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Last week I spoke with a number of New Hampshire families about their struggle to make ends meet in the face of soaring health care costs, lower wages and higher gas prices. They are suffering economically because they can’t afford to cover the cost of their health insurance premiums that have more than doubled under George Bush. Business owners and workers all across our country know what too many politicians still won’t admit: We can’t fix our economy without fixing our health care system. All across our country, jobs have moved overseas, where the cost of health care isn’t nearly...

Yesterday's batch of data from the Census Bureau is being handled as usual by our gloomy colleagues in the press: more Americans living below the poverty line, more Americans without health insurance.... But the total number of people with insurance also rose by one million to 243.3 million. Or to put it yet another way, while there are three million more people uninsured in 2003 than in 1996, the percentage of uninsured Americans was exactly the same at 15.6%.... John Kerry's health proposals single out... "millions of uninsured children who are eligible for health care ... but are not enrolled."...

John Kerry wants your money and your life. He has proposed a bold new health plan with a 10-year cost in excess of $1 trillion, to be paid in part by rescinding President Bush's tax cuts for the highest-income taxpayers.Mr. Kerry is seeking to completely transform the health-care system. The changes are far more radical than even he has let on. If he is successful, millions of middle-income families will enroll in Medicaid, the federal-state health program for the poor. Millions more will get their insurance through a system of managed competition, similar to what Hillary Clinton proposed more than...

WHEN NEWS broke in the New Hampshire Sunday News that John Kerry made up the story of Mary Ann Knowles having to work through her chemotherapy for fear of losing her health insurance, deja vu bells went off. Knowles, the New Hampshire resident and campaign volunteer he cited in his Democratic National Convention acceptance speech and used as justification for his health care plan, didn’t work through chemo because of an insurance problem. She kept working because her salary would have been reduced if she had gone on disability — a weighty prospect, to be sure. But, her husband told...

AMERICANS spend more on health care than the people of any other nation on earth, and it’s all George Bush’s fault, according to John Kerry. The senator came to Derry yesterday to tell residents there how bad they have it in George Bush’s America, where health care costs are rising so quickly. But are Americans really so bad off when it comes to health care? In a news release yesterday, the Kerry campaign complained, “Americans pay more per capita for health care than any other country. American spends $4,887 per capita on health expenditures compared to $3,160 in Switzerland, $2,792...

Affordable Health Care for Every American Dear Friend, Something very special is happening out here. Yesterday we stopped in Milwaukee and Beloit, Wi., and Davenport and Dubuque, Ia. So much hope has been pinned on this campaign -- we can feel that in the incredible size of the crowds and in the energy and excitement at each campaign stop. Thousands are even lining the sides of the road, waiting hours just to watch our caravan drive by. Nothing like this has ever happened during a presidential campaign as early as August. We have come to listen -- but also to...

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted on Fri, Jul. 16, 2004 COMMENTARY Kerry has a credible health plan PAUL KRUGMAN Will actual policy issues play any role in this election? Not if the White House can help it. But if some policy substance does get heard over conveniently timed terror alerts, voters will realize that they face some stark choices. Here's one: tax cuts for the very well-off vs. health insurance. John Kerry has proposed an ambitious health care plan that would extend coverage to tens of millions of uninsured Americans, while reducing premiums for the insured. To pay for that plan, Kerry wants...

Rhetoric WOMAN: “How many African-American adults have no healthcare insurance?”MAN:  “Too many.”WOMAN:  “One in five. And a million and a half African-American children also have no healthcare coverage.”MAN:  “That’s got to change.” WOMAN:  “Learn about John Kerry’s plan to expand access to health care to nearly all Americans, especially our children.” MAN: “Now you’re talking to me.”WOMAN:  “Get to know John Kerry. He has a lot to do with you. Get to know his plan for the community and the country.” KERRY: “I’m John Kerry and I approve this message.”MAN:  Paid for by John Kerry for President, Inc. The...

John Kerry has been touting his health care plan for America in TV commercials airing in battleground states across the nation. In these ads, Kerry promises to give every single American health insurance. But he doesn’t mention the price tag. One Clinton administration official, now an economist at Emory University says that “KerryCare” will cost the American taxpayers an astounding $895 billion over the next decade. And even at that cost the U.S could not guarantee that every citizen would get health insurance. In his recent TV ad John Kerry says 43 million Americans currently don't have health insurance. He...

Ken Thorpe, a former Clinton administration official who is now a professor at Emory University, initially estimated, at the request of the Kerry campaign, that Kerry's proposal would cost $895 billion. Republicans immediately lambasted it for being fiscally irresponsible and ran political ads saying Kerry would need to raise taxes to pay for his healthcare agenda. Last month, Thorpe revised his estimate. Based upon new information the campaign had supplied, Thorpe lowered the price tag from $895B to $653B. John Goodman, president of the National Center for Policy Analysis (NCPA), a conservative policy institute, called it unsurprising that the price...

Plus ça change.SENATOR JOHN KERRY hasn't done much to distinguish himself on health care policy. A look at his voting record shows him to be hesitant on medical savings accounts, although not on tort lawyers' trashing HMOs, concerned about the long-term sustainability of Medicare, yet delighted to expand the entitlement--a pretty typical Democrat, but nothing more than that. In his twenty years in Congress, Senator Kerry has never made health care a priority, passing not a single bill in this area. Candidate Kerry, on the other hand, is just wild about health care and has made it the major domestic...

Kerry Blasts Veterans Health Care Cuts MIKE GLOVER Associated Press LITTLE ROCK, Ark. - Democrat John Kerry used a focus on veterans' health as a vehicle to tout his war-hero record, while prominent backers trotted out to disparage President Bush for a far less heroic history. Kerry was wrapping up a four-day swing focusing on health care issues by talking about veterans issues, arguing that Bush has cut funding for Veterans Administration health programs and that's left hundreds of thousands of veterans without care. "The strength of this country comes from people like this who were willing to serve," said...

"John Kerry has a history of talking up health care in election years, then dropping the issue once the votes are in. Kerry's rhetoric on health care is at odds with his blank record on the issue. He opposed reforms that would make health care more affordable for ordinary Americans and opposed a prescription drug benefit for seniors." - Steve Schmidt, Bush-Cheney '04 Spokesman Kerry Talks Up Health Care In Election Years During Tough Re-Election Campaign In June 1996, Kerry Falsely Claimed He Had Introduced Legislation On Children's Health Coverage. "' I introduced yesterday in the United States Senate...

WASHINGTON, DC— U.S. Rep. John Boozman (R-AR), a member of the Veterans Affairs Health Subcommittee, issued the following statement regarding John Kerry’s visit to Arkansas: "Arkansans should judge John Kerry on his health care record, not his rhetoric. The reality is that Kerry tried to block the President's legislation that is guaranteeing affordable prescription drugs for all 453,000 Medicare beneficiaries in Arkansas. Kerry has also opposed the President's actions to limit the frivolous lawsuits driving up health care costs. "John Kerry has a history of talking up health care reform when running for office, but his attention span only lasts...

John Kerry, the apparent Democratic presidential nominee, flew to Arkansas on Wednesday, seeking to connect with Arkansas voters as he attempts to win the White House. The Massachusetts senator renewed contact with a couple of war buddies from Arkansas and invoked the names of Arkansas’ best-known mascot and some of its most storied politicians. Speaking to about 700 supporters outdoors under a rainthreatening sky at the airport in Little Rock, Kerry at one point did an impersonation of former President Clinton. "Bill Clinton said to me, ‘You gotta watch those Razorbacks,’’’ Kerry said in Clintonesque tones. "I heeded it," the...

Kerry to Discuss Veterans Health Care in Little Rock, AR Little Rock, AR – On Thursday, May 13, 2004, Democratic Presidential candidate John Kerry will talk about his plan to make health care more affordable for America's Veterans during a stop in Little Rock, AR.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (Reuters) - Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry (news - web sites) warned on Tuesday that health-care costs were crippling small businesses and criticized President Bush (news - web sites) for taking campaign money from companies picked to administer new prescription drug cards for seniors. Despite the uproar over the abuse of Iraqi prisoners, Kerry stayed focused on delivering his week-long message: that the nation's health system is "badly broken" and that Bush stood by as the cost of care and drugs soared. Kerry said health insurance premiums for small businesses had risen 47 percent in just three years,...

<p>John Kerry will spend the week talking about health care while his campaign talks tough on Iraq.</p> <p>WASHINGTON (CNN) -- John Kerry takes the high road this week with a series of speeches and town hall meetings on rising health care costs, starting today in Pennsylvania. His campaign, meanwhile, is going for the jugular on Iraq.</p>

EDINBORO, Pa. (AP) -- Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry said Monday his health care proposal to reduce soaring premiums and cut fraud and waste is the remedy for a system "badly broken" under President Bush. Accusing Bush of ignoring a steady rise in health care costs, Kerry began a weeklong trek to battleground states where he contends families are struggling to pay their medical bills. "Our health care system is badly broken," Kerry said in remarks prepared for delivery at Pennsylvania's Edinboro University. "Today, regular checkups are emptying family checkbooks. Waiting for a doctor's bill is causing as much anxiety...

Gephardt Attacked The High Cost Of Kerry's Health Care Plan Gephardt: Kerry Health Care Plan "Doesn’t Add Up." "Kerry’s explanation of how he’ll pay for his [health care] plan doesn’t add up. He’s trying to have it both ways." ("Out Of The Mouth Of Democrats," The Associated Press, 3/5/04) Gephardt: Kerry Won’t Say How He’ll Pay For Health Care Plan. "Gephardt has outlined how he’ll pay for his plan ---- by repealing all the Bush tax cuts. Kerry has not said how he’ll pay for his plan." (Dick Gephardt For President, "Kerry’s False Claims Against Gephardt’s Healthcare Plan," Press Release,...