Elizabeth Edwards Speaks: Health Care and the Economic Downturn

Elizabeth Edwards is back in the news, and once more she is lending her voice to the cause of health care reform. Mrs. Edwards is waging two battles currently: one against incurable cancer and another for universal health care and reform of our current system.

On Wednesday, she participated in a roundtable discussion in North Carolina. It is a state whose electoral votes are up for grabs in the current race for the White House due to both an influx of new residents hailing from the more liberal northeastern area of the country and a highly mobilized African-American population that leans toward the Obama camp.

As Wall Street continues its meltdown and the word "bailout" seems to be at the center of almost every conversation about the economy, Mrs. Edwards draws a link between the ongoing crisis in health care and the economic woes facing the country.

Mike Baker of The Associated Press reports:

Elizabeth Edwards said during a conference call Tuesday that medical bills often lead to foreclosure, a primary factor in the lagging housing market that's led to the demise of several Wall Street firms. Those without health insurance are often less productive, she said, because they miss work after failing to get treatment.

"Reform of our health care system is a very important part of the answers we're going to need to solve our economic woes," she said.

I'll be bringing you more info as soon as details of the roundtable are available.

SOURCE: "Elizabeth Edwards ties health care to economy" 10/01/08
photo courtesy of NCBrianused under its Creative Commons license

The Return of Elizabeth Edwards: Health Care Sytem Immoral

Elizabeth Edwards has returned to the public health care reform discussion for the first time since last August when news of her husband's affair hit the media. She spoke in Philadelphia, PA, on the night of the 16th.

Melissa Dribben of The Philadelphia Equirer reports:

Speaking knowledgeably and with dollops of relaxed good humor, Edwards told the audience of 200 people at the National Constitution Center that the current health-care system is immoral and "fails everyone except the extremely wealthy."

Seated onstage in a plush chair, the 57-year-old wife of former Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards used her experience as a patient with incurable breast cancer to illustrate lapses in the current system. But she was careful to say that the responsibility lies both with individuals, who need to take good preventive care, and insurance companies, which should be concerned with long-term health instead of short-term savings.

As a sufferer of incurable breast cancer, Mrs. Edwards has a voice that commands attention in matters of health care reform. Her direct experience with the system provides a veracity that is seen as lacking on the part of many in politics today. Another factor is that she does not see either of the current candidate's plans for health care reform to be ideal, although she has no problem in stating which one is her preference.

Except for one subtle remark about the "Republican vice presidential candidate's" opposition to stem cell research, Edwards maintained a relatively neutral political stance. Neither presidential candidate is proposing the kind of universal and comprehensive coverage that Americans deserve, she said. But of the two, Edwards said, Democratic Sen. Barack Obama's plan, which would mandate coverage for children, will move the nation more in the right direction.

In addition to the statements above, she once more reiterated her opinions about John McCain's personal health issues and their impact upon his perspective in this matter. Sen. McCain's multiple melanomas have been treated under his military health plan, which provides extensive coverage even though most private insurance plans in the U.S. would deny coverage on these pre-existing conditions.

The debate continues to heat up, and one must wonder if the media eye will pay more attention to Mrs. Edwards' health care activism or the peccadilloes of her husband. John Edwards has stated that he will stay out of the public eye until after November 4 in order to keep from clouding the issues or distracting from the focus of the Democratic Campaign.

SOURCE: "Elizabeth Edwards calls health-care system immoral" 09/17/08
photo courtesy of ariedana used under its Creative Commons license

The $40 Million Push

What do Elizabeth Edwards, ACORN, AFSCME, Americans United for Change, Campaign for America's Future, Center for American Progress Action Fund, Center for Community Change, MoveOn, NEA, National Women's Law Center, Planned Parenthood, SEIU, UFCW, and USAction have in common?

They are all pulling together as a unified force in an attempt to storm the airwaves with a message of reform.

On July 8, Health Care for America Now! launched their $40 million campaign with a press conference for the National Press Club in which they unveiled their campaign plans as well as their first $1.5 million ad buy to support it.

Julie Bosman who writes for The New York Times' blog, The Caucus, brings us the money quote when it comes to the overall thrust of the ads:

Its theme? “You can’t trust the insurance industry to fix the health care mess,” said the spokeswoman, Jacki Schechner. “We’re educating the public about our principles and what we’d like to see from the president and the new Congress.”

For those of you who remember the Harry and Louise commercials that were a driving force behind the failure of the Clinton Administration's attempts at health care reform, this should be redolent of a certain "turnabout is fair play" ethos.

Ms. Bosman's post to The Caucus gives a good overview of the group and its aims. Roger Hickey, Co-Director of the Campaign for America’s Future, a founder of Americans United to Protect Social Security, one who helped to create and build Change America Now and the new Americans Against Escalation in Iraq, shares his perspective as a man on the inside of the efforts in this piece on the Huffington Post.

The battle for reform continues. Please feel free to drop us a comment on the ads if you see them aired in your area.

SOURCE: "New Health Reform Group to Spend $40 Million" 07/03/08
photo courtesy of Simon Davison, used under its Creative Commons license

Elizabeth Edwards backs Clinton on Health Care

Martina Stewart, an Associate Producer at CNN, reports that Elizabeth Edwards has now publicly endorsed the health plan of presidential hopeful Sen. Hillary Clinton. Details appear in Stewart's article on CNN's Political Ticker:

Elizabeth Edwards, wife of former Democratic presidential hopeful John Edwards, is picking sides in the Democratic nomination race – at least with respect to health care. In an interview that aired Wednesday on ABC’s “Good Morning America,” she threw her support behind Sen. Hillary Clinton’s health care plan.

“In order to ensure that we have universal coverage, we need to say everybody has to join,” Edwards told ABC’s Robin Roberts. “So, for that reason, the mandates that Sen. Clinton is talking about, I think are going to be more successful in achieving the goal,” she added.

Both health care plans have the same goals, said Edwards, but “I just have more confidence in Sen. Clinton’s policies than Sen. Obama’s on this particular issue.”

This is not the first time that Edwards, a cancer survivor, has had good things to say about Clinton's approach to health care. Last September she even noted its similarities to the one her husband, John Edwards, espoused during his bid for the Democratic nomination. As noted on this blog, she has also been quite critical of Sen. John McCain's plan, stating that is gives too much leeway for insurance providers to deny coverage based on pre-existing conditions.

This public statement is one that will certainly have an impact on the battle between Clinton and Obama for the Democratic nomination. Even though neither John nor Elizabeth Edwards have made a formal endorsement of either candidate, endorsing Clinton's health care plan carries a lot of weight due to the high profile of the issue in the current race for the Oval Office.

SOURCE: "Elizabeth Edwards backs Clinton's health care plan over Obama's" 04/09/08
photo courtesy of John Edwards 2008, used according to its Creative Commons license

Hard Questions for John McCain from Elizabeth Edwards

Being on opposite sides of the political divide, it is not surprising that presidential hopeful Sen. John McCain and the wife of former hopeful John Edwards disagree on a number of issues.

This has now been thrown into sharp relief by a recent guest posting by Elizabeth Edwards on the ThinkProgress website:

I freely admit that I am confused about the role of overnight funding in repurchase markets in the collapse of Bear Stearns. What I am not confused about is John McCain’s health care proposal. Apparently Douglas Holtz-Eakin, a senior policy advisor to McCain, thinks I do “not understand the comprehensive nature of the senator’s proposal.” The problem, Douglas, is that, despite fuzzy language and feel-good lines in the Senator’s proposal, I do understand exactly how devastating it will be to people who have the health conditions with which the Senator and I are confronted (melanoma for him, breast cancer for me) but do not have the financial resources we have. In very unconfusing language: they are left outside the clinic doors.

She then proceeds to ask a series of very pointed questions about the McCain plan from the perspective of a person with an existing condition. Emphasizing his reputation for being a "straight talker," she calls on him to provide straight to in response to her questions.

It is a sobering post. Especially when her lead in question is:

Under your plan, Senator McCain, would any health insurer be required to sell you or me (or those like us with pre-existing conditions) a health insurance policy?

She goes on to ask incisive questions about the market driven approach, pointing out that cheap insurance is often made available through efforts on the insurer's part to avoid treatment of high cost or chronic diseases such as her own cancer.

We will see what, if any, response is to be had from the McCain camp as time goes by.

SOURCE: "sponds: Why Are People Like Me Left Out Of Your Health Care Proposal, Sen. McCain?" 04/01/08
photo courtesy of Library of Congress via pingnews, used under this Creative Commons license