Romney: My Health Law Is Different Than ObamaCare Because It’s Shorter

Mitt Romney trotted out that old argument about the Affordable Care Act being too long when trying to explain the differences between Massachusetts health reform and Obama’s law on NBC’s Today Show:

ROMNEY: I understand there are a lot of people who would like me to get up and say it was a terrible, boneheaded idea, it was a terrible mistake and we are all entitled to mistakes. The only problem is it wouldn’t be honest. we solved a serious need that existed in our state.

Q: President Obama can’t wrap his arms around you tightly enough. He said RomneyCare inspired ObamaCare.

ROMNEY: If I become president, I will repeal ObamaCare. My bill was 70 pages. His is over 2,000. He’s doing a lot of stuff that’s devastating to the health care system in this country. He’s wrong.

Watch it:

Despite the disparity in length, the two laws are very similar in how they try to expand access to health care and some of those extra pages in the ACA are devoted to controlling health care spending — something Romney didn’t include in his 2006 law:

Major Provisions	Affordable Care Act	Mass. Health Law
Individual Mandate	Yes	Yes
Employer Responsibility	Yes — but not required to provide coverage	Yes — required to provide coverage
Affordability Credits	Yes	Yes
Standard Benefit Package	Yes — w/o abortion services	Yes — w/ abortion services
Establishes Exchanges	Yes	Yes
Prohibits Insurance Company From Canceling Coverage	Yes	Yes
Bans Denying Medical Coverage For Pre-existing Conditions	Yes	Yes
Medicaid Expansion	Yes	Yes
Medicare Cuts	Yes	No Authority