Pawlenty touts Medicare proposal during Iowa trip

Republican presidential hopeful Tim Pawlenty told people during a Monday stop in Iowa that the key difference between his Medicare proposal and the proposal introduced by Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wiscosnin, is that his plan will change the way providers are paid.

The former Minnesota governor spoke to a group of about 60 people during a campaign stop at Point of Grace Church in Waukee.He said his plan would include "performance pay."

"We will begin to move providers from getting paid not just for the volume of procedures they crank out, but whether people are actually getting healthier and getting better," Pawlenty told The Des Moines Register.

He also told ABC's "This Morning" that he would support Ryan's proposal to privatize Medicare if his only choices were Ryan's plan or doing nothing.

Pawlenty, who launched his bid for the Republican presidential nomination last week in Des Moines, had stops planned later in the day in Boone and Fort Dodge. He is scheduled to visit Sioux City on Tuesday and Council Bluffs on Wednesday.

Former Louisiana Gov. Buddy Roemer, considered to be another possible GOP presidential hopeful, joined Pawlenty at the Waukee event, laying out a detailed plan to create jobs by overhauling the nation's trade, energy and tax policies. He said America is addicted to Middle Eastern oil, corporations that don't back taxes and special interests that have cost the nation jobs.

"We've stood by and let our best jobs go to China and Mexico," he said. "We are a nation of free trade, not fair trade."

Roemer, who hasn't officially announced his intentions, said he would increase the age for Social Security by one month each year for 24 years and reduce the national budget by 1 percent of the gross domestic product over five years.

He also promised that if he runs and wins, he would hold his inaugural celebration in Iowa, not Washington D.C.

"I'll go back to the heartland, where I started. We'll dance, eat and drink American products," he said.

(Copyright 2011 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)