Fresh from campaigning for Sen. John McCain’s health care proposal, self-appointed conservative health care spokesperson Rep. Michael Burgess (R-TX) is making straw-man arguments against progressive health care proposals.

After reading Burgess’ editorial in today’s Washington Times, for instance, one would falsely conclude that comprehensive reform efforts would force patients into government-run programs that ration care and limit coverage:

The idea of government-run health care sounds appealing to many Americans. Really what that means is limiting freedom – the freedom to choose a doctor, to take your health care with you when you switch jobs, to make personal medical decisions…As a Republican and a physician, it is critical for us to offer a clear and credible alternative to a one-size-fits-all system that puts bureaucrats in charge of health care decision-making.

Burgess has either ignored most comprehensive health reform legislation or misunderstood it, because nothing could be further from the truth. Consider Sen. Max Baucus’s (D-MT) proposal: the patient has the choice of staying with employer-based coverage or buying comprehensive insurance from a new Health Insurance Exchange.

The Exchange offers more options, not less. Individuals and small businesses will be able to “compare private coverage options and a public plan and to purchase the policy that would work best for them.” Plans purchased through the Exchange would be portable, allowing Americans to, as Burgess requires, “take your health care with you when you switch jobs.”

In the final days of the election, the McCain campaign has significantly altered its health care rhetoric. Initially arguing that McCain’s health care plan would allow voters to abandon their employer-based insurance plans for cheaper options on the individual market, the campaign is now emphasizing the importance of group coverage.

Senior McCain adviser and implosion watch subject Douglas-Holtz Eakin created a firestorm after effectively conceding the inferiority of individual health care plans on Tuesday, and Rep. Michael Burgess (R-TX) is all too eager to follow his lead.

While stumping for McCain’s health care plan, the three-term congressman attempted to combat critics who charge that McCain’s plan “basically blows up the current system“:

Burgess agreed that many workers wouldn’t initially drop employer-sponsored coverage. He said the cost of individual plans would drop if insurers were allowed to offer plans across state lines, as Mr. McCain favors.

“The price for the policy goes down if you increase the size of your pool,” he said.

Progressives have long argued that larger risk pools effectively spread both the risk and cost of health insurance across a wide spectrum of the population, allowing healthier people to subsidize the sick. McCain plan flips this principle on its head, breaking up employer-risk pools and shuttling everyone into an individual plan.

By Burgess’ own definition, if you adopt McCain’s health plan and decrease “the size of your pool,” “the price for the policy” goes up.

Yesterday, Rep. Michael Burgess (R-TX), the architect of Sen. John McCain’s (R-AZ) health care plan, falsely claimed that McCain’s health reforms would come closer to insuring every American “than will Senator Obama’s.”

Watch It:

As he has in the past, Burgess completely misrepresented the intent of McCain’s plan. In fact McCain’s proposal is predicated on the idea that everyone is getting too much health care. Rather than expanding access and making health insurance more affordable, McCain believes that families should have to pay more money out of pocket in order to reduce the amount of care delivered.

CLAIM: McCain’s plan “comes a lot closer to the ideal goal of offering every American the opportunity for insurance.”

FACT: McCain’s plan would not come close to insuring the 47 million Americans without health care.

- By equalizing the tax treatment of employer and individual plans, McCain would entice healthy workers to buy cheaper but less substantive insurance in the individual market place. The exodus of healthier workers from employer-pools would increase the average health care costs for sicker employees who can’t find coverage in the individual market, forcing them to opt out entirely.

- As the Center for American Progress Action Fund pointed out, the entire employer health insurance system could unravel, “ending this as an option for Americans who prefer it.”

CLAIM: Under McCain’s plan the uninsured would be able to purchase insurance because “the employer can provide…additional compensation to in a employee over and above the $5,000 tax credit that that employee could use to purchase insurance for themselves or family.”

FACT: Average premiums are higher than McCain’s credit of $2,000 for an individual and $5,000 for a family.

- According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, “the average annual premium costs for a family with employer-sponsored insurance was $12,106 in 2007, and it was $4,479 for a single person.”

- Annual premiums for nongroup coverage vary widely, currently ranging from $1,163 to $5,090 for singles, and $2,325 to $9,201 for family coverage.

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Yesterday, speaking at the Heritage Foundation, Rep. Michael Burgess (R-TX), who helped craft Sen. John McCain’s (R-AZ) health care plan, suggested that McCain’s reforms would not push Americans to abandon their current insurance plans. TechRepublican wrote about the event:

He [Burgess] noted that when discussing health care it’s important to leave people with the notion that they don’t have to change. If you like your current health care plan, you can keep it. He noted that 62% of people in his home district are satisfied with their existing care. Bottom line: be careful about rocking the health care boat.

McCain’s proposal wouldn’t just rock “the health care boat,” it would tip it over. As the Wonk Room has previously reported, McCain’s plan to replace the current tax breaks for employer-sponsored health insurance with a one-size-fits-all tax credit places the 158 million Americans who receive their health care through their jobs in danger of losing coverage.

By equalizing the tax treatment of employer and individual plans, McCain would entice healthy workers to buy cheaper but less substantive insurance in the individual market place. The exodus of healthier workers from employer-pools would increase the average health care costs for sicker employees who can’t find coverage in the individual market, forcing them to opt out entirely.

As the Center for American Progress Action Fund pointed out, the entire employer health insurance system could unravel, “ending this as an option for Americans who prefer it.” According to a 2007 Gallup survey, that’s a lot of people. Despite rising health care costs, 70 percent of Americans still rate their health care coverage as either “excellent” or “good.”

McCain’s plan would increase their costs and provide less coverage.