Dan Balz of The Washington Post and [link|http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2007/09/18/in_ways_clinton_healthcare_plan_resembles_romneys_mass_solution/|others] noted that Clinton's plan is in fact remarkably similar to Romney's own much-lauded health care scheme that he proposed for his own state, and which was subsequently enacted into law. Balz notes:There are differences in some details of the two plans -- the subsidies available for purchasing health care, the size of the tax on big companies that don't offer insurance, the scope of the basic benefits package, the tax credits offered to small businesses to provide insurance. But as Jonathan Gruber, an economist at MIT, told me today, the two plans are "very, very similar."
Gruber advised Romney as governor in the development of the Massachusetts plan and now is a member of a board overseeing its implementation. He said Clinton, Barack Obama and John Edwards consulted him as they were preparing their proposals this year.
One portion of Clinton's plan provides doctors and insurance companies with incentives to use "privacy -protected information technology." The point is to make health care more efficient and affordable. This subject has been an ongoing legislative issue in Congress for the past few years. Clinton has even worked with her husband's nemesis Newt Gingrich on this.
I really think you're making too much of that sound bite, just as you did about her comment on oil company taxes. It's hard for me to read her [link|http://www.hillaryclinton.com/feature/healthcareplan/americanhealthchoicesplan.pdf|summary of her plan] (16 page .pdf) and reach the conclusions you have based on some sentence fragments.
People can and will argue about the specifics of her plan, as well they should, but arguing with a caricature of the plan isn't very enlightening, IMHO.
Cheers,
Scott.