After initially claiming that they “will not campaign for full health care repeal”, Republicans have fully embraced a ‘repeal and replace’ strategy — even if the ‘replacers’ they’re proposing are just watered-down policies of provisions that are already part of the current law. Ron Johnson, who is challenging Sen. Russ Feingold in Wisconsin has pledged to “vote to repeal the Health Care Bill and replace it with market-based solutions that will include: portability, malpractice reform, mandate reduction, insurance purchase across state lines, lower costs, and a safety net for those with pre-existing conditions.”

After a debate with Feingold on Friday, however, Johnson had second thoughts about this strategy. He first embraced repeal and replace, but then backed away from immediate repeal, telling reporters that he supports provisions that would prohibit insurers from denying coverage to people with pre-existing conditions:

REPORTER: Is there anything in the bill that you like that needs to stay?

JOHNSON: Well certainly provisions that we can, again, there that we can repeal the whole thing and replace it with modest bills. Incremental, a modular type of system. What I’ve been talking about is not repeal and then replace. I would suggest we replace and then repeal. Let’s face it. We’re not going to repeal it in the first two years. So what I suggest is if the Republicans take over one of the houses of Congress, they start writing the replacement bill from day 1 so that we can show the American people this is what we intend to do and then we can show exactly how we’re going to solve the health care system in this country.

REPORTER: So health care for people with pre-existing conditions?

JOHNSON: My daughter’s heart is backwards. I think every voter in Wisconsin can be sure that I protect people with pre-existing conditions — that they’ll be able to maintain coverage.

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Under the GOP’s replacement Pledge in the House, however, individuals with pre-existing conditions who are currently uninsured could have a hard time finding affordable insurance since issuers would still be able to deny them coverage.

Johnson’s attempt to temper expectations for what Republican will be able to achieve if they do win back the House after the mid-term elections was also recently echoed by Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) who told PBS’ The News Hour: “Even if we controlled the House, unless we controlled the Senate and got 60 votes, we wouldn’t be able to pass any corresponding legislation in the Senate. So I think, we need to keep expectations, again, fairly modest as far as what we can do over the next two years.”

Throughout the health reform debate, Republicans falsely claimed that the Affordable Care Act’s estimated $500 billion in cuts to Medicare undermines senior’s benefits and now several GOP-affiliated groups are reiterating these charges in attack ads for the midterm campaign. During a recent debate with Sen. Michael Bennet (D-CO) — where Karl Rove’s American Crossroads and the National Republican Senatorial Committee have run Medicare attack ads — Republican challenger Ken Buck distanced himself from the charge and conceded that the attacks were false:

BUCK: Republicans did it to you and your colleagues during the health care debate when they said, oh my goodness, the Democrats are going to take $500 billion away from Medicare. That was absolutely despicable. It was wrong for the Republicans to do it then and it’s wrong of you to do it now.”

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“I hope you’ll call your friends who are pushing an ad accusing me of cutting $500 billion out of Medicare,” Bennet told Buck. “That $500 billion savings in Medicare is the very heart of the health care reform bill.”

Indeed, the health law does not cut the current Medicare budget, but slows growth in the program by removing approximately $500 billion from future spending over the next 10 years. The cuts help stabilize the program by eliminating overpayments and slowly phasing in payment adjustments that encourage providers to deliver quality care more efficiently. As a result the law extends the life of the Medicare trust fund by 12 years and allows seniors to retain all of their guaranteed Medicare benefits.

The Hill’s Michael O’Brien is reporting that West Virginia Governor Joe Manchin (D-WV) — “who is in a tough fight for a Senate seat” and has previously said that he would repeal parts of the Affordable Care Act — is now insisting that he’d vote for repealing the entire law “if it can’t be fixed”:

DOOCY: I know a while back you did support the president’s reform of the health care system in the United States. You were behind it. Now, however…

MANCHIN: See, no I wasn’t. Let’s be accurate on that.

DOOCY: Well you, I’ll give you a chance. You were supportive of it. Now, you’re calling for repeal of part of it.

MANCHIN: I still and have always been in support of health reform. If anybody believes that a child should be left off of their parents and also pre-existing conditions and small businesses and all those things should go uninsured, something is wrong in America. Now with that, the president’s plan — ‘Obamacare,’ as it’s been called — is far too reaching. It’s overreaching. It needs to have a lot of it repealed. But you can fix that. If you can’t fix that, repeal the whole thing.

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In September, after I posted a video showing Manchin saying he would have voted for the Affordable Care Act if he had been in Congress, his campaign admitted that “he said at the time that he would vote to do that.” They said that Manchin opposed only “several sections” of the law “including any provisions that allow for the funding of abortions and the provisions that are cumbersome to small businesses.” “He also believes people’s personal responsibility and healthcare choices should not be taken away by overreaching regulations,” the campaign said.

During a March 17 panel on health care at the National Governors Association, however, Manchin said “I’d be for it” when asked if he would support the health bill. “I think you’ve got to move the ball,” he said. “I have never, since I’ve been in the legislative process and since I’ve been governor, I’ve never gotten a perfect bill. I’ve never gotten a bill exactly the way I’ve wanted it….Let’s try, let’s try to make this. Bring us all in. Let’s make it work.”