Gingrich Group. In 2003 this entity founded the Center for Health Transformation. That entity outlines a set of 9 steps on its website that it calls strategies. One of those strategies is a new form of health justice which isn't fully explained.

Our Strategies

1. Create information-rich health savings accounts to both incentivize and empower the individual.
2. Create secure electronic health records with expert systems to maximize accuracy, minimize errors, reduce inefficiencies and improve care.
3. Develop a new system of health justice.
4. Create a buyers’ market for pharmaceuticals by building a transparent system for individuals, doctors, and pharmacists of price and efficacy information about prescription drugs and medically appropriate over-the-counter drugs. The system would have an open formulary with an “after-pay” rather than a co-pay (a “Travelocity” for drug purchasing).
5. Create a system and culture of rapid adoption of solutions that result in better outcomes at lower cost for both the public and private sector.
6. Establish an intellectually credible, accurate system for capturing the cost and benefits of better solutions, better technologies and better outcomes in order to create a technically correct model of return on investment for solutions resulting in better outcomes at lower cost.
7. Develop a real-time continuous research database and discover-develop-deliver ability (turning cancer into a chronic disease by 2015 and eliminating preventable complications from diabetes by 2015).
8. Knit together these electronic systems into a virtual public health network for health protection against natural outbreaks and a bioshield against deliberate biological attack.
9. By implementing the first eight strategies, turn health and healthcare from a problem into an opportunity, making it the leading creator of high-value jobs and foreign exchange earning in American society (including as a first step the creation of an undersecretary of commerce for health).

The Center for Health Transformation also outlines its approach in 8 points on its website. Its approach is centered around a number of business keywords that assert that the company can create plans, has the network and the people to get that plan out to the proper people in government, and the coalition to get those solutions in place.

Our Unique Approach

The Center for Health Transformation is a high-impact collaboration of private and public sector leaders committed to creating a 21st Century Intelligent Health System that saves lives and saves money for all Americans.

The Center is based on the following premise: Small changes or reactionary fixes to separate pieces of the current system have not and will not work. We need a system-wide transformation. Unlike other alliances, the Center unites stakeholders across the spectrum (providers, employers, vendors, trade associations, disease groups, think tanks) and government leaders at both the state and federal level to drive transformation according to a shared vision and key principles.

The Center’s unique impact is a function of 8 strategic strengths:

1. Transformational leadership - CHT is devoted to large-scale transformation. The Center’s unique leadership model and focus on building and training a large network of leaders are key elements to creating a critical mass of activity and impact to make transformation not just possible but inevitable.
2. A vision of a better future – Transformation requires a big vision of a better future that resonates with the public. We have developed a vision and vision principles based on moral and economic issues that have proven to resonate with the public and with leaders across the spectrum.
3. A strategic plan – Using our unique planning model, we have defined key strategies and high-leverage, big-impact projects to drive transformation and have shared that plan widely, resulting in the creation of broad coalitions working together to implement our strategies.
4. Proven solutions – We constantly identify, help create and share proven transformational policies and solutions, a key element in getting others to believe in our vision and to help accelerate its adoption.
5. A network of allies– Our unparalleled network includes top leaders in the federal government, 36 states in our state project, key corporations, top hospitals, disease advocacy groups, professional and industry associations, and leading research institutions. By uniting them toward a common vision and helping develop their role as leaders, we are having an impact unlike any other health collaboration.
6. A message and the ability to get it out – CHT offers remarkable speakers delivering our message, Washington’s top pollsters helping define the right language, and the media visibility needed to communicate the urgency and drive the demand for transformation beyond that of any other health transformation advocacy group.
7. Coalition building capabilities - We build coalitions to transform entire areas, including focusing at the geographic level to create community based models. We then build bridges to help connect, expand, and replicate these islands of excellence.
8. Constant learning that allows us to identify key leverage points and opportunities, combined with the power, speed, strategic skill and agility needed to impact them –Transforming government and educating the private sector, CHT is now applying those same operational strengths to transform health adoption.

Support for MassCare

Fox News has reported that Congressman Gingrich issued a statement in April of 2006 that supported the recent passage of Governor Romney's MassCare plan in Massachusetts. The statement, which was put out by the Center for Health Care Transformation, also claimed that it supported the goal of the program of 100% coverage.

The health bill that Governor Romney signed into law this month has tremendous potential to effect major change in the American health system. ... We agree entirely with Governor Romney and Massachusetts legislators that our goal should be 100 percent insurance coverage for all Americans.

Support for Mandates or Bonds

In 2008, Congressman Gingrich spoke at the Alegent Health Clinic in Bellevue, Nebraska. In that speech, he spoke about the social contract among Americans, and stated that there was a growing class of people that made more than $75,000 a year and chose not to have insurance. He asserted that these people were making the calculated, irresponsible decision to forgo insurance with the belief that the general population would pay for their care in the event of an accident or illness. As a solution, Congressman Gingrich asserts that the government can either enforce a mandate to require people to purchase insurance, or force everyone to purchase a bond in an amount to be determined later. Buzzfeed and TheBlaze first reported the video.

Does it Work?

In January of 2009, Congressman Gingrich wrote an article concerning the possible health care reform proposals in which he talked about what should be looked at in health care. The article notes the amount of fraud in the system could be as high as 10%. 

Does It Work? Applying the Obama Test to Health care by Newt Gingrich

01/27/2009 Does it work?

That is the test President Barack Obama set out in his inaugural address for evaluating government programs. When programs work, Obama said, we will “move forward.” But when they don’t, he promised these programs “will end.”

Last week I asked readers to put aside their natural skepticism that any government program, no matter how dysfunctional, will “end” under the Obama Administration.

And this week I’m taking a dose of my own medicine. At the National Press Club yesterday, I joined with a group of physicians and healthcare experts to take the Obama challenge and apply it to healthcare. We looked at Medicare, Medicaid, healthcare information technology and the range of healthcare programs and asked “do they work?”

Fraud Accounts for As Much as 10% of All Healthcare Spending

The bad news we found won’t shock anybody. In so much of our healthcare system, programs don’t work.

• Outright fraud -- criminal activity -- accounts for as much as 10% of all healthcare spending, more than $200 billion every year.
• Just 4% of doctors use advanced electronic medical records, despite irrefutable evidence that electronic prescribing, record keeping and communication saves lives and saves money.
• The federal government treats science and healthcare investments as costs only, refusing to factor in the savings that result from investments like the $10 billion invested in basic research on HIV/AIDS between 1985 and 1995 that saved the United States $1.4 trillion in healthcare expenditures.

The Good News: Health Entrepreneurs Are Creating Systems That Work

The good news is that there are healthcare entrepreneurs in America who are developing ways to provide more choices of better care at a lower cost. The “best practices” they have developed aren’t theoretical. They exist. The key to transforming our health system is to see that they are adopted by all the players in the system, public and private.

• A workplace-based healthcare plan in Omaha, Nebraska called Simplywell gives employees at the Greater Omaha Packing Company the tools they need to take charge of their own healthcare, including an electronic personal health record, tailored patient education, and annual screening. Repeat participants had a 27% improvement in normal blood pressure readings; a 16.7% improvement in normal cholesterol levels, and 41.3% fewer participants had elevated glucose levels -- all at a cost per employee that was less than half the industry average.
• The Massachusetts eRx Collaborative uses e-prescribing tools to allow physicians to access patient-specific prescription drug and medical histories, be alerted to drug-to-drug and drug-allergy interactions, and electronically transmit prescriptions directly to a pharmacy, minimizing possible errors from illegible handwriting. In 2007, approximately 104,000 electronic prescriptions were changed or cancelled because of drug-safety alerts to the physician. And data from the previous year show that e-prescribers saved 5% on their drug costs compared to prescribers that did not use the technology.
• Memorial Hermann Health Centers for Schools, a group of five school-based clinics in Houston, Texas uses private funding to serve mostly uninsured students. The centers diligently collect data and adjust their services to meet strategic objectives. In 2006-2007, student asthma exacerbations, ER visits, and hospitalizations decreased by 67%; cholesterol levels among targeted students declined by 73%; and students who received mental health counseling had improved grade point averages and fewer suspensions, detentions, and days absent.

The Center for Health Transformation (CHT) has collected examples like these best practices that 1) Improve individual health and wellness through prevention and personal responsibility; 2) Improve the quality, administration and delivery of care; 3) Lower costs; and/or 4) Expand access to care. All are available at CHT’s website, www.healthtransformation.net/cs/healthcarethatworks.

Four Steps to Saving Lives and Saving Money

Using these best practices as a base, the Center for Health Transformation has developed four initiatives to improve healthcare, lower costs, and insure every American:

The first is creating a healthcare system that works by insisting that the government and other healthcare players constantly adopt these best practices. Best practices should drive policy -- not the other way around.

Second is dramatically reducing healthcare fraud so the savings can help pay for health information technology and covering the uninsured. Medicare fraud alone could account for as much as $40 billion in healthcare spending a year. This level of theft and crime can be detected, eliminated, and then prevented with the right kind of technology.

Third is implementing science and investment-based budgeting with generation-long scoring. This is an issue that I personally spoke to at length yesterday. The federal government treats investments simply as costs and doesn’t take into account future savings that result from investments in science and healthcare. This must change if we are to have the kind of real change we need.

My Advice for Creating Electronic Health Records? Be Like Ike

The fourth CHT initiative for transforming our healthcare system is one that President Obama has also made a priority: electronic medical records. I couldn’t agree more with his goal of seeing that all our medical records are computerized within five years.

But as I pointed out in the New York Post recently, the hard part is making this goal a reality. My advice? Be like Ike. President Dwight Eisenhower’s investment in creating the interstate highway system created a wave of productivity and prosperity that we continue to ride today.

The same can be true of electronic medical records. Creating an infrastructure of an interconnected electronic health records system, that incorporates both the public and private sectors and the federal and state governments, is the first step in transforming our entire healthcare system and creating more choice of better care at lower cost.

Good Morning America Interview

On June 25, 2009 Congressman Gingrich was interviewed by Good Morning America about health care. The discussion covered a public option, Medicare, and possible payment plans for medical school.

On Public vs. Private Sector in Health Care

GINGRICH: In the case of health care, if I have to choose between my doctor and a government bureaucrat, I have zero doubt which one I want. And I think that it's very important that we not allow a bureaucracy to get set up. ...

JOHNSON: But you right now, you say that you don't want the government between you and your doctor. But right now many people have the private insurance office between them and their doctor. They're arguing constantly with their insurance company about what they'll cover, what they'll pay for.

GINGRICH: Right. And in that setting, if you don't like your current insurance company, you can change insurance companies. But if you ended up with a single national health system, you wouldn't be able to change bureaucrats. And if you look at the experience in France or Canada or Great Britain, if you look at the waiting lines in Canada, where, despite three years of effort, they've not been able to shorten the waiting lines, because in fact the system doesn't work.

JOHNSON: Now, the president says, and he said last night, again, what he wants is a system or a field where there's level playing opportunity, the same rules and regulations would apply to the public option as to the private insurance companies, and then they can really compete on a level playing field. You don't think that...

GINGRICH: I guarantee you the language they draft for the public plan will give it huge advantages over the private sector or it won't work.

JOHNSON: Because?

GINGRICH: Because it won't work. And what they will do is rig the game. I mean, anybody who's watched this Congress, I mean, look what they did with Chrysler, with the 55 percent of it to the union.

I mean, anybody who's watched this Congress who believes that this Congress is going to design a fair, neutral playing field I think would be totally out of touch with reality. I think it's disingenuous on the president's part and it wouldn't work.

JOHNSON: And when the president says to the private companies, you had 30 years to prove that you can do it well and they haven't...

GINGRICH: They have it done well. And the fact is, overall, 71 percent of Americans are relatively satisfied with the health insurance.

JOHNSON: But we have 46 million uninsured.

GINGRICH: Right. And we have -- you know, that means you also have 260 million insured.

JOHNSON: Oh, no, I'm...

GINGRICH: So let's start with, OK, what have the insurance companies not done? They've not done, covered people who are unemployed.

JOHNSON: Or who have pre-existing conditions.

GINGRICH: And the 46 million, by the way, includes illegal aliens.

JOHNSON: Yes.

GINGRICH: OK?

JOHNSON: But it's a significant number no matter how you look at it.

GINGRICH: It's a significant number. OK? The question is, are there ways to solve that that don't require creating a government monopoly? And I think there are a lot of ways.

On Primary Care and Student Loans

JOHNSON: People have a terrible time finding primary care doctors. We -- in Massachusetts now, we've got waiting lines for the initial doctor you want to see that can go up to a year. So we have problems at certain levels in this country right now. Maybe not so much with specialists, but as you know, obviously, primary care is really essential to good health care reform.

GINGRICH: That's right.

JOHNSON: And we have terrible waits for primary care doctors.

GINGRICH: Well, at the Center for Health Transformation, we're frankly working on a project to shift the payment patterns to dramatically expand the number of primary care physicians. Part of what has happened is because we've gone to a model where young people are borrowing so much money to get through medical school, that they look for the highest-paying specialty in order to pay off their student loans. And one of the things I heard the president say that I think is a very good idea is to actually have a program that if you're willing to become a primary care physician, we would forgive a large part of your loan...

JOHNSON: Loan forgiveness program.

GINGRICH: ... because you would induce a generation who don't particularly want to become specialists, but who do need to find a way economically to pay back their loans.

JOHNSON: What about doing what some other countries are doing, which is even pay for tuition, so you come out with no debt and the same effect?

GINGRICH: I think in both nursing and in medical school, we should be seriously looking at government scholarship programs that maximize getting the number of people we need into health care.

On Medicare

JOHNSON: Let me get back to the government insurance program. If you and others are so opposed to government insurance, per se, why don't you want to repeal Medicare, for example? That's a government insurance program, obviously.

GINGRICH: Well, what we did do is we've created more choices in Medicare to give people a wider range of opportunity, and there you have an effort on the part of the left even to eliminate the choices. Medicare is a good example. You know, the government already runs about 48 percent of all spending on health care. Now, if the government is so clever about reforming health care, they could create models in the 48 percent they already have. Instead, the effort is to get the other 52 percent. And if you go out and you talk to hospitals, for example, if the whole country were reimbursed at the rate of the Medi-Cal program, which is California Medicaid, virtually every hospital in the country would collapse.

On Government Regulation

JOHNSON: And I think you're outlining the kind of thinking that so many of us agree with. The question is, how do we get there to have that spread like a virus, in a sense, inside the health care system? And many would say that it's pretty hard to have happen without the government providing some guidance.And let me give you another example, if you think there's any analogous thinking here.When I get on an airplane, as you do all the time, whether it's a small airport in Peoria or Logan Airport in Boston, I'm very reassured to know that the FAA exists, that pilots are required to be trained in a very standard way...

GINGRICH: Yes.

JOHNSON: ... and re-certified every six months, that those planes are being examined very carefully. In other words, I'm happy to have the government involved in kind of providing a certain basic standard for safety, which, of course, is missing in medicine, which is one reason we have about 100,000 medical deaths in this country every year.

Isn't there a role for government in regulation, in setting standards, in making sure that certain basic criteria are met?

GINGRICH: Sure. Look, I'm a Theodore Roosevelt Republican. I think there are a lot of roles for government to set the rules but not to run the system ... If we could pass -- as part of this health reform, if we could pass a bill that said if you, as a doctor, follow the established best practices, and you have an electronic health record that proves you followed the established best health practices, then you have a safe harbor for malpractice suits and you're not going to be subject to the kind of horrendous attacks that trial lawyers levy on doctors.

Now, there would be a win-win for the country. The doctor would be participating in best practices, they would be recorded electronically. The doctor, in return, would be protected from trial lawyers. The country would pay less for litigation and it would pay less for bad outcomes.

JOHNSON: So, is it fair for me to say you're not opposed to a strong role for government, you just don't want government insurance, per se?

GINGRICH: I don't want the government to be the primary operator of the health system. I don't want the government to try to run things. I don't think the government runs things very well.

I'd like the government to set standards, to set goals, to incentivize the right behavior. All those are positive steps the government can take.

On Taxing Employer Benefits

JOHNSON: Do you think we should tax employer health benefits as income to help pay for this?

GINGRICH: No.

JOHNSON: So you disagree with John McCain and some others on that?

GINGRICH: Yes. And I see no rational reason to go out and punish people who have worked hard and who have a good health plan and say, why don't we attack your health plan because we've decided you have too much health insurance.

JOHNSON: Except people who are self-employed do have to pay taxes.

GINGRICH: But what I would do there is I think everybody ought to have the same tax advantage. So everybody ought to have the same access to being able to buy health insurance, except if you're very poor. I think you need a tax credit rather than a tax deduction.

On Passing Health Care Reform

JOHNSON: What's your sense, as a politician, about what's going to happen by the end of this year? I mean, regardless of your own biases or interests, what do you honestly think is going to happen?

GINGRICH: I think the odds are reasonably good they can get something through. And I think that the president faces a very big decision, whether he wants to move to the left and have a Waxman/Rangel big government bill, which I think may not be able to get through the Senate, or whether he really wants to have a genuinely bipartisan approach. And I don't think it's clear yet which way they'll go.

JOHNSON: You really don't? You think it's still a wide open question?

GINGRICH: Absolutely.

JOHNSON: You don't think that within the White House and the administration, they've already pretty much made up their mind?

GINGRICH: I'm not convinced of that at this stage. I mean, I think if they thought they could get away with it, they'd go with a very left wing bill. But I'm not sure -- if you look at, for example, the most recent poll that showed 58 percent of the country now wants to cut spending even if it lengthens the recession, I mean, that's a level of concern about spending that begins to bring a pressure to bear on Capitol Hill that's different than it was three months ago.

Three Reasons Government Can't Run Health Care

In August of 2009, Congressman Gingrich issued an article for Human Events noting three reasons why the government cannot run health care.

Three Reasons Why Government Can't Run Health Care

by Newt Gingrich

08/26/2009 Facta, non verba.

For those of you who have forgotten your Latin, it means "deeds, not words."

There's been a lot of overheated rhetoric about health care reform, but this saying is one that all Americans should return to when considering plans for a government-dominated health system.

In other words, we should judge government, not by its words, but by its deeds.

With this simple principle in mind, what follows are three examples why government can't - and shouldn't - run our health care system (at least not any health care system you or I would want to be dependent on).

Reason No. 1: Government Can't Be Trusted With a Credit Card 

Every family knows about making a budget and living within its means. Government, to put it bluntly, does not.

What if your husband had come home last Friday night and announced that he had racked up almost 30 percent more debt on the family credit card - including the mortgage and car loans - than he had told you about just a month ago?

Would you trust him to go out and start spending money to remodel the kitchen? And do you think he could get a loan to do it?

But that's exactly what the Obama Administration did with their weekend news dump. They announced late Friday that the amount of money they don't have but are nonetheless planning on spending over the next ten years isn't the astonishing $7 trillion they estimated in May but is instead an astounding $9 trillion.

Add this to the fact that, after the administration sold its health care reform proposal on the grounds that it will reduce costs to the Treasury, the independent Congressional Budget Office determined that the House plan will actually cost an astounding $1 trillion-$1.5 trillion in the next ten years, which will be added directly to the federal debt. The director of the CBO testified before Congress last month that "[i]n the legislation that has been reported we do not see the sort of fundamental changes that would be necessary to reduce the trajectory of federal health spending by a significant amount. And on the contrary, the legislation significantly expands the federal responsibility for health care costs."

Which do you have more faith in, the government's happy talk of "bending the cost curve" or its record of out-of-control spending?

Deeds, not words.

Reason No. 2: Government Can't Even Give Away Money Effectively

As the inimitable Andy McCarthy of National Review put it, "Compared to the infinite complexity of healthcare and health-insurance, cash-for-clunkers is kindergarten stuff. You trade in your old car for a new one that gets (slightly) better mileage and the government gives you money - between $3,500 and $4,500. How hard is that?"

Too hard for government bureaucrats, it turns out.

Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood has boasted that the cash-for-clunkers program provided "a lifeline to the automobile industry, jump starting a major sector of the economy and putting people back to work.''

But look at the deeds, not the words.

Last week, cash-for-clunkers ended in a bureaucratic morass of red tape, failed promises and unanticipated costs.

Air Traffic Controllers Manning the Cash-for-Clunkers Hotline

Only a government bureaucracy could mess up a program designed to give away free money.

The government wizards who set up cash-for-clunkers initially budgeted to sell 250,000 cars in three months.

The program sold that many in four days.

And because the central planners who think they can provide government "competition" to the private health insurance market failed to accurately estimate how many government workers it would take to administer cash-for-clunkers, they had to take employees from the FAA - air traffic controllers, no less - to help manage the demand.

And what about the car dealerships the program was supposed to help in the first place? Even though the rebates were supposed to be paid within 10 days, only 7 percent of federal promises under cash-for-clunkers have been paid so far, leaving dealers with millions of dollars in unfunded government promises.

More Than Bureaucratic Incompetence, Political Business as Usual 

But there's more to the cautionary tale of cash-for-clunkers than just bureaucratic incompetence.

This is a case study in what happens when politicians get involved in the marketplace.

Despite all the rhetoric of jump starting the auto industry, politicians' priorities are to give free goodies to their constituents. So as far as they're concerned, cash-for-clunkers has been a resounding success.

Forget the fact that they're spending money they don't have, or that car dealerships are left holding millions of dollars in empty government promises. They're not concerned with the long-term, just the next election.

So tell us again why should we think bureaucrats and politicians will perform any better with our health care?

Reason No. 3: Government Would Rather Pay Crooks Than Manage Efficiently

There's been a lot of worrying about the inevitability of government rationing health care under the Democratic reform bills in Congress.

Economists have known about this inevitability for a long time. Well, Americans can stop worrying. Government is rationing care already - and doing it in a particularly stupid way.

Studies have shown that early use of home health care after hospitalization - allowing patients to go home and be visited by a nurse to manage their care - saves Medicare billions of dollars.

So here is a case where an innovative government program actually saves the government money. Home health care is both more compassionate and more efficient. It reduces the likelihood a patient will be readmitted to a hospital by allowing her to heal in a more familiar setting.

Home Health Care Works, So Naturally Medicare Bureaucrats Cut Its Funding

So naturally bureaucrats at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services cut $34 billion from this compassionate, efficient program last week.

And if the House health care reform bill becomes law, an additional $56.8 billion will be cut from the program - an amount equal to almost the entire federal budget for home health care services in 2007.

What makes rationing care to the homebound all the more immoral is the fact that there is a much bigger pot of savings available to Washington if it only had the political will to look.

Instead of Seeking Savings from the Homebound, Why Not the Crooks?
 

As a new book by the Center for Health Transformation's Jim Frogue details, criminals rip off the taxpayers to the tune of $80 billion to $120 billion each year in the current Medicare and Medicaid programs.

We're not talking about inadvertent bill errors but outright fraud. Government health programs are currently paying men maternity benefits, giving taxpayer dollars to pizza parlors that are supposed to be HIV transfusion centers, and even paying dead patients federal health care benefits.

If ever there was a reason not to turn our entire health care system over to government it is this: Government can't run the health care programs it already has. It would rather ration compassionate, effective programs than do the hard work of rooting out and punishing the crooks who are stealing our taxpayer dollars.

Facts are Stubborn

Americans have already heard a lot of rhetoric about health care reform, and we can expect to hear a lot more.

But as Ronald Reagan used to say, facts are stubborn things. And the facts of government's track record in managing our money and delivering on its promises speak louder than any televised presidential speech or stage-managed town hall ever could.

So as the summer winds down and the debate rages on, let this be our mantra:

Facta, non verba.

Make a bumper sticker out of it.

Put it on a tee-shirt and wear it to a town hall.

And when someone asked you what it means, tell them that before we hand over more of our lives to government, we should consider how they've treated us so far 

Presidential Veto

In October of 2009, Congressman Gingrich wrote an article for Human Events and noted the reasons that President Obama should veto the health care reform legislation.

Will President Obama Veto Health Reform?
by Newt Gingrich

10/07/2009 With the Senate Finance Committee poised to pass health care legislation, the final contours of the bill that could come out of Congress are starting to come into focus. The bill will contain new taxes on the middle class. It will add to the deficit. And it will put government bureaucrats between Americans and their doctors, among other things.

So it’s not too early to ask the obvious question: Will President Obama veto health care reform?

It’s worth asking because so many of the costs to taxpayers the President has repeatedly promised won’t be in the legislation are, and so many of the benefits are not.

What follows is a list, in no particular order, of the contradictions between the President’s promises and the reality of Democratic health care reform. Add them up and it’s hard to see how President Obama doesn’t reject the bill Congress seems likely to send him.

Contradiction #1: From a Promise Not to Raise Taxes on the Middle Class to $2 Billion in “Penalties”

As far back as the campaign, President Obama promised he wouldn’t raise taxes on Americans making less than $250,000.

But an analysis by the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) found that at least 71 percent of the individual mandate penalties in Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus’s (D-MT) bill would be paid by Americans earning less than $250,000. In fact, the nonpartisan analysis found that, of the $2.8 billion in penalties the bill imposes on those who do not purchase health insurance, a full $2 billion will be paid by taxpayers earning less than $120,000 for a family of four.

The Senate Finance bill also levies $215 billion in new taxes on employers and health insurers for offering high-value insurance benefits, which will surely be passed onto all consumers.

Republicans tried to ensure that President Obama’s words would not ring hollow by offering an amendment that said: “This amendment provides that no tax, fee or penalty imposed by this legislation shall be applied to any individual earning less than $200,000 per year or any couple earning less than $250,000 per year.” Democrats defeated it.

Contradiction #2: From a Promise to Reject a Bill That “Adds One Dime to the Deficit” to $239 Billion Added to the Deficit

In his speech to the Joint Session of Congress, the President was adamant: “I will not sign [a bill] if it adds one dime to the deficit, now or in the future, period.”

And yet House bill H.R. 3200 will increase the deficit by an amazing $239 billion over the next decade.

The Baucus bill pretends to be deficit neutral but it’s an accounting gimmick. “It pays for itself” by forcing a new $250-300 billion unfunded mandate on the states. And it doesn’t include nearly $300 billion that will be spent to adjust physician payments in Medicare.

Contradiction #3: From a Promise That “If You Like Your Current Plan You Can Keep It” to Half of Medicare Advantage Benefits Being Cut

In his speech to the Joint Session of Congress last month and elsewhere, the President has reassured nervous Americans that if they like their current coverage, his reform will let them keep it.

Unless you happen to have Medicare Advantage, that is.

Or employer provided insurance.

The director of the nonpartisan CBO testified before the Senate that, under the Senate bill, the benefits of seniors under Medicare Advantage would be cut in half.

And an analysis of the House bill found that 88 million people will lose their current insurance under government health care.

What’s more, both bills would disrupt vision care for more than 100 million Americans.

Contradiction #4: From “If You Like Your Current Doctor You Can Keep Your Doctor” to Squeezing Doctors and Hospitals Until They Reduce Patient Access

Here’s what three doctors who are former chairmen of the American Medical Association (AMA) say about the cuts to Medicare in Democratic health reform bills:

“Now the government is saying that additional Medicare cuts are coming—thus forcing doctors to try and make up the difference in volume, by seeing more patients. If you ask patients about this, they understand that more volume means less time with the doctor. That's something that all patients and doctors should oppose. In time, it will be difficult to find a physician.”

And here’s what the executive director of the Mayo Clinic said: “We will have to violate our values in order to stay in business and reduce our access to government patients.”

Contradiction #5: From a Promise that No Government Bureaucrat Will Stand Between Patients and Doctors to a Medicare Commission With the Power to Deny Treatment

Just this week, in a speech to doctors gathered in the White House Rose Garden, President Obama reiterated his pledge not to let a Washington bureaucrat get between a patient and their doctor.

But the Senate Baucus bill creates an “Independent Medicare Commission” with the ability to deny benefits to the elderly or the disabled based on a government calculation of the costs versus the benefits.

Contradiction #6: From a Promise to “Slow the Growth of Health Care Costs For Our Families” to a New Tax on Hearing Aids, Wheel Chairs and Breakthrough Drugs

In his speech to the Joint Session of Congress, the President pledged to “slow the growth of health care costs for our families, our businesses and our government.”

But the Senate bill contains a tax on medical technology companies and drug makers that will raise the cost to American families for thousands of drugs and devices, including pacemakers, eyeglasses, hearing aids and powered wheelchairs.

Contradiction #7: From a Promise that Health Care Reform Will Fix the Economy to New Taxes on Small Businesses

One of President Obama’s main rationales for health care reform is that it is necessary for economic recovery.

Working against this promise is the provision in the Senate bill that will tax small businesses -- the engine of American economic growth and job creation -- that can’t afford to purchase health insurance for their employees. It’s hard to see how the economy recovers when small businesses are prevented from hiring new workers by a new government tax.

Contradiction #8: From Insuring All Americans to Leaving 25 Million Uninsured

One of President Obama’s three basic goals for health care reform is to provide insurance to those who don’t currently have it.

That’s the promise. The reality? The CBO has determined that the Senate bill will leave about 25 million nonelderly Americans uninsured.

I could go on, but I think the point is made. The differences between what Americans have been promised from health care reform and what they are getting go beyond the usual give and take of Washington.

A Congress controlled by the President’s party is producing health care legislation that blatantly contradicts his most basic, often repeated, promises.

What will the President do? Will President Obama veto health care reform? 

Read the Bill

In October of 2009, Congressman Gingrich wrote an article for Human Events noting that representatives should read the bill before it is voted on.

Know the Facts, Read the Bill, Vote

by Newt Gingrich

10/14/2009 As of Wednesday, October 14, there are some things we know, and some things we don’t know.

We know that the most recent economic projections forecast 10.3 percent unemployment as of next June and 8.5 percent unemployment through 2013.

And we know that cost increases to businesses and families could make these numbers even worse. They will slow down the recovery and kill job creation.

Now for what we don’t know: As of Monday, we can no longer have confidence that we know what the true cost of the Left’s health reform will be. A late-breaking report said that the bill passed yesterday by the Senate Finance Committee will increase the health care costs of the average American family by $4,000.

This specific figure may or may not prove to be the case.

The point is, we don’t know. And we can’t pass a law that remakes our economy and directly impacts the health of all Americans until we do.

$4,000 More in Cost to Families, $1,500 More in Costs to Individuals

The new report, prepared by PricewaterhouseCoopers and paid for by the insurance industry, contains some disturbing estimates of how much the Senate Finance Committee bill will cost Americans.

For the average family of four, health insurance costs about $12,300 today. The report found that, if we do nothing, that cost will rise to $21,900 in 2019. But under the Finance Committee bill, the average family will see its health care costs rise to $25,900 in 2019 -- a full $4,000 more than if we do nothing.

For the average single American, the cost of health care insurance today is about $4,600. The report found that this cost will rise to $8,200 in 2019 without the bill just passed by the Senate committee, but to $9,700 with it -- creating an additional cost to single Americans of $1,500.

This report comes on the heels of a CBO estimate last month that said the Senate Finance Committee bill will increase premium costs for both employers and individuals who purchase insurance on their own: “Premiums in the new insurance exchanges would tend to be higher than the average premiums in the current-law individual market…”

Some Analysts Believe the Study Underestimates the Cost of Liberal Health Reforms

This new report may or may not be an accurate estimate of the costs Americans will bear under liberal health care reform. Some, including Ron Bachman, a health care analyst at the Georgia Public Policy Foundation and the Center for Health Transformation, believe the PwC study underestimates the cost of liberal reforms.

Bachman believes that when the Finance Committee bill is merged with the legislation passed by the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee, the costs of private health insurance will be even higher than under the Finance bill.

Right now, three senators -- the chairmen of the Finance and HELP committees and Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) -- are meeting in secret to produce a bill for the full Senate to vote on. According to Bachman, the HELP bill is so loaded with pork barrel spending (he calls it the “Mother of all Slush Funds”) that the final Senate bill will cost even more than the Finance Committee legislation alone.

Consumers Bear the Cost of New Health Care Taxes Through Higher Premiums

Although we can’t yet know if the PwC numbers will reflect the exact costs of the Senate’s health plan, we can make some logical inferences that liberal health care reform will increase prices to American families and businesses.

The Senate Finance Committee bill, for instance, raises taxes on employers and insurers by more than $200,000,000,000.

The bill also taxes drug companies and medical device manufacturers, which will raise the cost of these items. And because insurers cover drugs and devices through insurance policies, consumers will ultimately bear the cost of these taxes through higher premiums.

Furthermore, the Senate Finance bill would destroy the very nature of “insurance,” which is for everyone -- young and old, sick and healthy -- to pay into the same system so that the medical care for those who need it is paid for by the insurance premiums of those who do not. The Finance bill may end up leaving mainly the sick in the system by requiring health plans to cover everyone, but allowing people to wait until they are sick to purchase a policy.

Sure, individuals would be fined as little as $200 a year if they don’t buy insurance, but why would someone want to buy a product today, knowing that they can buy it later at the same price when they actually need it? John Lott has a good column that compares this to buying auto insurance after you crash your car.

At the end of the day, health insurance premiums are a reflection of the health care delivery system. Because the Finance Committee bill will directly raise premiums through higher taxes but does little to actually reform delivery, it’s the worst of both worlds.

For ideas on how we can reform our health care delivery system and truly bring down costs to families and businesses, visit healthtransformation.net.

Congress Should Insist on Three Independent Studies Before it Votes

Americans can be forgiven for not knowing who to believe right now. And the Obama Administration’s response to the new study -- to demonize the messenger rather than engage on the facts -- doesn’t help clarify things.

Before it votes to transform one-sixth of our economy and every American’s health care, Congress should know the facts.

Congress should commission three independent studies of the cost of proposed health care reform by three professionally respected analytical firms.

Then Congress should post these studies online, so that all members and the American people can read them.

And then -- and only then -- Congress should vote.

As I mentioned in a column last week, some members of Congress are getting careless about reading legislation before they vote on it.

So for those members and others who need a refresher course on American democracy, here’s how it should go:

First: Know the Facts

Second: Read the Bill.

Third: Vote

Saying No

In October of 2009, Congressman Gingrich wrote an article for Human Events stating that the left had simply said no the the country's right to know what was in the health care reform legislation.

Saying 'No' to Your Right to Know
by Newt Gingrich

10/28/2009 "I'm going to have all the negotiations around a big table. We'll have the negotiations televised on C-SPAN, so that people can see who is making arguments on behalf of their constituents and who are making arguments on behalf of the drug companies or the insurance companies.” --Barack Obama, August, 2008

As we write, a small group of White House officials and three senators are huddled in Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s (D-Nev.) office deciding what kind of health care you and your family will be allowed to have.

Major policy decisions, such as whether or not there will be a government run “public” option, are being made. Backroom deals are being cut – all in secret. No C-SPAN cameras allowed.

If you think you should have a voice in this process, there is a place to make your voice heard. Just visit healthtransformation.net.

What Did Liberals Learn From the Townhalls? Shut Out the Troublemakers

It’s not like Americans have been apathetic about the future of our health care. Since this process began, we’ve demanded to know what is happening.

Last summer, Americans filled townhall meetings, many armed with copies of the 1000+ page bill that had been filed in the House -- a bill that most lawmakers had never read.

And the more we learned, the less we supported the Pelosi Plan.

But what did Speaker Pelosi and the other supporters of liberal health care reform learn? How did they decide to use this input from the American people?

After August, Liberals Were More Determined Than Ever to Ram Through a Bill

Some began cancelling town hall meetings. Others actually carded people in the audience to make sure they lived in their district. Still others began verbally chastising the citizens who asked questions.

Upon their return to Washington, it was clear that they had discounted what they heard at the town hall meetings. It was as if their meetings with the American people had never happened.

They were more determined than ever to ram through legislation.

Democrats Blocked an Attempt to Require That Bills Be Posted Online

In the Senate, the Finance Committee decided to pass a vague proposal -- containing no legislative details or cost analysis -- and allow no opportunity for the American people or their elected representatives to know what was being considered until after it was done.

During the process, Sen. Jim Bunning (R-Ky.) introduced an amendment to require that all bills be publicly available for 72 hours with legislative text and an official budget analysis from the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) prior to being considered.

The Democrats blocked the amendment, never allowing it to get fair and full consideration by the Senate, even though eight Senate Democrats supported the requirement. Senators Bayh (Ind.), Lincoln (Ark.), Pryor (Ark.), McCaskill (Mo.), Landrieu (La.), Nelson (Neb.), Lieberman (Conn.) and Webb (Va.), should be commended for later contacting the leadership urging them to support the change.

“When We Come Back In September, I Will be Available to Answer Any Question That Members of Congress Have”

It appears clear that the decision has been made to ignore the promise President Obama made to worried Americans in the summer of 2008 and again last July when he declared:
"So I just want everybody to know, Congress will have time to read the bill. They will have time to debate the bill. They will have all of August to review the various legislative proposals. When we come back in September, I will be available to answer any question that members of Congress have. If they want to come over to the White House and go over line by line what's going on, I will be happy to do that."

It is unfortunate that the Democratic leadership has decided it would be easier to rush their legislation through rather than honoring the people’s right to know.

Then again, maybe that choice is all Americans need to know when judging the Democrats’ healthcare bill.

Go to healthtransformation.net to Make Your Voice Heard

President Obama has failed to deliver on his repeated promises of transparency and openness.

But that doesn’t mean that we have to silently accept a government health care bill that was negotiated in secret and paid for with deals cut with special interests using our tax dollars.

Please sign the Center for Health Transformation’s (CHT) petition here, to tell Washington that We The People demand that all bills be publicly available, including legislative language and accurate budget analysis, at least 72 hours prior to any vote by Congress or committees in Congress.

There’s still time to make your voice heard.

“60 Minutes” Takes On Medicare and Medicaid Fraud

The correspondent announced the report with the warning that “it might raise your blood pressure.”

He was right. Last Sunday night, CBS’s “60 Minutes” ran a not-to-be-missed expose of something that the Center for Health Transformation has been warning about for months: The unbelievable amount of fraud taxpayers are footing the bill for in the Medicare and Medicaid programs.

“60 Minutes” estimates that an amazing $90 billion in spending on these programs each year is due to fraud. That’s right in line with what CHT’s Jim Frogue and I report in our book Stop Paying the Crooks.

If Health Care Passes, We'll Repeal It

On October 19, 2009 Congressman Gingrich appeared on Fox News and stated that if health care reform passes, then it would be repealed by the Republicans.

Corrupt Christmas Present

In January of 2010, Congressman Gingrich wrote an article for Human Events describing the passage of health care reform as a corrupt Christmas present.

Harry Reid’s Corrupt Christmas Present
by Newt Gingrich

01/06/2010 The Democratic leaders of the House and the Senate reportedly are planning on finalizing their differing health care “reform” bills in secret.

That’s right. They’re kicking out the C-SPAN cameras and planning on huddling behind closed doors with a few Obama Administration power brokers to transform the American health care system.

Not that anyone should be surprised by this, of course. “Secret” and “corrupt” are the two words that best describe the process by which Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid produced his trillion-dollar government takeover of our health care system.

A First Look At Harry Reid’s Corrupt Christmas Present

The American people didn’t have much of a chance to get a good look at Senator Reid’s corrupt Christmas present before it was passed. The legislation would dramatically expand the power and scope of the federal government -- and fail to fix any of the problems we face.

That continues the course of action that Democrats have taken this entire year on health reform. Every bill that has been introduced, from the House Tri-Committee bill this summer to the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions committee to Harry Reid’s latest bill, the recipe is the same: More regulation, higher taxes, bigger government, less control for you.

Here are just a few of the Reid bill’s details:

• • 2,409 pages (by comparison, the legislation that created Social Security was just 82 pages long)
• • $518 billion in tax increases (Joint Committee on Taxation and the Congressional Budget Office)
• • $466 billion in cuts to Medicare and Medicaid (CBO)
• • Many costs of the legislation won’t begin until 2014, but taxes will be imposed immediately (CBO)
• • Federal outlays for health care would increase by about $200 billion between 2010-2019 (CBO)
• • $26 billion of unfunded mandates to states over the next 10 years that will likely result in higher taxes (CBO)
• • Would increase non-group premiums by $300 per individual and $2,100 per family (CBO)
• • Up to 10 million people will lose their current health insurance coverage under the bill (CBO)
• • Adds a 10% tax on indoor tanning services (Section 10907)

No Christmas Miracle, Just a Lot of Washington Payoffs

As I mentioned before, Harry Reid didn’t need a Christmas miracle to pass this massive bill. Instead he used an approach more appropriate for "The Sopranos" than for the nation’s capital: payoffs. There may not have been any smoke-filled rooms, but there were plenty of shady deals.

The most egregious were those for Democratic Sen. Ben Nelson of Nebraska. He was the final holdout. Without his support, the bill would have been stopped. But Ben buckled under the pressure.

He was particularly pliable on his demands that no federal funding go to cover abortions. Instead he accepted a watered down compromise that allows individual states to prohibit plans that cover abortion services -- a compromise that the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops and numerous pro-life groups denounced as paving the way for federally funded abortions.

The Nebraska Exemption to Higher Medicaid Costs

But when Harry Reid needed his vote, Sen. Nelson took the money and ran -- $100 million to be exact. Nebraska will be the only state in the country where the full costs of Medicaid expansion will be covered by the federal government. Specialty hospitals in Nebraska will be exempted from new regulations. The state’s largest insurers will be shielded from new regulations. Here are the details of the Nebraska Exemption:

• • Federal government fully finances Medicaid expansion for two years and then increases its matching funds (known as FMAP) thereafter to 100% -- in perpetuity (Section 10201), totaling about $100 million
• • Reid bill specifically identifies Nebraska for higher federal matching funds, fully funding its expansion for an additional year
• • Carve outs for physician-owned hospitals in Nebraska
• • Physician self-referral exemptions within Nebraska
• • Nelson’s abortion compromise: a state may elect to prohibit abortion coverage in qualified health plans offered through an exchange if the state enacts a law to prohibit it
• • Shields two Nebraska insurers from taxes that other plans will pay: Mutual of Omaha and Blue Cross/Blue Shield (language crafted so it only affects these two in Nebraska)

The Roll Call of Shame: Senator Nelson Wasn’t the Only Senator Bought Off

But Sen. Nelson wasn’t the only senator to be bought off by Majority Leader Reid. More than a dozen other states received special goodies, including:

• • Louisiana
  $300 million in additional Medicaid funding
• • Vermont
  2.2% FMAP increase for 6 years for Vermont Medicaid program
• $600 million in additional Medicaid funding (CBO)
  • Massachusetts
  0.5% FMAP increase for 3 years for their entire program
  $500 million in additional Medicaid funding (CBO)
• • Hawaii
  Restores DSH funding eliminated in the past to expand Medicaid eligibility
• • Michigan
  Adjusts payments to hospitals according to local wage levels, which when adjusted aids Michigan
  Exemption for non-profit insurers in the state from large excise tax
• • Connecticut
  $100 million earmark for construction of a University of Connecticut hospital
• • Montana
  Medicare coverage for individuals exposed to environmental health hazards in or around the geographic area of Libby, Mont., subject to an emergency declaration as of 6/17/09
• • South Dakota, North Dakota, Wyoming, and Montana
  Adds 1% hospital wage index
  Adds 1% practice index for physicians to cover geographic cost differences

A Massive Bill, Compiled in Secret and Negotiated Through Corruption, Will Now Be Finalized in Secret

And so it has come to this: A massive bill, compiled in secret, negotiated through corruption, and passed by a party-line vote, will now be finalized in secret.

Americans deserved better for Christmas.

Reports are that House and Senate Democrats will go around the normal legislative process of a formal, transparent conference to iron out their differences. (This chart written by Democratic staffers provides a good summary of both bills, though it also includes a lot of spin.) But rather than a representative group of lawmakers from each chamber negotiating in good faith in the open, House Speaker Pelosi, Senate Leader Reid, and White House officials are planning to do the work themselves, locking out the vast majority of lawmakers -- from both parties.

If these secret proceedings are not stopped, the American people, through our representatives in Congress, will be presented with a done deal. If 2009 is any guide, the final vote will then be called before many members of Congress or the public has a chance to read, understand, and debate the details of the final bill. And in the end, the American people will be left to speculate as to the corrupt bargains that were required to see this monstrosity through to final passage.

Turn on the C-SPAN Cameras

But this does not have to be the outcome. Americans do not want our lawmaking to be done in secret. In 2008, then-candidate Obama condemned “negotiating behind closed doors” and instead called for “bringing all parties together, and broadcasting those negotiations on C-SPAN so that the American people can see what the choices are, because part of what we have to do is enlist the American people in this process.”

In this spirit of candidate Obama, C-SPAN Chairman Brian Lamb asked congressional leaders this week to let the American people have a seat at the table where decisions affecting every single American will be made and to allow C-SPAN to cover the health care negotiations among Senate, House, and White House representatives.

President Obama was right in 2008 as a candidate. Brian Lamb is right today. These health care negotiations should be held in the open and C-SPAN should be allowed to provide coverage so that all Americans can see how health legislation will affect their lives.

Open, honest government should be an American birthright. Joining Brian Lamb in requesting our elected leaders to live up to a minimum standard of openness and honesty is one New Year’s resolution that every American can agree on

Kill the Bill

On March 10, 2010 Congressman Gingrich wrote an article for Human Events asking representatives in Congress to kill the health care reform bill.

Kill The Bill
by Newt Gingrich

03/10/2010 Dear Readers,

It has been over a year since President Obama announced his plans for comprehensive health reform.

Since the announcement, as Americans learned more and more about the Democrats’ health care bill, opposition to the left’s plans for big government health care have grown and grown.

It started with the explosion of outrage at town hall meetings over the bill’s cuts to Medicare to pay for new bureaucracies and programs.

It gained steam when Americans realized the frightening potential for “death panels” when you give government the power to deny care based on budgetary concerns.

And it reached critical mass when the corrupt manner in which the bill was being shoved through Congress was exposed to the American people.

However, despite all the polls showing that Americans want Congress to scrap the current bill and start over, it is now clear that Democratic leaders are bound and determined to ignore the will of the people.

President Obama has called for the House of Representatives to pass by March 18 the same bill the Senate passed in December.

We must stop this bill from passing.

We DO Need Real Reform, but NOT This Travesty of a Bill

To be clear, I passionately believe America’s health care system is badly in need of reform.

I founded the Center for Health Transformation seven years ago as a unique collaboration of doctors, hospitals, and industry leaders dedicated to developing a 21st century, personalized, intelligent health care system.

In this column, and in op-eds and books, I have written repeatedly about common sense, market-oriented solutions that would save lives and save money.

I have always put the focus on solutions when it came to health care because when it comes to an issue that means so much to so many Americans, I believe solving problems must rise above political posturing.

I have even taken heat from fellow conservatives for cooperating with leading Democrats to achieve health reforms we agree on, like greater use of health information technology. In fact, there are even some specific elements of the bill -- like payment reform to reward quality care -- with which I agree.

However, as someone who has dedicated the last decade of his life to fixing what’s broken in America’s health care system, and has reached across party lines to do so, I regrettably have to say that this bill will do vastly more harm than good.

It will raise the cost of health care for everyone through crushing new taxes.

It will reduce benefits for millions of senior citizens without fixing the underlying structural problems of Medicare that are leading the program towards bankruptcy.

It will put government bureaucrats at the center of our health care system, not doctors and patients.

Furthermore, as Mark Steyn and others have noted, if this bill becomes law there may be no going back from a more statist, more bureaucratic, more left-of-center political culture that would mean the demise of America as a unique civilization.

Don’t Let Speaker Pelosi Be the Only Voice Your Congressman Hears

So it all comes down to one final vote.

If Speaker Pelosi succeeds in twisting enough arms and making enough promises to get the votes she needs, President Obama could sign the left’s big government, big bureaucracy health bill into law the next day.

Right now, Speaker Pelosi has the ear of skeptical members of her caucus.

She’s trying to make your member of Congress forget about the unpopularity of the bill in their districts.

She’s distracting him or her with the siren song of Washington fundraisers and other big party politics.

Speaker Pelosi would have your representative listen to Washington insiders rather than you.

We need to break through the Washington bubble and remind Congress who is in charge.

Call your Member of Congress today.

Tell him or her to vote against the left’s big government health care bill. Then call all your friends and family and ask them to do the same.

Together we can kill this bill once and for all. 

This Will Not Stand

In March of 2010, Congressman Gingrich wrote an article for Human Events declaring that the health care reform bill will not stand.

Healthcare Reform: This Will Not Standby Newt Gingrich

03/24/2010 No one should be confused about the outcome of Sunday's vote in the House on the healthcare bill.

This is not the end of the fight. It is the beginning.

The fight will continue in the Senate where Democrats will now try to pass a reconciliation bill filled with “fixes” to the healthcare bill passed Sunday. Republicans are committed to holding the Democrats accountable for their vote and making sure they do not abuse the reconciliation process.

The fight will continue in the states where 38 of them have filed or are planning to file legislation that rebukes Obamacare’s “individual mandate” that requires you to purchase insurance even if you would rather pay directly for medical care. In addition, Attorneys General from several states plan to file lawsuits challenging the constitutionality of the healthcare bill’s individual mandate.

And most importantly, the fight will continue at the ballot box for the millions of Americans who refuse to be ignored. In the end, it is only by repudiating those politicians who voted for the health bill in free and fair elections that we can repeal this bill and start over on common sense, market-oriented, patient-centered health reform.

Defying the Will of the American People

The American people spoke decisively against a big government, high-tax, Washington knows best, pro trial lawyer, centralized bureaucratic health system.

In every recent poll, the vast majority of Americans opposed this monstrosity.

Sixty-six percent of Americans think the bill will make things worse or make no difference for themselves and their families (Gallup).

Forty eight percent of Americans think the plan is a “bad idea.” Only 36 percent think it is a “good idea” (NBC/Wall Street Journal).

Only 17 percent of Americans think the bill will cause healthcare costs to go down. Nearly double that think their costs would go up (Pew).

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi knew the country was against the bill. That is why she kept her members trapped in Washington and forced a vote on Sunday.

She knew if she let the members go home their constituents would convince them to vote no.

Look at what happened with House Democrats Scott Murphy (N.Y.), John Boccieri (Ohio), and Brad Ellsworth (Ind.). The Center for Health Transformation commissioned surveys late last week specifically polling their constituents. We found deep and overwhelming opposition. In Rep. Boccieri’s district, his constituents opposed the bill by a 61-33 margin. For Rep. Ellsworth, it was even worse: 63 to 30 opposed.

But all three congressmen ignored their constituents. All three chose Speaker Pelosi over their constituents.

What we saw Sunday night was a pressured, bought, intimidated vote worthy of Hugo Chavez but unworthy of the United States of America.

The Machine

The Obama-Pelosi-Reid machine has combined the radicalism of Saul Alinsky, the corruption of Springfield, Ill., and the machine power politics of Chicago.

It is hard to imagine how much pressure they brought to bear on Congressman Bart Stupak to get him to accept a cynical, phony and possibly unconstitutional executive order on abortion. The ruthlessness and inhumanity of the Obama-Pelosi-Reid machine was most clearly on display in their public humiliation of Stupak when he was forced to speak out against a Republican effort to add the very language Stupak authored preventing taxpayer funding of abortion.

Democratic Congressman Alcee Hastings (who, while serving as a federal judge, was impeached and removed from the bench before being elected to the House) articulated the principles of this machine mentality on Sunday when he said, “There ain't no rules here, we're trying to accomplish something. . . .All this talk about rules. . . .When the deal goes down . . . we make 'em up as we go along."

It is hard for the American people to believe their leaders on the Left are this bad.

They are.

The American People Will Not Allow a Corrupt Machine to Dictate Their Future

On Sunday night, Congressman John Boehner aptly summarized the consequences of voting for this bill:

“If we pass this bill, there will be no turning back. It will be the last straw for the American people. And in a democracy, you can only ignore the will of the people for so long and get away with it. And if we defy the will of our fellow citizens and pass this bill, we are going to be held to account by those who have placed us in their trust.”

2010 and 2012 will be among the most important elections in American history.

These elections will allow us to save America from a leftwing machine of unparalleled corruption, arrogance, and cynicism.

The American people will not allow a corrupt machine to dictate their future.

Together we will pledge to repeal this bill and start over on meaningful, effective, healthcare reform.

Together we will prove that this will not stand 

Gradually Realizing the Truth

On March 25, 2010 Congressman Gingrich appeared on Fox News and spoke about the passage of health care reform legislation. He notes that people will see the gradual implementation of the bill and will not like it.

1,968 Reasons to Repeal

In January of 2011, Congressman Gingrich wrote an article for Human Events in which he lists numerous reasons to repeal the health care reform legislation.

1,968 Reasons To Repeal
by Newt Gingrich

01/19/2011 If you had any doubt about the importance of repealing the health reform law, a new chart from the Center for Health Transformation will give you 1,968 reasons to repeal the bill.

The chart, titled "The New and Expanded Secretarial Powers in the Health Reform Law" reveals the ways in which the 2,700-page health reform law grants 1,968 powers to the Secretary of Health and Human Services.

Control over the largest single sector of the American economy (about 18% of GDP, or one out of every five dollars in the entire economy) and a matter of life and death for every American, will be handed over to one appointed bureaucrat.

Here are five outrageous examples the Center for Health Transformation found in the 1,968 grants of power:

1. The Secretary determines “clinical concern”of drugs -- Section 3307 -- (ii) IDENTIFICATION OF DRUGS IN CERTAIN CATEGORIES AND CLASSES. (I) … the Secretary shall identify, as appropriate, categories and classes of drugs for which the Secretary determines are of clinical concern. (II) CRITERIA. The Secretary shall use criteria established by the Secretary in making any determination under subclause (I). (iii) IMPLEMENTATION. The Secretary shall establish the criteria … and any exceptions … through the promulgation of a regulation which includes a public notice and comment period.

Meaning: The Secretary will decide what clinical drugs seniors can access.

2. Secretary decides how drugs are dispensed in long-term care facilities -- Section 3310 -- (3) REDUCING WASTEFUL DISPENSING OF OUTPATIENT PRESCRIPTION DRUGS IN LONG-TERM CARE FACILITIES. The Secretary shall require PDP sponsors of prescription drug plans to utilize specific, uniform dispensing techniques, as determined by the Secretary, in consultation with … any other stakeholders the Secretary determines appropriate ... when dispensing covered part D drugs to enrollees who reside in a long-term care facility in order to reduce waste associated with 30-day fills.

Meaning: The Secretary will instruct physicians and nurses exactly how to give a drug to their patients in long-term care facilities.

3. “Tooth-level surveillance” -- Section 4102-- (2) NATIONAL HEALTH AND NUTRITION EXAMINATION SURVEY. The Secretary shall develop oral healthcare components that shall include tooth-level surveillance for inclusion in the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey … the term ‘tooth-level surveillance’ means a clinical examination where an examiner looks at each dental surface, on each tooth in the mouth and as defined by the Division of Oral Health of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Meaning: The Secretary will determine how dentists and dental hygienists should examine your teeth.

4. The Secretary may establish insurance premium ratings for states – Section 1201 -- FAIR HEALTH INSURANCE PREMIUMS … SECRETARIAL REVIEW … With respect to the premium rate charged by a health insurance issuer for health insurance coverage offered in the individual or small group market … Each State shall establish 1 or more rating areas within that State for purposes of applying the requirements of this title. The Secretary shall review the rating areas established by each State under subparagraph (A) to ensure the adequacy of such areas for purposes of carrying out the requirements of this title. If the Secretary determines a State’s rating areas are not adequate, or that a State does not establish such areas, the Secretary may establish rating areas for that State.

Meaning: The Secretary can overrule states on what insurance rates can be whether they like it or not.

5. The Secretary may use comparative effectiveness research -- Section 6301(c) -- LIMITATIONS ON CERTAIN USES OF COMPARITIVE EFFECTIVENESS RESEARCH… (2) Paragraph (1) shall not be construed as preventing the Secretary from using evidence or findings from such comparative clinical effectiveness research in determining coverage, reimbursement, or incentive programs under title XVIII based upon a comparison of the difference in the effectiveness of alternative treatments in extending an individual’s life due to the individual’s age, disability, or terminal illness.

Meaning: The Secretary can use comparative effectiveness research to determine access to care for seniors, like they do for patients in the British National Health Service.

(If you want a reminder of why this is so troubling, click here to read my newsletter from August 2009 on the danger of comparative effective research being abused by the government.)

Warnings about the Dictatorial Nature of Big Government

This report confirms what I warned about in my book, To Save America: Stopping Obama’s Secular Socialist Machine, which has just been released in an updated paperback, about how the rush to socialism under the Obama administration puts all our freedoms at risk.

Of course, I am hardly the first to warn about the inherently totalitarian nature of big government:

Thomas Jefferson warned in a letter to Charles Hammond that “When all government, domestic and foreign, in little as in great things, shall be drawn to Washington as the center of all power, it will render powerless the checks provided of one government on another and will become as venal and oppressive as the government from which we separated."

Freidrich Hayek warned in the Road to Serfdom that “The more the state ‘plans,’ the more difficult planning becomes for the individual.” Hayek also wrote in The Constitution of Liberty, "Once wide coercive powers are given to governmental agencies for particular purposes, such powers cannot be effectively controlled by democratic assemblies."

Even George Orwell, who was a left wing intellectual, understood the danger of giving too much power to unelected bureaucrats. Orwell’s novel, 1984, described dictatorship in London, not Moscow. He agreed with Hayek’s concerns in a review of the Road to Serfdom: “It cannot be said too often…collectivism is not inherently democratic, but, on the contrary, gives to a tyrannical minority such powers as the Spanish Inquisitors never dreamed of.”

Dictatorial Powers Inspire Dictatorial Behavior:
Kathleen Sebelius as a Case Study

These warnings about the corrupting nature of big government are already being shown to be true through the actions of Kathleen Sebelius, the current Secretary of the Health and Human Services.

Flushed with the promise of these 1,968 new grants of authority to her office, Secretary Sebelius recently made a series of threats to use one of these new powers to punish health insurance companies who have dared to tell the truth about how the health reform law has led to rate hikes for their customers.

The idea of an unelected bureaucrat using her power to punish those who exercise their right to free speech should be considered abhorrent in a society that values liberty.

Also, as Karl Rove astutely pointed out in the Wall Street Journal, Secretary Sebelius has also used her new powers to reward her friends. The Secretary has granted a number of companies exemptions from key requirements in Obamacare. More than a third of these companies’ employees are unionized compared to a mere 7% of the national workforce.

No Bureaucrat Should Have This Power

To be clear, the danger posed by Obamacare’s unprecedented centralization of power over our health decisions is bigger than the current occupant of the Secretary of HHS. No unelected bureaucrat should have this amount of power, whether he or she is in a Democratic or Republican administration.

The genius of the founding fathers is that they understood the fallen nature of man and designed a system of government to prevent any one person from being so powerful that he or she could violate the rights of any citizen.

Every step we take toward bigger and bigger government throws this delicate balance off kilter.

As Milton Friedman warns in this video clip, which has received over 1,000,000 hits on YouTube, giving power to bureaucrats to right the wrongs of society inevitably leads to worse results than that achieved by free people pursuing happiness on their own. “Where in the world do you find these angels,” Friedman asks “that are going to reorganize society for us?”

Considering the warning of Friedman and many more of history’s great thinkers on liberty, is it really any surprise that a political appointee would use new, unprecedented powers to reward friends and punish opponents?

The very fact that the Secretary is now so powerful that she can unilaterally punish opponents of the new healthcare law shows how dangerous this bill is to the freedom of the American people.

And this new study rom the Center for Health Transformation shows that there are 1,968 reasons why all Americans who value liberty should insist their elected representatives support full repeal of the healthcare law.

The Arrogance of Centralized Health Care

In August of 2010 Congressman Gingrich spoke about the arrogance of a bureaucrat who believes that he can make health care decisions for hundreds of millions of people.

Meet the Press - Support for Mandates

On May 15, 2011, Congressman Gingrich appeared on Meet the Press and was asked about a 1993 appearance on that same show in which he advocated in favor of a system that consisted of a mandate for individuals to purchase insurance coupled with subsidies to poor people to purchase their own insurance. He then reasserts his support for a mandate or a bond requirement. The video can be seen here and was reported by TheBlaze. In the appearance, Congressman Gingrich again asserts that there is a group of people making over $75,000 that are seeking to purchase a second house instead of buying insurance and that those people need to be forced to purchase a mandate.

GREGORY: Allright, let me ask you about another hot button issue in the Republican primary of course, and that's health care. Mitt Romney, having to defend that he was a proponent of universal health care in Massachusetts and specifically around this idea of an individual mandate, where you make Americans buy insurance if they don't have it.

Now, I know that you've got big differences with what you call Obamacare, but back in 1993 on this program, this is what you said about the individual mandate, watch:

GINGRICH in 1993:  I am for people ... individuals, exactly like automobile insurance ... individuals having health insurance and being required to have health insurance and I am prepared to vote for a voucher system which will give individuals on a sliding scale, a subsidy so we insure that everyone as individuals have health insurance.

GREGORY: What you advocate there is precisely what President Obama did with his health care legislation, is it not?

GINGRICH: No, it's not precisely what he did. In the first place, Obama basically is trying to replace the entire insurance system, creating state exchanges, creating a Washington based model, creating a federal system.

I believe that all of us, and this is going to be a big debate, all of us have a responsibility to help pay for health care.

GREGORY: You agree with Mitt Romney on this point?

GINGRICH: Well, I agree that all of us have a responsibility to help pay for health care, and that there are ways to do it that make most Libertarians happy.  I've said consistently that you ought to have some requirement that you have health insurance or you post an bond, or in some way you indicate that you are going to be held accountable.

GREGORY: But that is the individual mandate is it not?

GINGRICH: It's a variation on it  ... It's a system ...

GREGORY: So you won't use that against Mitt Romney?

GINGRICH: No, it's a system that allows people to have a range of choices which are designed by the economy. But I think that setting the precedent ... you know, there are an amazing number of people that think that they ought to be given health care and so a large number of the uninsured earn $75,000 or more a year, don't buy health insurance, because they want to buy a second house, a better care, or go on vacation.

Opposition to Mandates

As part of his 2012 campaign, Speaker Gingrich made videos answering questions. One video consisted of the health care mandate question. He states that he is opposed to the mandate and that it is unconstitutional. The video was released on May 16, 2011.

New Hampshire Debate

In June of 2011, Congressman Gingrich participated in the Republican primary debate in New Hampshire. He was asked about a mandate and stated that a mandate should be a litmus test and anyone supporting it should be ruled out.

KING: ... you have a -- I'll let you -- Mr. Speaker, you have at times said, you know, maybe you do have a consider a mandate. You've been very open to the individual mandate. It has become, it seems, at least at the moment, a litmus test in this Republican primary. Should it be?

GINGRICH: Yes, it should be. If you -- if you explore the mandate, which even the Heritage Foundation at one time looked at, the fact is, when you get into an mandate, it ultimately ends up with unconstitutional powers. It allows the government to define virtually everything. And if you can do it for health care, you can do it for everything in your life, and, therefore, we should not have a mandate.

But I want to answer Sylvia at a different level. This campaign cannot be only about the presidency. We need to pick up at least 12 seats in the U.S. Senate and 30 or 40 more seats in the House, because if you are serious about repealing Obamacare, you have to be serious about building a big enough majority in the legislative branch that you could actually in the first 90 days pass the legislation.

So I just think it's very important to understand, it's not about what one person in America does. It's about what the American people do. And that requires a senatorial majority, as well as a presidency.

Western Debate

In October of 2011, Congressman Gingrich participated in the Western Debate on CNN. He was asked about his previous support for mandates and counters that it was not him, but the Heritage Foundation that was the reference cited. He refers to Governor Romney's plan in Massachussetts as another big government solution.

COOPER: Speaker Gingrich, you've also been very critical of Mitt Romney's plan not only on Obamacare, but his plan to lower the capital gains tax only on those earning under $200,000.

GINGRICH: I want to say on health for a minute -- OK, let's just focus. "The Boston Herald" today reported that the state of Massachusetts is fining a local small business $3,000 because their $750-a-month insurance plan is inadequate, according to the bureaucrats in Boston.

Now, there's a fundamental difference between trying to solve the problems of this country from the top down and trying to create environments in which doctors and patients and families solve the problem from the bottom up.

And candidly, Mitt, your plan ultimately, philosophically, it's not Obamacare, and that's not a fair charge. But your plan essentially is one more big government, bureaucratic, high-cost system, which candidly could not have been done by any other state because no other state had a Medicare program as lavish as yours, and no other state got as much money from the federal government under the Bush administration for this experiment. So there's a lot as big government behind Romneycare. Not as much as Obamacare, but a heck of a lot more than your campaign is admitting.

(APPLAUSE)

COOPER: Governor Romney, 30 seconds.

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: Yes, we got it from you, and you got it from the Heritage Foundation and from you.

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 never supported them?

GINGRICH: I agree with them, but I'm just saying, what you said to this audience just now plain wasn't true.

(CROSSTALK)

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?

ROMNEY: Oh, OK. That's what I'm saying. We got the idea from you and the Heritage Foundation.

GINGRICH: OK. A little broader.

ROMNEY: OK.

Dartmouth Debate

On October 11, 2011 Congressman Gingrich participated in the Dartmouth Economic Debate. In that debate, he was asked about health care and Medicare/Medicaid. He responds by discussing the overall effect of the government into the health care system.

TUMULTY: Congressman Gingrich - Speaker Gingrich, Medicare is going broke. Consider the fact that half of all Medicare spending is done in the last two years of life, and research that has been done right here at Dartmouth by “The Dartmouth Atlas” would suggest that much of this money is going to treatments and interventions that do nothing to prolong life or to improve it. In fact, some of it does the opposite.

Do you consider this wasteful spending? And, if so, should the government do anything about it?

GINGRICH: I am really glad you asked that, because I was just swapping e-mails today with Andy von Eschenbach, who was the head of the National Cancer Institute, the head of the Food & Drug Administration. But before that, he was the provost M.D. Anderson, the largest cancer treatment center in the world.

And he wrote me to point out that the most recent U.S. government intervention on whether or not to have prostate testing is basically going to kill people. So, if you ask me, do I want some Washington bureaucrat to create a class action decision which affects every American’s last two years of life, not ever.

I think it is a disaster. I think, candidly, Governor Palin got attacked unfairly for describing what would, in effect, be death panels.

And what Von Eschenbach will tell you if you call him is, the decision to suggest that we not test men with PSA will mean that a number of people who do not have - who are susceptible to a very rapid prostate cancer will die unnecessarily. And there was not a single urologist, not a single specialist on the board that looked at it. So, I am opposed to class intervention for these things.

Michigan Economic Debate

In November of 2011, Congressman Gingrich participated in the Michigan economic debate. He discussed his views on health care and discussed his plan.

BARTIROMO: Mr. Speaker?

GINGRICH: Well, I just want point out, my colleagues have done a terrific job of answering an absurd question. To say in 30 seconds...

BARTIROMO: You have said you want to repeal "Obama-care," correct?

GINGRICH: I did. Let me finish, if I may. To say in 30 seconds what you would do with 18 percent of the economy, life and death for the American people, a topic I've worked on since 1974, about which I wrote about called "Saving Lives and Saving Money" in 2002, and for which I founded the Center for Health Transformation, is the perfect case of why I'm going to challenge the president to seven Lincoln- Douglas style three-hour debates with a timekeeper and no moderator, at least two of which ought to be on health care so you can have a serious discussion over a several-hour period that affects the lives of every person in this country.

BARTIROMO: Would you would like to try to explain...

(APPLAUSE)

BARTIROMO: Would you like to -- would you like to try to explain in simple speak to the American people what you would do after you repeal the president's health care legislation?

GINGRICH: In 30 seconds?

BARTIROMO: Take the time you need, sir. Take the time you need.

GINGRICH: I can't take what I need. These guys will gang up on me...

(CROSSTALK)

BARTIROMO: Do you want the answer the question tonight on health care or no?
(CROSSTALK)

BARTIROMO: Do you want to try to answer the question tonight, Speaker?

GINGRICH: Let me just say it very straight. One, you go back to a doctor-patient relationship and you involve the family in those periods where the patient by themselves can't make key decisions. But you re-localize it.

Two, as several people said, including Governor Perry, you put Medicaid back at the state level and allow the states to really experiment because it's clear we don't know what we are doing nationally.

Three, you focus very intensely on a brand-new program on brain science because the fact is the largest single out-year set of costs we are faced with are Alzheimer's, autism, Parkinson's, mental health, and things which come directly from the brain.

GINGRICH: And I am for fixing our health rather than fixing our health bureaucracy because the iron lung is the perfect model of saving people so you don't need to pay for federal program of iron lung centers because the polio vaccine eliminated the problem. That's a very short (inaudible).

Unleashing Growth and Innovation to Move Beyond the Welfare States

On November 21, 2011 Congressman Gingrich released his plan for social security, health care, and welfare reform. The health care section of this plan is shown below.

Step 3: Health Care Reform: Obamacare versus Patient Power

With the overwhelming burden of existing entitlement programs threatening long-term fiscal chaos and the end of America’s traditional world leading prosperity,President Obama decided the top priority was to make the problem worse with Obamacare, which wildly expands future entitlement spending. While President Obama insisted Obamacare would not add to the federal deficit, Ferrara in America’s Ticking Bankruptcy Bomb explains why it will add $4 to $6 trillion in additional deficits and debt in the first 20 years of implementation alone. On top of this, it promises to decimate the world leading quality health care that has long been a central component of the high standard of living of the American people.

But that is not the biggest problem.

Obamacare was advanced to address two central problems, rapidly rising health costs and the number of uninsured. In reality it did nothing to address costs. Expanding insurance coverage through government expansion without addressing costs is the worst possible approach. National health care costs have been growing faster than the economy for almost a century, though the costs began to skyrocket in earnest about fifty years ago. In 1960, health care costs amounted to 5 percent of the size of the total economy. Over the next half-century costs grew more than three times as quickly as GDP, so that by 2009 they amounted to 17% of the economy.That year, Americans spent $2.5 trillion on health care, a figure higher than all but four other economies in the world.

Even compared to other affluent countries, we spend a disproportionately high amount on healthcare. France spends about 11.2% of GDP, followed by Switzerland and Germany, which both spend between 10 and 11% of their output on healthcare.

We spent $7,538 per capita on healthcare, a third more than second-place Norway ($5,003) and third-place Switzerland ($4,627). Germany and Britain bothspent less than half as much, and the OECD average in 2009 was $3,060.

Obama’s health plan does not do a thing to halt this dangerous trend. In fact,by 2040 the Congressional Budget Office estimates that close to one-third of our entire output will be dedicated to healthcare.

The Third-Party Payment Problem

What makes healthcare so unique that its costs rise so much more quickly than any other sector?

The answer lies in what economists call the “Third-Party Payment” problem. Simply put, patients do not actually for health care products and services directly, so few of us actually grasp the true cost of this care. Most working-age Americans have private insurance or an HMO where they pay a fixed premium every month, with additional costs heavily subsidized. Seniors and the poor depend on government insurance, where costs tend to remain consistent regardless of how much care is consumed. In 2008, private health insurance, Medicare, Medicaid, or other public spending paid for 84% of health expenditures.

Why does this matter? Consider this analogy: Imagine sending your son into a candy store. You tell him he can buy whatever he likes, but the cost of whatever he purchases comes straight out of his allowance. Now imagine instead that you tell him that his favorite uncle has paid for an “all you can eat” deal at the candy store that day. The bill has already been paid up front, so he can take as much candy as he wants at no further cost. Your son would likely make his selections with a more discerning eye under the first scenario; the second scenario is likely going to create a very bad stomachache.

This is the core of the problem with our current system of health insurance. We don’t purchase our medical services and devices directly. Rather, a third party– whether it be private insurance or the government –pays the bills, so few of us ever grasp the magnitude of the costs of medical care. Therefore, with little transparency and little sense of true costs, neither patients nor the medical industry have any incentives to control these costs.

On the consumer side, we as patients have poor information about the true cost and quality of care. Because we are not paying the costs of our care directly,patients have little incentive to search for the best or most efficient value in their health care choices.

On the provider side, doctors, hospitals and other businesses in the medical industry have little incentive to compete to lower costs, since costs are rarely a consideration for consumers. In just about every other industry, a new and popular innovation will quickly draw many competitors into the market selling a similar product–the result of this competition is that future iterations of the product both increase in quality and decrease in price. Just think about how much cheaper and better-quality flat-screen TVs are today than they were just 5 years ago. But in health care, none of these rules apply, and new technology actually tends to increase costs all around.

Most other countries have addressed this problem of costs by instituting centralized, government-controlled healthcare systems. The government uses taxpayer money to pay all of the medical bills, so the government ultimately decides the type and quantity of health care that its citizens can consume. Health care decisions become a cost-benefit analysis, but a cost-benefit analysis made by some distant government bureaucrat, not a patient and their doctor.

In Britain for instance, the National Health Service Constitution is clear that government approves and government decides—not patients and doctors.

“You have the right to drugs and treatments that have been recommended by NICE [National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence] for use in the NHS, if your doctor says they are clinically appropriate for you. You have the right to expect local decisions on funding of other drugs and treatments to be made rationally following a proper consideration of the evidence.
If the local NHS decides not to fund a drug or treatment you and your doctor feel would be right for you, they will explain that decision to you.” [emphasis added]

This model is wrought with perverse incentives, particularly to sacrifice to broader political calculations the interests of the sickest and most costly, always a small minority not nearly fully aware of the scope of possible medical alternatives.With the government and politics ultimately deciding who gets paid how much for what health care, incentives for investment to develop new medical technology,innovation, and breakthroughs are decimated. Most disturbingly, the government is left to make life-or-death decisions for many individuals, as it is the final arbiter as to whether or not certain services are worth the costs.

The British NHS even goes so far as to use rationing of health care services to promote social equality: “[The NHS] has a wider social duty to promote equality through the services it provides and to pay particular attention to groups or sections of society where improvements in health and life expectancy are not keeping pace with the rest of the population.” The fact that government promotes a left -wing social agenda through the delivery of medical services is beyond chilling.

Though initially subtle and opaque, Obamacare creates the framework to take America down this road. That can be seen for starters in the $15 trillion in future cuts to Medicare payments to doctors and hospitals, and turning over the program to the democratically unaccountable Independent Payment Advisory Board.

Patient Power: The Pro-Market, Pro-Patient Alternative to the Obama Model

The alternative has been dubbed Patient Power, after the seminal book of that name by free market health guru John Goodman published by the Cato Institute in 1992. The classic example of such policy is Health Savings Accounts (HSAs).

Here is how HSA’s work: The consumer enters an insurance policy with a high annual deductible, typically between $2,000 and $6,000 in 2011. The higher the deductible, the lower the cost of the insurance, with monthly premiums much lower than traditional insurance plans. The funds that would normally go towards financing monthly premium payments instead are saved in the HSA, to be withdrawn as needed. Typically, if a patient remains healthy during his first year on a high-deductible HSA plan, enough funds will accumulate in the savings account to cover all of the expenses below the deductible (And even if the patient has an unhealthy first year, the net out of pocket costs after using up the first year savings in the HSA is not much more than standard deductibles and copayments in traditional health insurance). Unspent HSA funds can be used for health expenses in later years, or for anything in retirement.

High-deductible plans coupled with an HSA all but eliminate the “third party payment” problem for all non-catastrophic expenses. The patient will be paying for non-catastrophic medical care and products directly out of this HSA account.Therefore will have an incentive to search for care that is high in quality, but he will be cognizant of the costs as he will be paying these costs directly.

As HSAs become more widespread, the medical industry will fundamentally change the way it operates. Doctors, hospitals and other providers would now have to compete to both maximize quality and control costs–as is the case in just about every other market. Producers of medical technology and pharmaceuticals will have incentives to develop new products that both reduce costs and improve quality. The medical industry, one of the few remaining that is insulated from the positive powers of free-markets, will adapt and flourish.

HSAs can be expanded throughout the health care system. Workers can be allowed the freedom to choose them in place of employer provided coverage, the poor can be allowed to choose them for their Medicaid coverage, seniors can be allowed to choose them for Medicare.

Similar policies would involve providing the poor through Medicaid with designated sums for the purchase of private insurance coverage in competitive markets, resulting in incentives for cost saving choices among competing health insurance alternatives. That can be done with employer provided health insurance as well, with the worker free to use an employer contribution for any private insurance coverage of his or her choice.

By contrast, Obamacare goes in the opposite direction and actually restricts consumerism. Obamacare increases taxes on Flexible Spending Accounts by cutting the tax advantage by 50%. On HSAs, Obamacare restricts what medicines patients can purchase, and the most dangerous assault on HSAs could be when the federal government prohibits their inclusion in the newly state-based health insurance exchanges that Obamacare mandates.

We must also break down other unnecessary barriers to achieve Patient Power. Americans should be allowed to purchase insurance across state lines, which will vastly increase choice and drive down costs. Regulations that only serve to benefit special interests must be repealed, including mandates that require plans to cover unnecessary services, guaranteed issue rules, and community rating rules.Additionally, regulations that exist only to bar certain providers from market should be pared down, especially certificate of need requirements.

Bringing “Patient Power” to Medicare

Consumerism can also be unleashed in Medicare, as House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan has proposed. Retirees can be provided premium support through the program for the purchase of the private health insurance they choose. The resulting market competition among health plan will help to control costs. Similar private sector competition for the drug coverage of Medicare Part D has proved quite successful in controlling costs. A personal savings and investment account for the Medicare payroll tax during working years would provide additional funds that can be used in retirement for the purchase of private health insurance of the retirees’ choice.

President Obama's approach to Medicare emphasizes again the other alternative of expanded government control over the health care provided to seniors under Medicare. He makes sharp Medicare cuts to payments to doctors and hospitals for senior health care, and creates the Independent Payment Advisory Board to implement still further Medicare cuts, which is ominously exempted from democratic control. This is why Ryan’s Medicare reforms are actually better for seniors than Obama’s approach to Medicare.

Maximizing Quality for Medicare Patients

Improving the quality of health care is also a critical part of the solution to Medicare. While many of the changes need to be made to other parts of government, such as fundamentally transforming the FDA and NIH as well as encouraging and accelerating research and development with tax changes, the breakthroughs that would result will greatly benefit Medicare—both in terms of improvements in beneficiary health and cost savings.

For example, in regenerative medicine we stand at the edge of a dramatic new potential to use our own cells to grow solutions totally compatible with our bodies. Regenerative medicine is creating the potential for revolutionary breakthroughs for spinal cord injuries, cancer patients, heart disease and every aspect of our physical body. In kidney dialysis alone the federal government now spends $27 billion a year. Kidney dialysis will soon be a larger cost than the entire NIH budget. Yet regenerative medicine stands at the edge of making it an obsolete therapy.

Brain science stands on the edge of an even greater revolution in knowledge and capabilities than regenerative medicine. Because of breakthroughs in instrumentation and computation, brain science will almost certainly be the most exciting and explosive area of new knowledge in our lifetime. Brain science opensup potential solutions for Alzheimers, Parkinson’s, Autism, Schizophrenia, Bipolar disease, and even in how fast and thoroughly we learn.

Medicare spends billions every year to treat the symptoms of Alzheimer’s. Medicaid programs also spend billions in long-term care costs related to the disease.If we were to move the barriers standing in the way of innovators and entrepreneurs to find a cure or a vaccine, we could unleash the power of cutting-edge industries like biotechnology to develop and deploy the treatments and cures that will improve health and lower costs in Medicare.

Additional changes to Medicare, such as rapidly moving away from fee-for-service payments to value-based payments, are also vital. Fraud continues to be an anchor on the program. Some estimates are as high as 10 percent of all Medicare spending is outright fraud, leading the GAO to designate Medicare as “a high
-risk program because of its size, complexity, and susceptibility to improper payments.” Utilizing modern information technology to monitor fraud in real-time is critical.

All of these solutions must be combined with empowering Medicare patients with the decision-making authority and responsibility over how their health care dollars are spent. Medicare patients must be given market incentives to consider the full costs of the health care they choose to consume, in which case the patient weighs the personal benefits of his or her health care against the costs of that care.

Improving the Health Care Safety Net for Low Income Americans

Such Patient Power reforms can be extended to provide a complete healthcare safety net covering everybody to assure that no one will suffer lack of essential health care, for just a small fraction of the cost of Obamacare. Moreover, this can and should be accomplished with no individual mandate and no employer mandate.

Obamacare, by contrast, for all of its trillions in future taxes and spending, and both its individual and employer mandate, still does not cover everyone.

Such reform would begin with Medicaid, which already spends over $400billion a year providing substandard health care coverage for 50 million low-income Americans. Congress should transform Medicaid to provide assistance to purchase private health insurance for all those who otherwise could not afford coverage,ideally with Medicaid provided premium support. This one step would enormously benefit the poor already on Medicaid.

The program today pays doctors and hospitals only 60% of costs for their health care services for the poor. As a result, close to half of all doctors and hospitals won’t take Medicaid patients. This is already a form of rationing, as Medicaid patients find obtaining health care increasingly difficult, and studies show they suffer worse health outcomes as a result. Access is already a dire problem. But shockingly, Obamacare dramatically expands Medicaid—20 million more Americans beginning in 2014—without making a single change to fundamentally improve the program. It is a scandal to add 20 million more Americans to the program without addressing the existing access problem.

Health insurance vouchers would free the poor from this Medicaid situation,enabling them to obtain the same health care as the middle class, because they would be able to buy the same health insurance in the market.

Ideally this would be done by block granting Medicaid back to the states, as with the 1996 AFDC reforms discussed above. With finite block grants for Medicaid,states that innovate to reduce costs can keep the savings. States that operate programs with continued runaway costs would pay those additional costs themselves. The voters of each state can then decide how much assistance for the purchase of health insurance to provide each family at different income levels to assure that the poor would be able to obtain essential health care. This would rightly vary with the different income and cost levels of each state.

This would not cost much because only about 12 million Americans arguably cannot afford health insurance without some public assistance. Out of the 47million uninsured we keep hearing about, 9.7 million are already eligible for current government programs like Medicaid or SCHIP but haven’t signed up. Another 6 million are eligible for employer sponsored insurance but have not signed up for that either. Another 9 million are in families earning more than $75,000 per year.Another 10.2 million are immigrants, legal or illegal, and not U.S. citizens. Just give the assistance necessary, counting what they can reasonably pay based on their income, to the 12 million Americans that need it to buy private health insurance.

A second step necessary to ensure a complete safety net is to provide federal funding to help each state run a High Risk pool. Those uninsured who become too sick to purchase health insurance in the market, perhaps because they have contracted cancer or heart disease, for example, would be assured of guaranteed coverage through the risk pool. They would be charged a premium for this coverage based on their ability to pay, ensuring that they will not be asked to pay more than they could afford. Federal and state funding would cover remaining costs. Such risk pools already exist in over 30 states, and for the most part they work well at relatively little cost to the taxpayers because few people actually become truly uninsurable.

Obamacare included $5 billion to fund high-risk pools until 2014. In theory risk pools will no longer be needed since insurers will be required to cover pre-existing conditions, and guaranteed issue and community rating would be mandated. This will undoubtedly drive up the cost of insurance for everyone. The better approach would be to assist those who are truly uninsurable in the private market with a publicly backed high-risk pool, while introducing a series of patient-power reforms for the private market.

The law already provides that insurers cannot cut off already existing policy holders, or impose discriminatory rate increases, because they become sick while covered. That would be like allowing fire insurers to cut off coverage for houses once they catch on fire. If this law needs to be modernized, it should be.

With these reforms, those who have insurance can keep it, those who can’t afford it are given the necessary help to buy it, and those who nevertheless remain uninsured and then become too sick to buy it have a back up safety net in the risk pools. Everyone is assured of being able to get essential health care when they need it, with no individual or employer mandate.

The intractable problem with such individual and employer mandates is this:once you have a mandate, the government has to specify exactly what coverage must be included in insurance for it to qualify. This introduces political considerations into determining these minimum standards, guaranteeing that nothing desired by the special interests will be left out. And once the government mandates such expensive insurance, the government becomes responsible for its costs. It has to adopt expensive subsidies to help people pay for the expensive plans that it is requiring. The resulting cost to the taxpayer and strain on the budget leads the government to try and control healthcare costs by limiting healthcare services.The inevitable result is rationing by a nameless, faceless, unaccountable board of government bureaucrats. This is why individual and employer mandates are bad policy leading down the road to socialized medicine, whether the mandates are adopted at the federal level, or the state level.

Two Starkly Different Paths

The Medicaid block grants would likely cost less actually than Medicaid today, but serve the poor far better as discusses above, and the High Risk pools involve only marginal additional costs. Obamacare, by contrast, was estimated by CBO to cost a trillion dollars a year, more likely $2 to $3 trillion. But with Patient Power, the patients themselves would enjoy maximized personal control over their own health care, with the current world leading quality of American health care maintained. So again, the people are better served, at just a fraction of the cost.

Moreover, once the decision over what health care to buy is united with market incentives to control costs in the patients themselves, then the people themselves can decide what percentage of GDP should be devoted to health care,through their collective decisions in the marketplace. The health cost problem would be addressed in the competitive marketplace, consistent with the preferences of the people. The health care industry would then be a contributor to jobs and growth of the economy just like any other, rather than considered a net drain on the economy. Restraint of health costs consistent with consumer preferences would further contribute to economic growth.

2012 Presidential Campaign Website Statements

JOBS & THE ECONOMY

"Creating jobs and getting back to 4% unemployment is the most important step to a balanced budget." -- Newt Gingrich

1. America only works when Americans are working. Newt has a pro-growth strategy similar to the proven policies used when he was Speaker to balance the budget, pay down the debt, and create jobs.
2. The Gingrich Prosperity Plan
3. Stop the 2013 tax increase to promote stability in the economy. Job creation moved from stagnant to improving in the two months after Congress extended tax relief for two years. We should continue what has worked by making the rates permanent.
4. Make the United States the most desirable location for new business investment through a bold series of tax cuts and regulatory reforms, including:
   1. Eliminating the capital gains tax to make American entrepreneurs more competitive against those in other countries;
   2. Dramatically reducing the corporate income tax (the highes in the world) to 12.5%;
   3. Allowing for 100% expensing of new equipment to spur innovation and American manufacturing;
   4. Ending the death tax permanently.
5. Repeal Sarbanes-Oxley to remove burdensome financial regulation that is holding companies back from taking risks and making new investments.
6. Implement an American energy policy that creates jobs in the United States versus the Obama plan which borrows money from China to give to Brazil to drill for oil and to then sell to Americans.
7. Enforce the fiscal responsibility Americans deserve by controlling spending, implementing money saving reforms, and replacing destructive policies and regulatory agencies with new approaches.
8. Repeal and replace Obamacare with a pro-jobs, pro-responsibility health plan that puts doctors and patients in charge of health decisions instead of bureaucrats.  

HEALTHCARE

"We must repeal and replace the left's big government health bill with real solutions that will lower costs and improve health outcomes." -- Newt Gingrich

The big government Obamacare approach does not address the root causes of America's health care crisis. Instead, it creates layers of new taxes, regulations, and bureaucracies that will ultimately make our problems worse, not better. Newt proposes a personalized health system that would save lives and save money by empowering doctors and patients with more choices and more information.

Reforms to save lives and save money

1. Make health insurance more affordable and portable by giving Americans the choice of a generous tax credit or the ability to deduct the value of their health insurance up to a certain amount and by allowing Americans to purchase insurance across state lines, increasing price competition in the industry.
2. Create more choices in Medicare by giving seniors the option to choose, on a voluntary basis, a more personal system in the private sector with greater options for better care. This would create price competition to lower costs.
3. Reform Medicaid by giving states more freedom and flexibility to customize their programs to suit their needs with a block-grant program similar to the successful welfare reform of 1996.
4. Reward quality care by changing the Medicare and Medicaid reimbursement models to take into account the quality of the care delivered and incentivizing beneficiaries to seek out facilities that deliver the best care at the lowest costs.
5. Reward health and wellness by giving health plans, employers, Medicare, and Medicaid more latitude to design benefits to encourage, incentivize, and reward healthy behaviors.
6. Stop health care fraud by moving from a paper-based system to an electric one. Health care fraud accounts for as much as much as 10 percent of all health care spending, according to the National Health Care Anti-Fraud Association. That's more than $200 billion a year. Compare this to the 0.1% fraud rate in the credit card industry thanks to its high-tech information analysis systems.
7. Stop junk lawsuits that drive up the cost of medicine with medical malpractice reform.
8. Speed medical breakthroughs to patients by reforming the Food and Drug Administration.
9. Inform patients and consumers of price and quality so they can make informed choices about how to spend their money on care. Patients have the right to know this information, but finding it is virtually impossible.
10. Invest in research for health solutions that are urgent national priorities. More brain science research, for example, could lead to Alzheimer's Disease cures and treatments that could save the federal government over $20 trillion over the next forty years.

Answering the Attacks

As part of his 2012 presidential campaign, Congressman Gingrich dedicated a page to "Answering the Attacks." On that page, Congressman Gingrich states on that page that he went along with the Heritage foundation in the 1990s when they supported a mandate instead of "HillaryCare." He states that shortly thereafter, he realized that the mandate was not counterproductive and unconstitutional.

Mandate to Purchase health insurance

Newt opposes Governor Romney’s health insurance mandate, and Newt opposes President Obama’s health insurance mandate. Newt believes mandates to buy health insurance are wrong on principle, and in the case of the Obamacare health insurance mandate, unconstitutional as well.

With respect to President Obama’s health insurance mandate, Newt believes it is an unprecedented and unconstitutional expansion of federal power. If the federal government can coerce individuals—by threat of fines—to buy health insurance, there is no stopping the federal government from forcing Americans to buy any good or service. It is a serious and unconstitutional infringement of individual liberty.

With respect to Governor Romney’s mandate, we have observed that it doesn’t achieve its goal of providing low cost catastrophic coverage for the uninsured. The intractable problem we have learned from experience with health insurance mandates is this: once you have a mandate, the government has to specify exactly what coverage must be included in insurance for it to qualify. This introduces political considerations into determining these minimum standards, guaranteeing that nothing desired by the special interests will be left out.

In the 1990s, Newt and many other conservatives, such as the Heritage Foundation, proposed a mandate to purchase health insurance as the alternative to Hillarycare. However, the problems outlined above caused Newt to come to the principled conclusion that a mandate to purchase health insurance was unconstitutional, unworkable and counterproductive to lowering the cost of healthcare.

Today, Newt carries the banner in fighting for the repeal of Obamacare and advocates for a “patient power” replacement that will create a free market framework for healthcare, provide affordable, portable, and reliable healthcare coverage, and establish a healthcare safety net focused on those truly in need. This system moves us towards the goal of healthcare for all with no unconstitutional mandate of any kind.

Sponsored and Cosponsored Legislation

This representative has not been identified as sponsoring or cosponsoring significant legislation related to this title.

References

[1] Website: Good Morning America Article: Newt Gingrich on Public Health Option: 'They Will Rig the Game' Author: ABC News Medical Editor Dr. Timothy Johnson Accessed on: 05/18/2011

[2] Website: Fox News Article: Gingrich Supported Romney Health Care Plan in 2006 Newsletter Author: NA - Wall Street Journal Accessed on: 01/24/2012

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