Vander Plaats, Rants square off on health-care

By James Q. Lynch

The Gazette

Two Sioux City Republicans seeking their party's nomination for governor have squared off over the state's proper role in health-care reform.

Bob Vander Plaats' suggestion that Iowa run its own Medicare and Medicaid programs “sounds good on the stump, but in practice it just doesn't work,” Rep. Chris Rants said Wednesday.

Vander Plaats dismissed the attack from his GOP rival who has been in the Iowa House since 1992 as “more of the same from a career politician.”

Rants and Vander Plaats are among a handful of Republicans vying for the nomination to be the party's challenger to Democrat Gov. Chet Culver in 2010.

Vander Plaats wasn't laying out a plan, but speaking of core Republican principles – “less government, lower taxes and higher quality, including the area of health care”  -- when he said the state could run its own health-care programs.

“It's clear to me that President Obama and congressional Democrats are going to push more health care costs onto the states,” Vander Plaats said. “I'm saying, ‘What happens if you move the pendulum the other way? What if you take the federal government out of it and leave the money here?'

““We know how to spend it more wisely than Washington does. Not many Iowans would argue with that reality,” he said.

Rants heard Vander Plaats' comments about a state-run health-care system at GOP events over the weekend “and it sounded like a plan to me.”

“He rolled out an idea that, frankly, I don't think is very well thought out,” Rants said, adding that doubling the size of the state budget doesn't seem consistent with core Republican principles.”

Rants argues operating Medicaid would cost the state $2 billion and $3.3 billion for Medicare. “Iowans can't afford it, not now, not ever.”

He cited data from Kaiser's Statehealthfacts.org, which reported there are 504,944 Iowans on Medicare each getting an average of $6,572 for a total of more than $3.3 billion. On average, Medicaid is a two-for-one match with the state putting $1 billion into the program.

Iowans have long complained Medicare reimbursement to health-care providers is too low, Rants said, “So how would we expect Iowa taxpayers to pay more on top of that?”

His overall approach to health-care, Vander Plaats said, is to “put the focus on the person not on government.” He favors a greater emphasis on preventive care, more insurance coverage pooling, liability reform, allowing Iowans to put more dollars into medical savings accounts and health savings accounts and other innovations.

The exchange between Rants and Vander Plaats comes as differences between their supporters in the Woodbury County Republican Party, their home county in western Iowa, appear to be heating up.

According to the Sioux City Journal, a central committee member was ousted and another barely survived a vote to remove her from the party's leadership. They were said they were targeted after questioning Vander Plaats' comments on using an executive order to block the Iowa Supreme Court decision striking down the state's ban on same-sex marriage.

Other Republicans running for the nomination or exploring candidacies include Iowa Senate Minority Leader Paul McKinley of Chariton; businessman Christian Fong of Cedar Rapids; Rep. Rod Roberts of Carroll and Sen. Jerry Behn of Boone.

Candidates for the June 2010 primary election must file their nomination papers by March.