Elizabeth Edwards: "We’re Interested in Health Care"

Elizabeth Edwards articulated the differences of the health care plans of all three candidates on the Today Show:



Vieira is a horrible interviewer (re Katie Couric), but Elizabeth handled the questions well and pushed back any off-topic questions back to the issue of health care. She also refused to go negative on either candidate and didn't agree with pundits who think Obama and Clinton were trying to take the party down with their disagreements.

While the questioning was a little similar on Morning Joe's show, it seemed a bit more easy going, and I was glad to hear that Elizabeth and John made it crystal that they will vote in their primary, and would let them know if they had any announcements to make about endorsements, but not likely.

Here's a part of the transcript from Think Progress:

BRZEZINSKI: So you’re saying Senator McCain wouldn’t get coverage under his own plan?

EDWARDS: Well, he’s the beneficiary of some great government programs, but in terms of private insurance, he would not be guaranteed coverage under his own plan.

BRZEZINSKI: Oh, OK.

EDWARDS: Neither would I or anybody with a pre-existing condition. Imagine how many families that involves across this country.

BRZEZINSKI: We’ll have to ask him about that, because his campaign actually tells us that he’s the only candidate with serious plans to control health care costs. So we’ll (inaudible) at him tomorrow.

SCARBOROUGH: Yes, he suggests, Elizabeth, that it’s costs that matter the most and he’s the only one that’s addressing those costs. What would you say to that?

EDWARDS: Well, first of all, he’s not the only one addressing it. In fact, every candidate is addressing it. But his particular plan to address it keeps the costs low by avoiding coverage of — by cutting benefits to people.

We’ll end up having these bare bones policies with high deductibles and lots of exclusions, including a really important exclusion in real people’s lives for pre-existing conditions.

And it’s really truly important that we make certain that our health care coverage provides the health care we need. We don’t care about having a piece of paper. We care about having our costs be something that we can afford.

A high deductible cost policy or — which is one of the ways in which he keeps health care costs down — or one that limits our benefits is not the way Americans want to see us go. We need actual coverage.

We’re not interested in health care insurance. We’re interested in health care. And there’s a real difference between the two. Maybe he keeps the price of the insurance down but not the cost of the health care itself.

Elizabeth continues to do the heavy lifting the other candidates won't do.

Oh, one tidbit of news about Elizabeth Edwards: she has accepted a fellowship at the Harvard Institute of Politics. Read about it at the Harvard Crimson. She's addressing the public at the KSG a week from today.