During last night’s senatorial debate in New Hampshire, Sen. John Sununu (R-NH) falsely suggested that his Making Health Care More Affordable Act of 2008 (S.3072) “wouldn’t discriminate against people with preexisting conditions”:

And I wouldn’t discriminate against people with preexisting conditions, no one should be for that. In fact, we have a health care affordability act at the federal level that prevents exactly that kind of discrimination.

Watch it:

Given the toughness of his campaign, Sununu may not have had time to read his own bill, for it legitimizes the very same kind of discrimination he condemns.

The Making Health Care More Affordable Act of 2008 creates Association Health Care Plans that are exempt from state insurance regulations and consumer protections. Like the McCain plan, the Sununu proposal allows insurance companies “to be licensed in the state of their choice and sell policies to people in other states without adhering to the standards that would otherwise apply to them in each state.”

By relocating to the states with the least regulation, insurance companies could cherry-pick the most profitable risk pool (young and healthy workers), leaving older and sicker people behind. State-regulated health care plans would be left with a disproportionate number of older and sicker employees who are more expensive to cover. As a result, if enacted, this bill will result in higher premiums for four out of five small employers, the Congressional Budget Office estimates.

Small business groups, like the National Small Business Association, oppose Sununu’s bill:

AHP legislation would likely increase premiums for small employers and their workers, and make it much harder, if not impossible, for small business owners with older sicker workers to get access to affordable health coverage.

Sununu allows insurers to circumvent existing consumer protections, without establishing “any new national standards with which the plans must comply.” Thus, not only does his plan not prevent companies from discriminating against people with preexisting conditions, it practically encourages them to deny coverage to all but the healthiest Americans.

Yesterday, during a roundtable discussion at the Council on Foreign Relations, Austan Goolsbee, Senior Economic Adviser to the Obama campaign asked McCain spokesperson Douglas Holtz-Eakin if McCain’s plan to give every American a refundable tax credit to purchase health insurance was “socialism”:

What about the health care credit which is not tied to work, and is refundable, and goes to all the very people? Is that socialism? Are you a Muslim?

Watch it:

All kidding aside, Goolsbee has a point. For while McCain has regularly attacked Obama’s model of comprehensive health care reform as government-run or socialistic, McCain’s tax credits and Guaranteed Access Plan to cover uninsurables allows the government to redistribute the wealth to those who chose to purchase health coverage or the sickest Americans who can’t afford or find plans in the unregulated individual market. (The latter group would need about $100 billion.)

In fact, just yesterday, during an interview in Orlando, Florida, McCain explained that the government would fund, regulate and approve plans in the G.A.P. initiative:

To start with we will give every family in America a $5,000 refundable tax credit so they can go any place in America and get the health insurance they need. Second, if Carolyn is not able to qualify for any health insurance policy, we will establish government approved plans to give them the health insurance they need.

More importantly, Goosbee’s exchange with Holtz-Eakin underscores the government’s role in helping Americans find affordable health insurance coverage. A pragmatic approach to health care reform would expand the group health market and improve public programs, thus giving Americans the choice of staying in employer coverage or joining a private or public plan.

In the final weeks and months of this campaign, the McCain campaign has adopted a patchwork-like approach to selling its ever-evolving health care proposal.

In the video compilation below, McCain admits that his health care plan would increase taxes on some Americans. Campaign advisers Tucker Bounds, Nancy Pfotenhauer and even running mate Sarah Palin, disagree:

Indeed, McCain’s health insurance plan gives you $5,000 (the size of McCain’s tax credit) but takes away $12,000 (the average cost of a plan in the employer market). By equalizing the tax treatment of employer and individual plans and enticing healthy workers to buy cheaper but less substantive insurance in the individual market place, McCain’s tax reform would increase costs for sicker workers and may force some workers to opt out entirely.

As James Kvaal explains, a middle-class family paying 25 percent in income taxes and 5 percent in state taxes would experience an immediate tax increase under McCain’s plan if they paid more than $16,700 in health care premiums. Moreover, since McCain’s credits diminish in proportion to growing health care premiums, by 2014, a middle-class family (who is in the 25 percent tax bracket and pays average premiums) would pay $300 more in taxes.

But the McCain campaign is talking out of both sides of its mouth, misrepresenting its plan and consistantly contradicting the candidate.