The Massachusetts Pilot Program

When John Fund interviewed Scott Brown after his win over Martha Coakley in the Massachusetts special election for the seat once occupied by Ted kennedy, he touched upon an apparent contradiction.  Brown campaigned for and won the U.S. Senate seat by promising to be the 41st vote against the health care reform bill currently before congress.  As a Republican state senator he voted in favor of then Governor Romney's universal health care plan for Massachusetts.

Mr. Brown says he designed his campaign to revolve around four issues: taxes, excessive spending, terrorism and health care. But it's clear that voter angst over ObamaCare was the rocket fuel propelling him to victory. "People got where I was," he says. He was often asked to sign his autograph with the number "41" next to it, meaning he was running to be the key vote to block health-care legislation from final passage.

Nonetheless, Mr. Brown is clearly sensitive—and a tad defensive—about his state's own universal health-care system. It now covers about 95% of the population; but it has also led to the nation's highest insurance premiums. It is driving hospitals towards bankruptcy and making it more difficult for people to see a doctor. Mr. Brown voted for the system in 2006 when it was proposed by then-GOP Gov. Mitt Romney. "Of course, it can be made better," Mr. Brown says today. "But it was bipartisan and it fit our local needs. We were being eaten alive by health-care costs." Universal coverage hasn't changed that, however.

All of those things are what we can expect from the Democrats' national health care plan – higher insurance costs, higher health care costs, reduced access, and in the end it won't really cover everybody.  It is obvious though, that Obama has not gotten the message that was delivered by the voters of Massachusetts.  He has repeatedly promised to push ahead with ObamaCare anyway. 

By implementing its universal coverage plan, Massachusetts has done one of the things state governments are supposed to do – provide pilot programs from which the federal government can learn.  Scott Brown knows he won the special election by promising to vote against ObamaCare, but having voted for universal coverage in Massachusetts it's clear he will be willing, as U.S. Senator, to vote for some kind of national health care reform.  That reform should not be modeled on the Massachusetts plan.