Republican Radicals? You Betcha…

Our friend Ramesh Ponnuru from National Review puts forward an interesting proposition in Time magazine. Republican proposals on health care policy are radical. He elaborates that Democrats are incremental in their approach to buttress a failing status quo with additional governmental support programs.

Ponnuru explains that the GOP is trying to move away from some 60 years of federal policies that show preference to employer-provided health insurance.

He concludes,

Liberal health experts worry that these plans would cause the employer-based system to unravel. But it’s already unraveling. As health costs increase, companies are cutting back on their coverage or dropping it altogether. The Democratic solution to the problem is to find new ways to bolster the employer-based system and fill in its gaps.

The federal government long ago got into the business of insuring two groups that the job-based system excludes: Medicare covers retirees, and Medicaid covers the jobless and indigent. These programs have been expanding. The Democratic plans would expand the federal backstop still more to achieve universal coverage. So both parties would shift responsibility for health care away from business. The main difference is whether government or individuals would get control of the money business now spends on health care.

There is nothing "conservative" about trying to chart a new course; in a word, it is radical. It is also common sense.