GOP Govs Discuss Health Care at Retreat
October 20, 2007
By SHANNON McCAFFREY
GREENSBORO, Ga., Oct. 21, 2007 (AP Online delivered by Newstex) -- Republicans have not been known as the party of health care, but to make headway in the next election they need to embrace what is fast emerging as the top domestic issue for many Americans. That was a key message at a Republican governor's retreat Sunday in eastern Georgia.
On the agenda at the Republican Governors Association retreat at Lake Oconee were initiatives to drive down health care costs through such plans as health savings accounts, the portability of health records and other free-market proposals designed to boost competition.
Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, former Georgia Gov. Zell Miller and Karl Rove, a former top adviser to President Bush, spoke.
Rove's speech was closed to the media, but he said afterward that Republicans must pay attention to health care if they want to win.
"Because health care and education are on the minds of a lot of swing voters," Rove told The Associated Press.
In a recent opinion piece for The Wall Street Journal, Rove wrote that GOP needed "a bold plan" on health care aimed at putting the patient in charge.
Some GOP members fretted over changes to the health care system that Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton might make should she win, calling it "Hillary care." Clinton has proposed providing universal health coverage.
"When Americans have no ideas and Democrats have bad ideas, Americans will choose bad ideas because Americans will almost always choose something rather than nothing," said Bill McInturff, a Republican pollster.
Health care is not an issue that "gets the blood pumping" in the Republican base, he said, but the issue has moved beyond the Democratic base and Republicans must offer their own solution to compete.
For the governors, the policy retreat was aimed at creating a new face for the GOP, which has been struggling recently on the national stage.
The group's executive director, Nick Ayers, said that in the last election cycle Republicans were, by and large, focused on attacking their opponents rather than putting forth real ideas. The result was that the party lost control of Congress, he said.
"This is the beginning of the RGA pushing a theme that really good policy equals good politics," Ayers said.
Ayers said health care is probably the Republicans' weakest issue but added that innovation in the states is arising under the leadership of GOP governors.
It all points to a significant disconnect between Republicans in Washington and in the states, Ayers said.
"Republican governors are popular, but most people are basing their assumptions about the party on what's going in Washington," he said.
Dozens of association contributors from the health care and pharmaceutical industry showed up for a dinner Sunday night, where they mingled with top state officials over a fried chicken.
Rep. Bobby Jindal, who was elected Saturday as Louisiana's governor, will become the 23rd member of the Republican Governors Association. Staff from 17 states attended the retreat.
___
Republican Governors Association: http://www.rga.org
Newstex ID: AP-0001-20385367
