Perry condemns mandatory insurance, but TX faces coverage crisis

At campaign stops and in the three debates he's participated in so far, Republican presidential hopeful Gov. Rick Perry has made a sport out of bashing former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney's 2006 state health insurance plan. He's missed no chance to yoke "Romneycare" to "Obamacare," the federal healthcare reform Republicans largely revile. But while Perry condemns both efforts to make carrying health insurance mandatory, his home state of Texas faces a staggering crisis in health coverage: Texas leads the nation in the size of its uninsured population, has the third-lowest percentage of people covered by their employers, and spends less per capita on Medicaid, the joint state-federal insurance program for the disabled and poor children, than all but one other state.