Barack Obama has made his first speech on the issue of healthcare, defining the problem as he sees it and deferring specifics until a later date. While keeping to generalities, he made some interesting statements that are likely to raise expectations for his final plan.
Here is most of the speech’s text, with my annotations and commentary:
“On this January morning of two thousand and seven, more than sixty years after President Truman first issued the call for national health insurance, we find ourselves in the midst of an historic moment on health care. From Maine to California, from business to labor, from Democrats to Republicans, the emergence of new and bold proposals from across the spectrum has effectively ended the debate over whether or not we should have universal health care in this country.”
Note: He doesn’t specify which proposals he considers “new and bold,” but presumably he’s referring to various state initiatives, proposals from insurers, and the business/labor coalition proposals – among others.
“Plans that tinker and halfway measures now belong to yesterday. The President’s latest proposal that does little to bring down cost or guarantee coverage falls into this category. There will be many others offered in the coming campaign, and I am working with experts to develop my own plan as we speak, but let’s make one thing clear right here, right now:”
He makes clear that he’s describing the President’s plan in that first sentence. But inquiring minds want to know: is he referring to Hillary Clinton, too?
“In the 2008 campaign, affordable, universal health care for every single American must not be a question of whether, it must be a question of how. We have the ideas, we have the resources, and we must find the will to pass a plan by the end of the next president’s first term.”
That’s a commitment: universal healthcare by 2012. I don’t understand Kevin Drum’s attack from the left. Kevin says “Maybe in a little while he’ll give a major speech in which he really does endorse universal healthcare rather than fiddling around the edges of the debate.” Actually, Obama’s endorsement of universal coverage seems unequivocal to me. The left would be better off focussing their concern on that word “affordable.” The definition of “affordable” is what’s creating division and resistance to the Schwarzenegger plan, and will be critical in the upcoming policy debates on the Federal level.
