Getting lost in all the hockey mom horseshit is a real issue that affects all Americans: healthcare reform.
If the Republicans are allowed to stay in the White House, we will get four more years with no healthcare reform.
Whenever I've heard Obama stress this issue on the stump, he's always referencing the 47 million people without insurance. That's fine, but that's not enough. He needs to speak to the people who are underinsured and who are filing bankruptcy because they can't pay their medical bills. He needs to talk about insurance companies making life and death decisions. (A diarist here calls it "death by spreadsheet.")
This is an issue that reaches ALL Americans. It has not been adequately addressed in the everyday campaign communications. It needs more advertising.
McCain's health care plan is a joke:
The crux of McCain's healthcare plan is to end a tax break for employers who provide health insurance premiums now utilized by many workers. That would be replaced with a tax credit worth as much as $5,000 per family for the purchase of health insurance. McCain would also promote cost controls and competition among insurance companies. He has also joined with Democrats to support legislation that would allow the purchase of prescription drugs from Canada.
But McCain's plan has no guarantee that people could get insurance, and no requirement for people to do so. McCain believes his plan would make insurance more affordable, which would bring it within reach of many more families. But many critics say that failing to require insurance companies to provide coverage could leave millions of people without affordable medical care.
http://www.boston.com/...
Where can anyone in the U.S. get health insurance coverage for $5,000 per year? Where are people with pre-existing conditions supposed to go?
I know Obama has been criticized because his plan is not single payer universal coverage. He's been called "an incrementalist."
I'll take his plan over McCain's plan any day. A McCain presidency means four more years of no reform or making it worse.
When my husband retires in two years, I and my teenage son will have no insurance. Where are we supposed to go with $5,000?