Standing Apart: Five Repubs Backing Health Reform

The list of high-profile, outside-the-beltway Republicans backing an overhaul of the healthcare system is raising eyebrows.

S President Barack Obama (R) greets California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R-CA) (L) during a press conference announcing fuel efficiency standards in the Rose Garden of the White House May 19, 2009 in Washington, DC.

(Mark Wilson/Getty Images)

• California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.

• New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg (technically an independent, but he's running for reelection on the Republican and Independence Party tickets).

• Bill Frist, the former GOP Senate majority leader and a physician whose family founded Hospital Corporation of America.

• Tommy Thompson, former secretary of Health and Human Services.

• Mark McClellan, former Medicare chief.

The White House freely acknowledges that it nudged most of these men – Frist came out on his own – toward making public statements. But just as freely, they did say what they said.

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The wave of endorsements has already gotten through to one of its most important targets, Sen. Olympia Snowe (R) of Maine. She is the only Republican member of Congress potentially willing to vote for the Senate Finance Committee's version of reform.

"It is important to hear all voices in the party," she said Tuesday, according to the Washington Post. "The more we hear, the more we learn, the better job we can do in the final analysis."

The Senate Finance plan, which is awaiting a cost analysis from the Congressional Budget Office and is the least liberal of the five bills in play, is the one that comes in for the most praise from Republicans.

Mr. Frist told Time magazine last Friday if he were still in the Senate, he "would end up voting for it." He doesn't think it's perfect; it doesn't do enough to bring costs under control, he says. But he likes the requirement that individuals purchase insurance, and the ban on exclusion from coverage for pre-existing conditions.

Mayor Bloomberg does not endorse any particular plan, just the overall concept of reform working its way through Congress. Mr. Thompson mentioned the Senate Finance plan specifically. Governor Schwarzenegger endorsed the goals of reform, but not a specific plan.