Certain folks note that Howard Dean said on Olbermann’s program last night, “This is basically the Mitt Romney bill in Massachusetts, except it doesn’t insure as many people.” Note that this is Dean criticizing the bill.

There was quite a bit of back-and-forth yesterday on whether this revised, revised, revised version of health care is now essentially the plan signed into law by Romney. Phil Klein of the American Spectator contends:

What remains is a Medicaid expansion, a mandate forcing individuals to purchase insurance or pay a tax, and sliding scale subsidies for individuals to purchase government-designed insurance policies on new government-run exchanges — and those elements formed the core of Romneycare.

The Romney camp argued that there are some key differences – the Massachusetts version

did not raise taxes. Second, its focus was on strengthening the private insurance market, and I don’t think anyone believes that Democrats have given up on their dream of a public option. And finally, Governor Romney believes states should be free to come up with their own approach instead of having Washington create a “one-size-fits-all” solution for the entire country.

I note that folks who prefer another option in 2012 are making sure this Dean quote gets around; my sense is that it’s really, really, really early for Republicans to begin rehashing the strengths and flaws of Mitt Romney’s decisions in Massachusetts.