Politics/elections

Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney responded Friday to a recent Wall Street Journal editorial blasting the Massachusetts healthcare law that passed when he was that state's governor. 

The law is a political liability for Romney because it largely inspired Democrats' healthcare reform law that passed last year.

"I was not surprised to read yet another editorial in the Journal yesterday criticizing the healthcare reforms we enacted in Massachusetts," Romney wrote in a response to the editorial. "I was, however, not expecting the distortions of what we accomplished."

Romney goes on to make several points:

ANN ARBOR, Mich. — Romney says he won't apologize for the law he signed: "It wouldn't be honest."

Democrats are painting the former Massachusetts governor as a political chameleon willing to shift positions to build support.

Democrats went on the attack against former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney (R) ahead of his highly anticipated healthcare speech Thursday in Michigan. 

The Democratic National Committee (DNC) sought to portray Romney as a flip-flopper on healthcare by crafting some mock slides for the PowerPoint presentation Romney is expected to deliver Thursday afternoon at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor.

The Wall Street Journal's editorial board excoriates Mitt Romney as "Obama's running mate"

In its news pages, the Journal details Romney's strategy going forward as he seeks to reduce the political liability of Massachusetts healthcare reform.

Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Rand Paul (R-Ky.) went head-to-head over whether healthcare should be a right during a Senate HELP hearing, reports Kaiser Health News.

The Associated Press explains the significance of the American Medical Group Association balking at ACO regulations.

He is expected to address one of his own political liabilities: the Massachusetts healthcare reform he signed into law.

Eli Lilly was roiled with multimillion-dollar scandals when possible presidential contender Mitch Daniels was an executive there, the Center for Public Integrity reminds readers.

First lady Michelle Obama will host a "Let's Move!" event with military families on the South Lawn of the White House. 

Florida overhauls Medicaid, writes The Associated Press.

Kaiser Health News explains the ins and outs of the Independent Payment Advisory Board.

House Republicans hammered the White House on Tuesday for gaps in its publicly released visitors logs. The issue has become a touchstone for many House Republicans frustrated by a lack of information about the administration's meetings with various industry groups in the run-up to healthcare reform.

Republicans were rankled by the agreements that the administration and Senate Democrats struck with several healthcare groups — particularly a deal with the pharmaceutical industry — to help ward off opposition to the healthcare bill. Rep. Michael Burgess (R-Texas) has requested records specific to a May 2009 agreement in which a group of industries agreed to trim $2 trillion per year in healthcare spending. The administration has said his requests are overly broad or that no relevant records exist.

"Two trillion dollars and no one even jotted down a note on the back of an envelope?" Burgess said Tuesday during a hearing of the Energy and Commerce Oversight subcommittee.

House Republicans have stood together behind the Ryan budget proposal after a two-week recess highlighted by attacks on the plan.

The liberal group EMILY's List got an early start Wednesday on its efforts to promote candidates for Congress.

The group, which promotes Democratic women who support abortion rights, named four candidates on its early "On the List" roster, flagging the candidates for EMILY's List members.

The group named Lois Frankel (Fla.), Ann Kirkpatrick (Ariz.), Ann McLane Kuster (N.H.) and Christie Vilsack (Iowa) as the first four candidates to the new, early list. The foursome includes some of the most highly touted Democratic recruits this cycle, and seen as virtual locks to secure support from EMILY's List through the 2012 cycle.

"Women across the country are fired up over the extreme anti-woman agenda moving forward in the House and we are seeing women jump into races earlier than ever this year," said the group's president, Stephanie Schriock. "EMILY’s List wants to help them now. ‘On the List’ provides us with a way to get in faster and introduce our members to these great candidates right away."

Kirkpatrick is a former one-term congresswoman who lost in 2010 to Rep. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.) and is looking to reclaim her seat. Christie Vilsack, the former first lady of Iowa and the wife of Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, is likely to challenge Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) in a redrawn district next fall.

Liberals were heartbroken when Kuster fell short in her effort against Rep. Charlie Bass (R-N.H.), but will try again in 2012. Frankel, meanwhile, is hoping to unseat freshman GOP firebrand Rep. Allen West next fall.

The resignation of Sen. John Ensign (R-Nev.) opens up the top Republican spot on the Senate Finance Health subcommittee, but the competition for the perch is drawing little attention.

The subpanel has largely ceased to function over the past couple of years. It last held public hearings in March 2009, and did not vote on the healthcare law; the equivalent subpanel on the House Energy and Commerce Committee, by contrast, has already held at least four hearings this year alone.

Throughout the healthcare reform debate and since then, Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) has kept tight control over the process. The reform law debate for public consumption took place in the full committee, while Baucus ironed out the details behind the scenes with a handful of senators that did not even include the Health subpanel's chairman, Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.).