Fantasy Politics USA

Lance Armstrong and his foundation, LIVESTRONG are sponsoring two Presidential cancer forums. Today was the first one with the Democratic candidates, and on Tuesday at 11 a.m. two of the Republican candidates will meet. Hillary Clinton spoke first today and said that President Bush has waged a war on science, so Clinton proposed we wage a “national war on cancer.” “What really bothers me is that we are on the brink of so many medical breakthroughs right now and instead of pushing forward with the resources and the focus that is needed, the current administration has really called a halt in the war against cancer,” Clinton said. She wants to raise taxes on cigarettes, and stopped just short of asking for a federal ban on smoking in public places. Clinton instead feels smoking bans should be regulated at a state and local level. Clinton called for a nine point plan for fighting cancer, which included health care coverage for everyone. “I intend to do everything I can to sign into law national health care,” Clinton said.
John Edwards was the next candidate to speak, and he favored a national ban on smoking in public places, but he doubts it would be constitutional. He pointed out that cancer is a “big personal issue for our family.” Like Clinton he feels that the foundation for cancer prevention is universal health care. “The foundation for fighting cancer is a truly universal health care system for every man, woman and child,” Edwards said. He said the difference between him and Clinton is that she allows the special interest to join in. “If you give drug companies a seat at the table, I think they’ll eat all the food,” Edwards said. Instead, “they have to be beat.” “We have to confront (the special interests) head on and fight them,” he said. He announced his National Strategy for Cancer Survivorship
Dennis Kucinich said he wanted to fashion a “compassionate health care system which truly meets the needs of all of the American people.” He also pushed for Medicare for all, and the end of private health care insurance. He says insurance companies make money by not providing health care. Kucinich says the current system is “only about the health of the insurance companies. This system is wrong. This system must change. I’m the person to do it.”
Bill Richardson wanted a surge in the war on cancer instead of a surge in the war in Iraq. The nation spends $6 billion a year on cancer research, Richardson said. “That’s about two weeks in Iraq. That’s pathetic,” he said. Richardson said he would name Armstrong his cancer czar, but Armstrong said he has retired. Richardson also said we all should get the same level of coverage as the President does.
Notably absent from the forum was Barack Obama who was spending personal time with his family today. According to David Plouffe, Obama’s campaign manager, Obama has chosen to limit his appearances at these forums. “So far, Barack has attended seven Democratic debates and 19 candidate forums,” David Plouffe said. “There are five remaining sanctioned DNC debates, which we are committed to attend and two Iowa debates normally held in January, which are being held in December, which we are also committed to attend.” If campaigning is so hard on his schedule, then what in the hell does he think the White House will be like? Talking to the people should be the number one thing on Obama’s mind right now, not personal time with his family. He is running for one of the most powerful positions in the world.
Lance Armstrong later commented on the no shows saying, “We obviously think a disease that kills 600,000 Americans a year deserves having all of the frontrunners here.” The GOP has only two candidates signed on for the forum on Tuesday so far, Mike Huckabee and Sam Brownback. “It’s a disappointment,” Armstrong continued, “that two cancer survivors on the Republican side are not coming. Mayor Giuliani and Senator McCain are both cancer survivors. As a fellow survivor and as somebody that wants to represent this community and wants to see change happen, that’s disappointing.”
Alan Cosgrove

It has been almost two years since Hurricane Katrina, and all the politicians are planning trips to New Orleans to celebrate the progress or lack of it. Even President Bush is planing a trip down to the Big Easy. After ignoring the area for the last two years and only offering promises, I would have thought Vermont would have looked more attractive to President Bush. Barack Obama made his visit to New Orleans today. “The words never again cannot be another empty phrase,” Obama said on a tour of the city’s Gentilly Woods section. “It cannot become another broken promise.” Obama said the nation failed New Orleans long before Hurricane Katrina. “Racial discord, poverty, the old divisions of black and white, rich and poor, it’s time to leave that to yesterday,” he said. “In rebuilding, we’ve got an opportunity to do more than put up a foundation that for too long failed the people of New Orleans,” Obama told a group at a church. “In rebuilding, we’ve got an opportunity to build something better, a foundation that can put up with a lot, upon which the children of New Orleans can build their dreams.” Progress in New Orleans has been slow at best, and mired in a bureaucratic mess, and Obama heard plenty of horror stories from residents during his brief visit. Obama was critical of Bush’s lack of urgency in rebuilding New Orleans. Obama tried to reassure the crowd saying, “I can promise you this; I will be a president who wakes up every morning and goes to bed every night with the future of this city on my mind.” I would hope he would think about the whole country, because New Orleans is just a drop in the bucket when it comes to what George W. Bush has screwed up. Obama has offered a plan to help rebuild New Orleans that is similar to the ones offered by other Democratic candidates like Hillary Clinton and John Edwards, who announced his intentions to run from New Orleans.
Alan Cosgrove

Mike Huckabee says that Fred Thompson, who is expected to finally jump into the race later next month, will have a hard time meeting his high expectations. “Let’s just hope Fred decides it’s just too hot this summer to even do this. Maybe he won’t get in,” Huckabee said on Fox News Sunday this morning. “But if he does, I think he’s going to suck a lot of the oxygen out of the room when he first comes in. But I’m not sure I’d want to be in his position where the expectations are simply just sky-high for him to be able to perform,” Huckabee added. Huckabee said it is better to, “be in a position to over perform than to get in and then under perform the expectations. And so far, that’s what we’ve done.” He used his second place finish at the Iowa Straw Poll as an example of this. Referring to Thompson, Huckabee said, “People are expecting him to basically come in and be the fifth head on Mount Rushmore. Whether he can live up to that — I think there’s a real challenge for anybody to live up to that, including if Ronald Reagan were to come back. I’m not sure he could live up to Ronald Reagan’s persona and image at this stage.”
Thompson is really not to worried about his late entrance into the race. Thompson told reporters on Saturday, “We have done within a few months what other people have spent much longer periods of time doing.” He is polling second or third in most polls without even announcing. But when he really has to answer to his policy initiatives, instead of just making glaring generalities, then things might change. Thompson seems to think he is heading in the right direction saying, “We’ve made some changes along the way and are better for it, and I think we are where we need to be right now.” Fred Thompson 08, the lazy man’s campaign. Is he going to make Newt Gingrich do all the work for him, and when does Karl Rove sign on?
Alan Cosgrove

Mitt Romney gave a speech before the Florida Medical Association today and outlined his health care proposal. His health care policy would allow each state to dictate their own type of health care coverage. His campaign is calling it a “federalist approach” to health care. “A one-size-fits-all national health care system is bound to fail. It ignores the sharp difference between states and it relies on Washington bureaucracy to manage,” Romney said. “I don’t want the people who ran the Katrina cleanup to manage our health care system.” This new federal approach differs from his successful universal health care plan that he helped bring about in Massachusetts. Romney wants the government to help each state lower premiums by deregulating their insurance industries, and he says we can save more money by capping malpractice damages and making sure everyone is insured. “The problem of the uninsured is a problem for all Americans,” he said, because the insured ultimately pay for the uninsured now. So instead of giving money to the hospitals to help pay for the uninsured, Romney suggest we use it to help the poor buy affordable insurance on the open market. “No more free rides,” he said. “Everybody pays what they can afford.”
John Edwards wasted no time in bashing Romney’s health care proposal. “Mitt Romney’s cure is worse than the disease,” Edwards said in a statement. “Not surprisingly, he’s unwilling to take on the big insurance and drug companies. As a result, it will make a dysfunctional health care system even worse.” Then Edwards asked, “If universal health care was good enough for Massachusetts, why isn’t it good enough for the rest of the country?”
Here is the powerpoint presentation that Mitt Romney gave today before the Florida Medical Association, and here is a Policy Briefing detailing Romney’s plan to improve the health care system.

Alan Cosgrove